The Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta is experiencing continual and often rapid change, making it challenging to predict and prepare for the future. Traditional data and models are no longer adequate to foresee future conditions, and this uncertainty cannot be resolved by simply gathering more data. Decision-making becomes complex when stakeholders hold differing views on the consequences of actions. New methods for anticipating future conditions and making decisions are necessary to manage the Delta effectively.
The Delta Independent Science Board is reviewing the “Decision Making Under Deep Uncertainty” approach, which is interdisciplinary and provides decision-makers with innovative tools and processes. These tools help them make better-informed decisions despite the challenges they face. Previous seminars have covered an introduction to deep uncertainty, tools for decision-making under uncertainty, cognitive biases, and participatory planning.
The final webinar in the series focused on dynamic adaptive planning and how it might be applied to management issues in the Delta, with speakers giving examples of how this approach has been used around the globe.
The speakers:
- Dr. Marjolijn Haasnoot is an environmental scientist at Deltares, Utrecht University, specializing in water management, climate adaptation, integrated assessment modeling, and decision-making under deep uncertainty. She developed the Dynamic Adaptive Policy Pathways (DAPP) method to support decision-making under uncertain change. Her recent work focuses on adaptation to sea level rise in deltas and monitoring for signal detection to implement or adjust adaptive plans.
- Dr. Andrew Warren is an expert in climate resilience, adaptation, and integrated planning at Deltares, Utrecht University, with over 15 years of experience in the water sector. Andrew primarily develops and applies Decision-Making under Deep Uncertainty methodologies to incorporate long-term uncertainties into strategic planning processes across diverse problem domains, including water supply and sanitation, water resources management, flood risk management, and urban water management. Currently, his work focuses on collaborating with water utilities to develop climate resilience and adaptation plans for long-term sustainable service delivery.
Dr. Haasnoot began by introducing the Dynamic Adaptive Policy Pathways approach. In the Netherlands and globally, people feel like they are facing a new climate reality. The IPCC has said that climate change is already affecting people and nature and will not lessen. Adaptation can reduce impact, but the progress is uneven, largely incremental, and not happening fast enough.
“There are mechanisms in our climate system with a low probability and a high impact – for example, the ice sheet loss from Antarctica, which could result in a very rapid sea level rise,” said Dr. Haasnoot. “This is of high concern for many coastal areas and deltas. In addition, there are certainties from things we know will happen – some impacts are already committed. However, there are also many uncertainties, particularly the rate and magnitude of change. This depends largely on global warming itself and the extent to which we mitigate climate change.”
The main idea of the Dynamic Adaptive Policy Pathways approach is to break climate adaptation into manageable steps over time, linking the long-term to the short-term so that every decision taken is a meaningful step towards the long-term. This starts the adaptation process, but it can be adjusted depending on how the future unfolds. This approach also works to avoid maladaptation, which occurs when the action is ineffective, results in larger emissions, or results in a lock-in situation.
The graphic illustrates the idea of a road map with the different routes that can be taken and the points at which you can switch to different routes. Over time, there might be more opportunities, or you may have taken the wrong path, which could result in a lock-in situation. The paths determine the available options and the pathways considered. So, this approach is used to deal with large amounts of uncertainty.
The graphic on the left of the slide shows the possible sequences of decisions to achieve the objective, and underneath are three axes: changing conditions, such as sea level rise, river flows, precipitation, or temperature, and then different time horizons, which indicate the timing depending on a particular scenario. On the right is a scorecard, which helps to evaluate the pathways and the decisions.
Dr. Haasnoot then explained how to read the map. “In the current situation, at some point, the current measures may not be sufficient anymore because, for example, risk increases with climate change. So here you see four different options. In this case, it was about navigating the river under climate change using ships. With increasing climate change, the river inflow may be reduced due to drought. So then we could shift to medium-sized ships that we can navigate even during low flows. Dredging can be small-scale, so you can choose the small ships; they are good for the next 100 years, or with large-scale dredging, we can start using the medium-sized ships, but then at some point, this is also not sufficient … So it’s knowing what the options are and also when to start switching.”
