Preference criterion for flood control under uncertainty

Abstract

Real‐time reservoir control may be reduced to the dual purpose problem of (1) flood control under uncertain inflow and (2) conservation control (water supply, power generation, low flow augmentation, recreation, etc.) after the flood has receded. Under this circumstance, the reservoir flood control is modeled as a game against nature. The decision maker makes the release decisions based upon his value judgments which express preferences over operating attributes and trade‐offs between reservoir purposes and upon his attitude toward risk. His decision behavior is described by a two‐attribute disutility function. It is argued that minimization of expected disutility is a plausible and well motivated criterion for reservoir flood control under uncertainty. Problems of application are discussed, and an experiment in assessing the disutility functions of individuals is reported.