Development of a decision scaling framework for drought vulnerability assessment of dam operation under climate change

Water supply is continuously suffering from frequent droughts under climate change, and such extreme events are expected to become more frequent due to climate change. In this study, the decision scaling method was introduced to evaluate the drought vulnerability under future climate change in a wider range. As a result, the water supply reliability of the Boryeong Dam ranged from 95.80% to 98.13% to the condition of the aqueduct which was constructed at the Boryeong Dam. Furthermore, the Boryeong Dam was discovered to be vulnerable under climate change scenarios. Hence, genetic algorithm-based hedging rules were developed to evaluate the reduction effect of drought vulnerability. Moreover, three demand scenarios (high, standard, and low demand) were also considered to reflect the future socio-economic change in the Boryeong Dam. By analyzing quantitative reliability and the probability of extreme drought occurrence under 5% of the water storage rate, all hedging rules demonstrated that they were superior in preparing for extreme drought under low-demand scenarios.