This approach is useful:
- When there are decisions to be made that have a very long lifespan and a larger societal impact,
- When there is a large sensitivity to uncertain changes or deep uncertainty,
- When there is the risk of path dependency, meaning that the decision that you make now influences the decisions that you can make in the future, or at least the effectiveness of those decisions, and
- When there are high costs involved or potentially irreversible impacts for people living in an area or for nature.
“So, in short, this is used when there is the potential of regret,” said Dr. Haasnoot. “It’s not like the silver bullet for everything. It’s typically an approach when there’s this large uncertainty and long-term impact.”
This approach is similar to a policy analysis, which is a systematic approach that starts with identifying the present and future risks, the uncertainties, and the long-term adaptation needs. The entire solution space is mapped, including the options and the thresholds of each option. Sometimes, adaptation tipping points are used, which are the conditions under which this measure is no longer effective or insufficient and objectives are not being reached. There can also be opportunities for new or additional actions.
“Based on this exploration of pathways, we can identify our near-term actions, which are low regrets and very robust, and what our long-term options are,” said Dr. Haasnoot. “Then we typically start implementing the lower grid actions, and we have the long-term options, which are implemented depending on how the future unfolds. The monitoring informs the implementation of follow up actions and sometimes identifies that we need to reassess the plan. So that’s why we have the circle.”
This approach has been used for more than ten years and has been applied in many regions worldwide, so they are now assessing the scientific literature and experiences in practice.
They analyzed up to 300 papers and 230 case studies that utilized the pathways approach. They found it has been applied in different policy domains, typically water, transport, natural resources management, and agriculture. The graphic shows the regions worldwide that have utilized the approach; the size of the box indicates the amount of studies.
“There are a lot of case studies in Australia, the US, New Zealand, the UK, the Netherlands, Indonesia, Bangladesh and Vietnam,” said Dr. Haasnoot. “We also found by looking at all these papers and where it has been applied that it is now starting to move from theory to practice. It has been incorporated in several guidance documents; we found 20 guidance documents around the world. And about 70% has a case study of which about 40% were classified as real-world really informing policy and stakeholder involvement.”
There have been different approaches to developing pathways. Some approaches utilized qualitative assessments with storylines and model-based assessment; some approaches detailed adaptation thresholds while others just sequenced adaptation methods; and some developed a future vision and then backcast the sequences of measures to get there.
Dr. Warren then discussed applications of the pathways approach they have completed and the lessons learned. The best approach is to use a phased approach that goes through multiple iterations, gradually increasing the level of analysis in each iteration.
The first step is to introduce the pathways approach: Why do we undertake pathways planning? What are the potential challenges we will face in the future? How can we respond to those challenges? There are various ways that can be done – through webinars, workshops, and other means of communication.
They have developed a game called “Sustainable Delta,” which gives people an experience of planning under uncertainty. “It’s a nice primer to get people on board with why we want to start planning and incorporate pathways principles into our plans,” said Dr. Warren. “From there, it’s setting up a common knowledge base or set of experiences that you can then start to talk about real-world problems.”
Initially, a qualitative analysis is developed that frames the problem, sets objectives, looks at uncertainties, considers options and opportunities available to address risks, and roughly sequences the steps, looking at dependencies that can be identified between the various options.
“The whole purpose of this initial stage is to scope the analysis for the next stage,” said Dr. Warren. “So it helps to throw out some things that you already know aren’t going to be feasible or attractive to your stakeholders. It helps to provide a boundary condition and scoping for the later more quantitative assessment.”
The second level brings in additional quantitative information from reports or previous studies, including building models and calculating tipping points. At this point, the pathway drawing starts to get more detail and look more like a map.
