(364e) Optimizing Resilience in the Assessment of the Water-Energy-Food Nexus

At present, satisfying the basic resources needs, such as water, energy and food, represents one of the biggest problems around the world [1]; this due to the mismanagement of resources, as well as the losses caused by the climatic events that have been increasing over the years.

A general methodology for optimizing resilience in the context of the water-energy-food nexus of a region that may face extreme weather conditions due to climate change is proposed. This approach makes it possible to design a scenario that can recover its functionality at a lower cost. In the same way, critical failures that affect productivity in existing systems can be identified and in this way propose alternatives to face them, since it allows identifying those scenarios where some failures may occur that lower the performance of the system and thus be able to make decisions about how to approach the problem before, during or after the design of the system [2].

The addressed problem consists of determining the best configuration of a water-energy-food nexus system, where it is sought to supply the needs of these resources in a particular region that present a lot of variations on their climate conditions, where it seeks to meet the needs to improve the sustainable development, reduce hunger and the management and availability of resources. To address this problem, a systematic methodology to assess the resilience in process engineering systems is considered [3].

A case study from the northwest of Mexico was used to show the applicability of the proposed methodology. A multi-objective non-linear optimization model was formulated and different scenarios were coded and solved, where the total profit and the individual profit for each of the considered sectors were maximized, and the emissions of CO2 were minimized. There are certain areas in Mexico, in which the availability of these resources is affected by different disturbances, mainly the climatic conditions are one of them. Therefore, carrying out this analysis allows identifying those areas that are most susceptible, as well as at what time of the year and by which weather phenomenon they may be affected at present.

References

[1] Deng, HM, Wang, C, Cai, WJ, Liu, Y, Zhang, LX. (2020). Managing the water energy-food nexus in China by adjusting critical final demands and supply chains: An input-output analysis. Science of The Total Environment, 720, 137635.

[2] Moslehi, S, Reddy, TA. (2018). Sustainability of integrated energy systems: A performance-based resilience assessment methodology. Applied Energy, 228, 487-498.

[3] Núñez-López, J. M., Rubio-Castro, E., & Ponce-Ortega, J. M. (2022). Optimizing resilience at water-energy-food nexus. Computers & Chemical Engineering, 160, 107710.