The document summarizes research on integrated water management of the Red-Thai Binh river system in Vietnam under changing conditions. The researchers used optimization methods to design reservoir operating policies that balance multiple objectives like hydropower production, flood control, and water supply. Climate change assessments showed vulnerabilities are amplified by operations and depend on uncertain future scenarios. Further research will introduce socio-economic factors and robust optimization to support adaptation strategy design.

1. Integrated and sustainable water management of
Red-Thai Binh rivers system under change
M, Giuliani1, D. Anghileri2, A. Castelletti1,2, E. Mason1, M. Micotti1, R. Soncini-Sessa1, E. Weber1
1. Dept. Electronics, Information, and Bioengineering - Hydroinformatics Lab, Politecnico di Milano
2. Institute of Environmental Engineering, ETH Zurich

2. The Red-Thai Binh rivers system
VIETNAM
CHINA
LAOS
CAMBODIA
THAILAND
Catchment area = 169,000 km2
• 51% in Vietnam
• 48% in China
• 1% in Laos
Hanoi 6.5 million people living in the
metropolitan area, 20 million in the delta
Hanoi

3. Vietnam: a fast developing country
Source: General Statistics Office of Vietnam
1996 1998 2000 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2012
0
20
40
60
80
100
120
140
160
years
GDP(billionUSD)
agriculture
industry
service
1996 1998 2000 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2012
72
74
76
78
80
82
84
86
88
population(millioninhabitants)

4. Three major rivers
HanoiDa River
Thao River
Lo River
Delta
Sontay

5. The Red River basin
HanoiDa River
Thao River
Lo River
Delta
SontayJan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
14
16
18
20
x 10
3flow(m3
/s)
Historical discharge at Sontay

6. Hanoi citySector 1: Flood in Hanoi

7. Sector 2: Delta Water Supply
rice cultivation in the Red River delta

8. Sector 2: Delta Water Supply
rice cultivation in the Red River delta
Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec
0
100
200
300
400
500
600
700
800
900
waterdemand(m
3
/s)
cultivation (58%)
livestocks (<1%)
fishery (29%)
urban supply (2%)
industry (1%)
rural supply (2%)
environment (7%)

9. Sector 3: Hydropower
SonLa reservoir

10. Sector 3: Hydropower
SonLa reservoir
Hanoi
Da River
Thao River
Lo River
1996 1998 2000 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2012
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
45
50
55
years
billionGWh
hydropower (10%)
coal (20%)
natural gas (11%)
oil (23%)
biomass (36%)
National hydropower production
HoaBinh (1995)
10.9 km3 - 1920 MW
TuyenQuang (2008)
2.5 km3 - 342 MW
SonLa (2012)
12.5 km3 - 2400 MW

11. Unexpected negative feedbacks
The massive storage capacity of the upstream reservoirs and sand mining activities
along the river are producing geomorphological alteration downstream.
Inlets of irrigation canalsSand mining
Long Bien Bridge in Hanoi

12. Research question
Hanoi
Delta
SonLa
12.5 km3 - 2400 MW
HoaBinh
10.9 km3 - 1920 MW
TuyenQuang
2.5 km3 - 342 MW
How can we design water management strategies that meet primary needs
while ensuring long-term sustainability?
Flood in Hanoi
Delta Water Supply
Hydropower

13. Methodology
1. Design operating policies over historical conditions
can we understand the tradeoffs and support stakeholders negotiations?
2. Re-evaluate the solutions under a changing climate
how do the policies perform in the medium and long term?
3. Re-evaluate the solutions under different climatic projections
how much uncertainty affects future operation?
4. Identify adaptation strategies

14. 1. Design operating policies over historical conditions
how to manage multiple objectives and promote negotiation to identify compromise
solutions?
how to run the optimization given the complexity of the system (i.e. daily regulation
of 3 reservoirs, 5 states, 117 decision variables)?
Evolutionary Multi-Objective Direct Policy Search (Giuliani et al. 2014)
rt = fθ(It) searching for the best policy in multiple objectives
Giuliani et al. (2014), Curses, tradeoffs, and scalable management: advancing evolutionary
multi-objective direct policy search to improve reservoir operations, JWRPM in review

15. 2. Re-evaluate the solutions under a changing climate
Top-down scenario based impact assessment (Anghileri et al. 2011)
Socio-techno-economic scenarios and associated
emssions
A1B from Special Report on
Emission Scenarios (IPCC 2000)
Models of the main physical processes at the global scale HadCM3 climate model
Models at higher resolution nested within GCMs, adding
regional forcings
PRECIS climate model
Simulation of the hydrology at the river basin scale statistical downscaling + HBV
Impacts on different stakeholders given the current water
management
Historical policies +
Hydropower, Delta supply,
Flooding
Anghileri et al. (2011), A framework for the quantitative assessment of climate change impacts on water-related activities at the basin scale, HESS

16. source: Wilby and Dessai (2010), Robust adaptation to climate change. Weather
3. Re-evaluate the solutions under different climatic projections

17. Non-dominated policy over history
Hydropower
energy deficit
Flood in Hanoi
damages
Delta Water Supply
water deficit
15.37
16,798
59,568
1,100
16.5
The study required ~18,000 computing hours
using parallel computation on the Cornell
University cluster, along with DecisionVis
software for the analysis of the results.Ideal Solution