The next level could include a full assessment of pathways, with multiple pathways modeled on multiple scenarios. However, Dr. Warren noted that this is only undertaken if needed to further the decision-making process.
“So by phasing the approach in this way, what we’re trying to do is to avoid decision paralysis within an institution, so an institution can take a decision, get the information that they need to progress that decision and progress that plan,” said Dr. Warren. “If a level one analysis is sufficient for that, perfect. If level two is needed, then do that. And if level three is warranted, only then go to that level. Often, that level three type of analysis requires specialized modeling tools and alternative decision-making under deep uncertainty methods such as robust decision-making and so forth. These are more resource intensive, requiring specialized models and so forth.”
Dr. Warren then discussed now the dynamic pathways approach has been used in various contexts around the globe.
MIAMI FLOOD RISK STUDY
The Miami study was a flood risk management study for the C7 basin that looked at how to deal with increasing sea levels and the available strategies. The phasing process started with a conversation with stakeholders around the table with maps, thinking about potential options, risks, and vulnerabilities, looking at where existing flood impacts are experienced, and hypothesizing what that might look like under future sea level rise scenarios. The output from the workshop was the pencil drawing shown on the slide.
That process provided some boundary conditions and constraints on what was to be analyzed. A modeling analysis calculated the tipping points for various options according to expected annual damages. From that analysis, the pathways map emerges, as shown on the slide.
“So these are the modeling outputs, putting some quantitative detail to those initial more causative narrative-driven pathways,” said Dr. Warren. “We see several options in the graph; some of them performed better than others. For example, in the top line with no additional measures, we see that we’ve already reached our threshold, which is the dashed line. As the sea level rises in the future, the damages are expected to increase. With two sets of measures implemented, local flood mitigation or elevating the ground, we see they have the effect of reducing or delaying the incidence of those tipping points by several decades, in some instances.”
“However, the earlier measures do buy you time. That allows you time to work out how much I think the sea level will rise? If I have to switch to land use measure, should I switch to a six-foot, seven-foot, or eight-foot elevation? It gives you more time to work out how to make that bigger decision in a more informed manner and with improved data.”
NEW ZEALAND
New Zealand has been working for more than a decade to mainstream pathways thinking into a national climate adaptation strategy building.
The Sustainable Delta game was used to raise awareness among municipal and higher government stakeholders. Pilot studies were undertaken, one being the flood risk management study, which looked at how the pathways approach could inform the thinking to maintain a flood protection level for that community. The work has continued over the years since then, and now the dynamic adaptive pathways approach is included in the national guidance for municipalities on coastal adaptation.
“It’s a process, and it takes a long time to get this buy-in at all levels of government,” said Dr. Warren. “As long as a change agent is initially there that agrees groundwork can be done, the awareness raising can be done. Then you can really start to deliver some impact.”
AUSTRALIA
The original pathways approach focused on a single sector and developing an adaptive plan to deal with a single challenge. However, an Australian utility with multiple objectives of water supply, wastewater, and environmental quality, among others scaled up the pathways approach to look at their entire system in an integrated fashion.
“Essentially, what we said was to look at each of your core objectives in isolation and develop adaptation pathways for each of those issues,” said Dr. Warren. “Then try to look for the interdependencies, the synergies, and any conflicts that may emerge and synthesize them into a single integrated plan. This thinking is currently being echoed in some of our European projects when we’re looking at multi-risk and multi-hazard situations.”
The slide above shows one of the utility’s first pathways applications, looking at how to adapt their biosolids management strategy. “What was interesting about this is that when we started working on this case, we thought that the main issue we were going to deal with was increasing sludge volumes, such that we wouldn’t have sufficient facilities to manage them. But what actually emerged from the Level One type of analysis, just sitting around talking about the challenges, was that the issue was not about sludge volumes; the issue was about regulations.”
