Download Climate change adaptation

Climate change adaptation
Program summary
Climate change poses potential risks and
opportunities to Sydney Water, due to changes
in the frequency, distribution, intensity and
duration of climate-related events. Though
Sydney Water is well positioned to deal
with climate change, the Climate Change
Adaptation Program will build on our existing
business capability and systems to quantify
the risks and improve staff understanding of
climate change impacts.
Climate change challenge
Sydney Water provides sustainable water and wastewater
services to over four million people. We have extensive
experience managing climatic and weather-related
extreme events through an adaptive management
approach, embedded in corporate planning and risk
management protocols.
Climate change can alter the frequency, intensity,
duration and distribution of climate-related hazards,
such as bushfires, storms, flooding, hail, wind and heat
waves. These changes pose a wide range of potential
risks that could damage Sydney Water’s assets and affect
operational and maintenance requirements.
The challenge is to adapt to climate change as part of
ongoing management of existing infrastructure, and
improved decision making for new infrastructure.
Sydney Water uses a range of processes, decision logics
and tools to achieve least-cost performance and servicing
standards. Climate change will challenge our current
processes. Sydney Water must consider the trade-off
between investing in adaptation measures during the
planning/construction stage or adapting progressively
during refurbishment and renewal of infrastructure.
Ultimately, we will need to combine these approaches to
effectively adapt to climate change over time.
What are the impacts?
Climate change poses a variety of risks to Sydney Water including:
• potential reduction in fresh water supplies
• changes to customer demand for water
• increased risk of pipe corrosion and odours
• more extreme storms that test the capacity of sewage
treatment plants and networks
• increased sea levels and storm surges posing a flood risk to
low lying coastal assets and remote assets
• more extreme hot days and intense bushfires that could
pose a threat to worker safety
• changes in soil conditions leading to greater risk of pipe failure
• disruption to electricity supplies due to increased extreme
storms and heatwaves.
Photo: Matt Lauder, ©Department of Environment, Climate Change and Water NSW
Adapting to climate change
Sydney Water completed a qualitative risk assessment of the impacts
of climate change on its infrastructure, maintenance and operations
in December 2008. By identifying and evaluating high level climaterelated impacts, the risk assessment helped engage the organisation,
highlighting Sydney Water’s priorities and informing the development of
Sydney Water’s Climate Change Adaptation Program.
Outcomes so far
Sydney Water’s qualitative risk assessment identified and evaluated
63 climate change risks to Sydney Water operations and infrastructure.
Almost 60% of these risks were assessed to be high priority and in
need of further investigation. These high priority risks included rising
sea levels and inundation of low-lying assets, plus increased intensity
and frequency of bushfires and extreme weather events.
Activities that have informed the development of Sydney Water’s climate change approach
Internal engagement
climate change state
of science workshops
Supply/
Demand
Sydney Water’s
Climate Change
Strategy released
Completed the climate
change qualitative risk
assessment
Mitigation
2008
Adaptation
2009
Climate change
included in Sydney
Water’s Strategic
Corporate Risk
Framework
Sydney Water
Climate Change
Adaptation Program
funding approved
2010
Involvement in NSW
Senior Officers Climate
Change Adaptation
Group
Exploring future
directions in NSW
infrastructure
Today
Program
roll-out
Where to now?
Sydney Water’s Climate Change Adaptation Program will focus on
how climate change may affect our:
Infrastructure
Including $39 billion of physical assets, structures,
plant, equipment and facilities such as water,
wastewater and recycled water mains, stormwater
channels, pumping stations, reservoirs, treatment
plants, buildings and communication networks.
Operations
Covering our business processes, protocols and staff
involved in the delivery of water and wastewater,
information technology, customer-related billing and
communications services.
Maintenance
Including inspecting, maintaining and repairing
Sydney Water’s infrastructure to ensure operational
performance and reliability. Four broad maintenance
types will be considered including preventative,
corrective, major periodic and breakdown maintenance.