18. Non-dominated policy over history
Hydropower
energy deficit
Flood in Hanoi
damages
Delta Water Supply
water deficit
15.37
16,798
59,568
1,100
16.5
The study required ~18,000 computing hours
using parallel computation on the Cornell
University cluster, along with DecisionVis
software for the analysis of the results.Ideal Solution

19. The study required ~18,000 computing hours
using parallel computation on the Cornell
University cluster, along with DecisionVis
software for the analysis of the results.
Non-dominated policy over history
Hydropower
energy deficit
Flood in Hanoi
damages
Delta Water Supply
water deficit
15.37
16,798
59,568
1,100
16.5
Ideal Solution
0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3
x 10
4
0
5
10
15
Hydropower
energy deficit
Flood in Hanoi
damages
Delta Water Supply
water deficit
16.5 487
Ideal Solution

20. How the policies perform in the medium and long term?
Hydropower
energy deficit
Flood in Hanoi
damages
Delta Water Supply
water deficit
15.37
16,798
59,568
1,100
16.5
1990-2010
Ideal Solution

21. How the policies perform in the medium and long term?
1990-2010
Hydropower
energy deficit
Flood in Hanoi
damages
Delta Water Supply
water deficit
15.37
16,798
59,568
1,100
16.5
2040-2060
Ideal Solution

22. How the policies perform in the medium and long term?
1990-2010 2040-2060
Hydropower
energy deficit
Flood in Hanoi
damages
Delta Water Supply
water deficit
15.37
16,798
59,568
1,100
16.5
2080-2100
Future is not
stationary
Ideal Solution

23. Reservoir operation amplifies climate change impacts
Hydropower
energy deficit
Flood in Hanoi
damages
Delta Water Supply
water deficit
15.37
16,798
59,568
1,100
16.5
Median
1990-2010
2080-2100
difference
Flow Hydropower Flood in Hanoi Delta Water Supply
866 2.36 11,909 143.2
917 3.45 43,769 251.4
5% 45% 75% 267%
0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0
0
5
10
15
20
25
x 10
3
probability of exceedence
flow(m
3
/s)
1990-2010
2080-2100
Flow duration curve of Da River
Ideal Solution

24. Perturbed physics ensembles
5 different parameterization
of the same GCM

25. 32
16,798
245,531
1,742
16.5
Hydropower
energy deficit
Flood
damages
Delta Water Supply
water deficit
Standard scenario
LEGEND
history
Q0
Q10 (dry)
Q11 (wet)
Q3 (small T)
Q13 (large T)
Qens (avg)
Ideal Solution

26. 32
16,798
245,531
1,742
16.5
Hydropower
energy deficit
Flood
damages
Delta Water Supply
water deficit
Dry scenario
LEGEND
history
Q0
Q10 (dry)
Q11 (wet)
Q3 (small T)
Q13 (large T)
Qens (avg)
Ideal Solution

27. 32
16,798
245,531
1,742
16.5
Hydropower
energy deficit
Flood
damages
Delta Water Supply
water deficit
Wet scenario
LEGEND
history
Q0
Q10 (dry)
Q11 (wet)
Q3 (small T)
Q13 (large T)
Qens (avg)
Ideal Solution

28. 32
16,798
245,531
1,742
16.5
Hydropower
energy deficit
Flood
damages
Delta Water Supply
water deficit
Temperature scenarios
LEGEND
history
Q0
Q10 (dry)
Q11 (wet)
Q3 (small T)
Q13 (large T)
Qens (avg)
Ideal Solution

29. 32
16,798
245,531
1,742
16.5
Hydropower
energy deficit
Flood
damages
Delta Water Supply
water deficit
Tradeoffs change with the scenarios
LEGEND
history
Q0
Q10 (dry)
Q11 (wet)
Q3 (small T)
Q13 (large T)
Qens (avg)
0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5
x 10
5
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
Hydropower
energy deficit
Flood in Hanoi
damages
Ideal Solution

30. Tradeoffs change with the scenarios
LEGEND
history
Q0
Q10 (dry)
Q11 (wet)
Q3 (small T)
Q13 (large T)
Qens (avg)
LEGEND
history
Q0
Q10 (dry)
Q11 (wet)
Q3 (small T)
Q13 (large T)
Qens (avg)

31. 32
16,798
245,531
1,742
16.5
Hydropower
energy deficit
Flood
damages
Delta Water Supply
water deficit
Uncertainty challenges decision-making support
LEGEND
history
Q0
Q10 (dry)
Q11 (wet)
Q3 (small T)
Q13 (large T)
Qens (avg)
0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5
x 10
5
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
Hydropower
energy deficit
Flood in Hanoi
damages
compromise solution
Ideal Solution

32. Conclusions and further research
• EMODPS successfully designed water management policies addressing tradeoffs
and promoting stakeholders negotiation.
• Top-down climate change assessment improved our understanding of the
vulnerabilities of the system, which are amplified by reservoir operations and
depend on the considered future, nonstationary, uncertain scenarios.
Further research will focus on introducing socio-economic scenarios, running robust
optimization, and switching to a bottom-up approach for supporting the design of
adaptation strategies,
The Project is funded by the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affair as part of its development cooperation program.

33. thank you
Matteo Giuliani
matteo.giuliani@polimi.it
http://giuliani.faculty.polimi.it