Currently, in Australia, a lot of biosolids sludge is applied to land, and the primary concern of the utility is if the regulations should change such that sludge can no longer be applied to land due to reasons such as PFAS or other environmental risks. What would they do with it?
“So they started looking at the different options,” said Dr. Warren. “They had centralized versus decentralized options, advanced treatments, novel treatments, incineration – all of them are on the table. And this was essentially the first pathways map that they were able to develop. What is on the slide are the preferred pathways. Several other pathways have been grayed out or pushed to the background as those were deemed less preferred in a multicriteria analysis.”
“What the utility did from these pathways map was leverage that into a complete roadmap for the coming five to ten years, where they identified the key decision points where they would need to make a call as to whether or not that we’re going to choose a decentralized strategy or a centralized strategy, and of which technologies or further studies they would invest in.”
PHILIPPINES
The city of Cebu in the Philippines is undergoing water stress, and a previous study indicated that the water gap would be significant under future climate change scenarios. The city needed to identify some alternative sources to meet demand.
Various options were available, including building new dams, upgrading weirs, or drilling new groundwater wells. So, while working to develop a pathways map, they soon realized that all the options on the table were needed to serve as the demand projections they were facing. Many options were needed, even in a low climate change scenario by 2040 time horizon. However, if climate change exceeded those expectations and tended more toward the high scenario, all options could be needed before the end of the decade.
“What’s important is that the pathways thinking demonstrated that the authority needed to identify different options, which they found out early, which is one of the benefits of the approach. By taking a longer-term perspective, they can identify whether or not there are already limits to the catalog of options they had available to them.”
“The sequencing of the options didn’t need to follow according to lock-ins or dependencies or these sorts of things because they were all needed. But rather could follow something a little bit more simple: based on cost effectiveness, choose the measure that would give you the biggest bang for your buck first. And then follow on from that.”
NETHERLANDS
The final example is from the Netherlands. The country is low-lying and quite vulnerable to flooding. The government wants to anticipate climate change, particularly sea level rise, increasing river inflows, and droughts so they used the adaptation pathways approach as part of their adaptive delta management. The program has governance and institutional aspects, such as long-term funding and a Delta Commissioner who leads the program. Based on the exploration of different impacts and different strategies, they have developed an adaptive plan called Delta Decisions.
The analysis explored different pathways for different regions in the Netherlands for adapting to floods and droughts. The plan has maps with varying timelines for various scenarios, and other sequences of action. The boxes show the short-term, mid-term, and long-term measures.
“What is special I think about this pathways map is it’s a sequence and it shows the measures for different actors,” said Dr. Haasnoot. “For the regional, they show only one pathway. Ideally, there are multiple pathways behind this, but then also to shift in case the future turns out differently or to accelerate if it goes faster. So that’s still a bit of a challenge, I think. But they decided to keep the pathway map and the adaptive plan simple and to show mostly the preferred adaptation path.”
There is a ‘signal group,’ which is a group of experts that look for signals of the pace of climate change and any new insights that require changes to the adaptive plan or additional adaptation levels. An assessment is performed each year, and a full reassessment of the plan is required every sixth year.
An example of deep uncertainty is accelerated sea level rise and the potential large contribution from Antarctica. They used adaptation tipping points or thresholds to look at key elements, such as the effectiveness of storm surge barriers, the pumping of rivers to the sea, and the amount of sand needed to maintain the dunes.
These measures would have significant impacts, so four strategies were developed, as illustrated on the slide. “We now have a protected open strategy with an open connection between the rivers and the sea,” said Dr. Haasnoot. “But with increasing sea levels, our levees along the river would need to be much, much larger. An option could be to close off the river, but then we would need to pump out rivers, the Netherlands would be safe, and we would all be behind our barriers. … We could make a new coastline, which has a benefit as it would create a new area. There will be space for storing the rivers in case of high river discharge, but we would still need to pump out the rivers and a huge amount of sand to make a new coastline there. The fourth strategy is to live more with water and accommodate and like floating houses or buildings on stilts, but at some point, give more space to water and relocate in some areas.”