Customers
Including both existing and future residential,
commercial and industrial consumers of Sydney
Water services.
The program involves three key themes to address our exposure
and response to climate change impacts
Theme 1 Vulnerability
Impacts of
climate change
Ability to respond
and recover
Portfolio of adaption
& planning responses
This theme focuses on understanding how various, plausible climate change scenarios could affect
Sydney Water. This includes:
• translating the science into useable scenarios, developed with internal and external stakeholders and
technical experts.
• mapping Sydney Water’s exposure to climate change hazards using the best available expertise. Sydney
Water is working with the Federal Government’s Critical Infrastructure Protection Modelling and Analysis
(CIPMA) Program to map exposure to particular climate change risks.
• assessing the impacts at a more detailed level, by location and asset, operation and customer types, to
determine our vulnerability. The work being carried out under CIPMA will help inform this assessment.
Program benefits and outcomes
By planning for climate change adaptation now Sydney Water will reduce the potential financial,
operational and reputational impact of climate change. The Sydney Water Climate Change Adaptation
Program will build on our existing business capability and systems to quantify the risks and opportunities
and improve staff understanding of the impacts of climate change. It will cost, prioritise and deliver options
to inform future capital and operational investment.
Outcomes of the multiple projects led by Sydney Water under the three key program themes: Vulnerability,
Resilience and Adaptation will contribute to our capability to understand, plan, respond and adapt to
climate change.
Theme 2 Resilience
Impacts of
climate change
Ability to respond
and recover
Portfolio of adaption
& planning responses
This theme will look at Sydney Water’s existing resilience to natural hazards and system failures, to establish
a baseline and therefore identify gaps that need adaptation responses. This includes:
• collating our learnings and quantifying the impacts of past natural events and system failures, such as
storms, bushfires, floods, king tides and power outages.
• assessing the inter-dependency of Sydney Water’s infrastructure with our bulk water, key energy and
telecommunication suppliers.
Path to adaptation
The project flow chart shows the timing, linkages and interaction.
2009-10
2010-11
2011-12
2012-13
Mapping our cIimate change hazard exposure
Collating learnings from past natural events
Translating science into useable scenarios
Inter-dependency energy, communications and bulk water
Detailed assessment and quantification of
impacts testing various scenarios
Adaptive risk management framework
Multiple complex long term risks, trigger points, risk tolerance levels
Risk quantification
Detailed assessment by infrastructure, operation and customer type
Adaptation responses
Response plans
Theme 3 Adaptation
Impacts of
climate change
Ability to respond
and recover
Portfolio of adaption
& planning responses
This theme focuses on embedding climate change adaptation into existing business practices and processes,
including budget cycles, risk management, and monitoring/review processes. This includes:
• developing a flexible, scalable and responsive adaptation management framework with the capability
to compare the impact of climate change and adaptation measures on cost, asset life, risk likelihood and
consequence.
• producing prioritised adaptation responses supported by cost-benefit analysis and multi-criteria
assessment for infrastructure, maintenance, operations and customer servicing.
Sydney Water is adapting to climate change by
reducing it’s reliance on electricity by introducing
11 gas cogeneration and hydroelectric facilities
Working together
Collaboration is essential to the success of climate change
adaptation. Sydney Water is working with numerous
stakeholders to ensure the program is well informed, aligned
with the latest science and policy directions and aims to achieve
a collective approach to addressing these risks. Sydney Water is
actively working with leaders in climate change adaptation, risk
management and infrastructure services. The broad range of
program stakeholders includes all levels of government, national
and international research facilities, other utilities, the insurance
industry, our suppliers (electricity, telecommunications, bulk
water) and the community.
Fay Briggs, ©Department of Environment, Climate Change and Water NSW
To know more
Web sydneywater.com.au
Enquiries 13 20 92
Postal address
Sydney Water
PO Box 399
Parramatta NSW 2124
SW64 08/10
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