The strategies are currently being explored by the government. This graphic shows a backcasting-forecasting approach. “We looked at the pivotal decisions … each branch and circle describes a reason to further adapt. And this can be adaptation measures like typical water management measures and opportunities like spatial development in the coastal zone.”
IN CONCLUSION:
The dynamic adaptive pathways approach supports decision-making under uncertainty. If implemented well, it can help to increase the solution space and avoid maladaptation. There are many approaches, as it can be tailored to different situations.
QUESTIONS & ANSWERS
DR. THOMAS HOLZER: My question has to do with the time axis. I noticed in the Philippines study that you use two different time bars. It would seem to me another way of doing that would be to treat it as a variable. The uncertainty of a pathway may be a lot larger than the uncertainty of the time bar on it. Did you try to treat time statistically? It would give you a better sense of urgency because you’d have a probability to go with it.
DR. MARJOLIJN HAASNOOT: “We didn’t put probabilities on the time axis because that would also mean that we put probabilities on the scenarios. But we did explore a huge amount of time series, and then make box whisker plots for the timing of when a new measure would be needed. In some situations, that would be a very narrow time window; in others, that would be broader. So the signals are very important to know when to further adapt.”
DR. THOMAS HOLZER: Where did the uncertainty come from in the box whisker plots? Was it from the scenario or that time axis?
DR. MARJOLIJN HAASNOOT: “In some cases, it was the scenarios, but also from the conditions, if you would include more uncertainties. For example, we also looked at different values. Different people have different risk acceptance; maybe some persons would like to adapt earlier, so that would be an earlier reason to adapt, while others have a higher risk acceptance.”
DR. TANYA HEIKKILA: How do you determine which pathways could put you at risk for path dependency? How do you overcome some of the cognitive biases that we have in being able to see things like path dependency?
DR. ANDREW WARREN: In dealing with path dependencies, part of the thinking behind the metro map was that looking far enough in advance and looking at the adaptation possibilities would highlight whether or not you’re attending towards part dependency. So, part of it is taking that long-term view.
However, overcoming cognitive biases is trickier. Ultimately, we are reliant upon stakeholder value and stakeholder perceptions. Some data informs these processes, and perhaps that serves to shift some of these biases in some way. But, I’ve also been involved in many processes or projects where I’ve been asked to develop a pathways map, and they want the map to end with this solution, which, to me, flies in the face of the whole approach. So what the pathways thinking can do is tend to open up the solutions base or stakeholder’s thinking in terms of what may be possible.”
What we’ve tried to start thinking about is how to actually motivate your stakeholders to think transformational because one of the aspects of the approach is it can break some of the parts-dependent thinking because if you believe the incremental adaptation that we’re currently undertaking is not going to serve us for the long term, we’re going to have to transform the way we operate. What does that mean? … the less skin in the game the people themselves have like, the more objective they can be about those sorts of discussions. That’s one way to try and overcome these biases. But they’re present for sure.”
DR. MARJOLIJN HAASNOOT: In one study we did with the World Bank and the Dutch government, we looked at transfer costs. The pathway is still possible in some situations, but the total costs are much larger because you have to shift to some action. So it’s not like a fixed location, but it does introduce many more costs, not only financially, but also for society or nature. So we just objectively showed the two time horizons and different pathways and looked at the costs and benefits to illustrate this.”
CHAIR LISA WAINGER: What are some of the performance measures that are most important?
DR. ANDREW WARREN:“It’s context-specific. Generally, if we’re dealing with risk, it depends on the level of the magnitude. If the magnitude of the impact is truly great, that actually does lead. What we’re finding now with some of these pathways studies is we’re dealing with these low probability, high impact events and an uncertain future. And that’s really tricky for a decision-maker. It’s not that the pathways approach will provide the answer to which decision you should make. Rather, it helps to inform the other potential dangers you have on the horizon and look at the options available. But the hard decision remains with the decision maker. To your question regarding proposed metrics, sometimes its impact but the cost is very much a leading one.”
CHAT QUESTION: When developing pathway maps with members of the public, what concepts are most difficult to convey?
“The concept I’ve found people struggle most with is the tipping point concept. For a problem domain, such as flood risk management, it’s perfect. It works well when you’re talking about a water level. And everyone thinks about a bathtub, the bathtub fills up, and then it overflows, so you have a very clear tipping point. But when dealing with other prominent contexts, that tipping point concept starts to be a bit more abstract in some ways.
Even how we draw the pathways maps can be confusing because it’s not about an increasing water level, for example, but rather, it’s about decreasing water availability. It can translate, but it often requires a little bit of mental gymnastics from stakeholders. So that’s one that I’ve found that that stakeholders do struggle with.”
DR. MARJOLIJN HAASNOOT: “I agree … It’s not really a tipping point; it’s like an objective that is not reached. So that’s why we sometimes use this word threshold or say, there is a reason to further adapt. … If that is difficult, we start to sequence what to do first; what could you do next? If that’s not good, what would you do next? Without saying what is not a good answer … sometimes it’s useful to really discuss this objective and reason to further adapt and the adaptation tipping point because it also makes it clear that there’s an objective norm. So, depending on the situation, it can be useful to talk about it. And sometimes it’s better to continue and talk about sequences.”
DR. ANDREW WARREN: “What we just presented was the approach. It would be very easy for you to go home and think well, I need to do step one, step two, and step three in a very dogmatic way. But, the way we implement the approach is much more flexible. We take what works but given the context. Sometimes, the adaptation tipping point concept works and is useful, so we use it; sometimes, it’s less useful, so we don’t highlight it so strongly. Other times, with other problems, you’re dealing with opportunities, and that may be leading the decision-making and opening up the solution space. So something might become a possible option in 20 years. And you want to know that’s in your toolbox … it’s the flexibility of the approach.
DR. INGE WERNER: I was very impressed with the Netherlands’ example of approaching sea level rise. One reason why I was impressed is that you really included water conservation in their measures and included stakeholders; even accepting shortages was in there. But my question is also cost-related. I was looking at the four adaptation plans where you showed adapting the coastline in various ways. The last one was accommodate and retreat. In terms of cost, adapting the coastline, changing the rivers, putting in pumps, and hauling huge amounts of sand, wouldn’t it be better to work towards a worst-case scenario and try to work towards that accommodate and retreat concept when that, in the end, might be more beneficial and cost-effective?
DR. MARJOLIJN HAASNOOT: “That is part of the debate that we are having. The current plan is up to one meter of sea level rise, and then we can typically continue with what we have with a little bit of raising levees. But for multi-meter sea level rise, we get this transformative decision. So we are in a process where, from these visualizations and key strategies to watch, a more detailed analysis of what it would mean to do the Protect Closed option and pump out the rivers. The pump capacity is huge; it’s about 10 to 20 times more than the largest pump in the world. So that’s huge, but still, in the discussion’s happening now in the Netherlands, some people think we can do that; we just put in 10 of these big pumps, or 20. We are a rich country. Other people say it’s completely against nature. And given the path that we are now on with the emissions, we should prepare for a larger sea level rise. And that includes giving more room for water and starting now. We need to build a lot of homes at the moment. So where are we going to build this? What we are doing is just mapping the solution space and discussing the consequences and the benefits of decisions. We’re continuously looking in more detail at the consequences. There’s no final answer yet.”
DR. JAYANTHA OBEYSEKERA: In the New Zealand study, they found a champion among decision-makers to promote this concept. Do you have any suggestions on how to find that champion?
DR. ANDREW WARREN: So my response to you would be to look in the mirror. And I’m not trying to be flippant here. In Australia, a champion has emerged within this consulting firm within Orekon. He is pushing the industry towards thinking in this way, and he’s finding like-minded individuals, setting up a community of practice, and putting a lot of energy into this.
In New Zealand, it wasn’t so much a decision-maker but a former civil servant. One reason New Zealand has progressed so far in adaptive planning is because of the effort she has been putting in. She had the context within the government to push the right buttons and make things happen faster than, perhaps, my contact in Australia, who’s working within a consulting firm. So things are moving a little bit slower there. But identifying a champion – there is no rulebook to doing this. It’s more about finding the people who want to pick this up and drive this further within their organizations.
DR. ROBERT NAIMAN: The timelines you show in your charts are long, often decades to maybe even a century or so. And yet, the decision-makers, the local voices that come into the discussions, and so on, their tenure is often very short, on the order of just a few years. People retire, go on to other things, get promoted, and so forth. And I was curious how much of an issue you have with high turnover in opinions and ideas? And or maybe you don’t … you are trying to put out scenarios that are long-term. How much of an issue is it with this relatively rapid turnover and people?
DR. MARJOLIJN HAASNOOT: “In many situations, people do see that there are these long term impacts of decisions. For example, if it is about infrastructure, then it’s typically not citizens that make that decision. We do have some discussion about what is a realistic time horizon? Or, how long do you have to look ahead? … In a case study in Sweden and New Zealand, they did a participatory process with people living in the area for longer-term planning. In both cases, they agreed upon potential pathways. But then, in the end, they want everything implemented at once. Because they felt now we have an agreement; now we have the money, let’s implement; no need to stage it. So that was their way of looking at that approach.
DR. ANDREW WARREN: “It comes back to the problem domain, the context in which the plan has been developed. With utilities, their planning time horizon is often 10-20 years. And that’s what they’re interested in. Trying to get them to think about a century in advance is very, very difficult. And you definitely can get some opposition to that.
“So what we do with the stakeholders is to get them to project as far ahead as they feel comfortable initially, which is why phasing is critical. Because these are the discussions that you’re having in that level one type of assessment. What did they feel comfortable with? Then, let’s look at what that looks like. But then you can use those results to push your stakeholders a bit. What if this isn’t enough? What if we take a look further into the future? And again, looking from a water utility perspective, you can very easily get what utility planners are thinking of – their current population and climate change projections- and develop a plan for the next year, 20,25, sometimes out to 50 years.
“But then you can use that to prod them and say, you’re putting in place infrastructure that is going to be here for much, much longer. Don’t you want to ensure that this infrastructure will serve you for that longer period? What if we just stressed the system and looked a little bit further ahead? Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. It really depends on the people in the room. And but it can serve to stimulate an opening up other thinking.”
CHAIR LISA WAINGER: A common issue we hear about exploring this deep uncertainty is that we can’t afford to do this thing that would protect us against the extreme event. Would you sum up what you see as the biggest value of this, given that constraint?
DR. MARJOLIJN HAASNOOT: Yeah, I can see that point. That depends on when this uncertainty may be relevant. With this adaptive process planning, you can still think about what is useful now in terms of preparing, at a minimum. And what are the preparatory actions, not to build everything, but at least to be able to do it when the signals say it will happen. Still, there are trade-offs between how long you are going to wait to start and what’s your risk acceptance. That is different. If I look at the Netherlands, we don’t have enough time to fully adapt. So, if we want to live safely in this low-lying Delta, it is necessary that people can see immediately.
DR. ANDREW WARREN: So you can’t afford to do what you need to do. That’s unfortunate. What are you going to do? Because if this future comes to be, you will have to do something. So, if your solution space is constrained for financial reasons, that’s the reality. But then you still have a solution space. And maybe some of those solutions are uncomfortable. But start those discussions early.”
