Resilience Planning Research Articles

Safeguarding supply chains from cyber-physical system attacks frameworks and strategies

This review paper delves into the escalating challenge of safeguarding supply chains against cyber-physical system (CPS) attacks, emphasizing the critical role of CPS in modern supply chains and the multifaceted vulnerabilities they introduce. We systematically outline a comprehensive framework encompassing preventive measures, detection and response strategies, and recovery and resilience planning to mitigate these risks. Furthermore, we explore the implementation challenges inherent in integrating cybersecurity and physical security strategies, highlighting innovative technological solutions and the crucial role of policy and regulatory compliance. This paper aims to offer actionable insights for enhancing the security posture of supply chains, underscoring the importance of collaborative efforts among stakeholders to navigate the complex landscape of cyber-physical threats. Keywords: Cyber-Physical Systems, Supply Chain Security, Cybersecurity, Physical Security, Recovery and Resilience, Policy and Regulation.

The role of science in resilience planning for military-civilian domains in the U.S. and NATO

ABSTRACT In recent years, the NATO member nations have committed to a coordinated approach to strengthening resilience among the Allies, including the development of National Resilience Plans (NRPs). The Allies outlined the extent to which the robustness of their respective military capacities requires the designed resilience of systems that bridge civilian and military domains. This article outlines the role that resilience plays in supporting tactical and strategic measures of national security and defense within military and civilian domains. This exploration provides an outline of how resilience is currently applied in practice by the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) and NATO. Building on this diversity of applications, various categorical forms of resilience drawn from the empirical science of resilience are positioned within NATO’s emerging frame for ‘layered’ resilience. This article reinforces the scientific debate that an optimal orientation to resilience leaves open the door for the transformative adaptation of function and identity when the single-equilibrium processes of resilience reach their limits. This article concludes with a normative perspective on how military and civilian resilience planning could support the development of NRPs that would amplify the Allies’ collective capacity to face shared security threats.

Investment planning framework for mitigating cascading failures

Critical component outages can lead to widespread cascading propagation, which is however typically ignored in existing investment planning approaches. To address this gap, this paper seamlessly integrates advanced cascading failure analysis into resilient investment planning. It first deploys a stochastic simulator to generate spatiotemporal high-impact low-probability (HILP) events, which are then assessed using a cascading failure model, generating various cascading quantification metrics (CQMs). The framework explicitly quantifies tail risks (i.e., HILP events) using Conditional Value-at-Risk (CVaR) with a confidence level determined by unsupervised clustering, instead of using a predetermined confidence level. This enables the more tailored identification of a set of worst-case scenarios for the system under investigation, improving its practicality. An optimization model then utilizes the outputs of the cascading analysis and the defined CVaR confidence level to identify investment portfolios that provide a hedge against cascading failures. The proposed work is demonstrated on the IEEE 39-bus system, revealing reduced cascading propagation.

The multilevel governance challenges of NextGenerationEU: the Spanish and Italian decentralised systems viewed through the lens of federalisation

The post-COVID-19 panorama presents serious economic and social challenges, prompting the European Union (EU) to allocate extensive funds to its Member States. The central financing instrument created for this purpose, NextGenerationEU (NGEU), requires the Member States to implement ambitious reforms to bring about green and digital transitions within their National Recovery and Resilience Plans (NRRPs). Despite innovative elements in NGEU’s decision-making process, legal basis and fiscal integration policy, the role of sub-state authorities in the context of multilevel governance (MLG) demonstrates a centralised tendency. In order to understand this issue, the management of NRRPs in the Spanish system of autonomous communities and Italian regionalism will be taken as emblematic case studies. Specifically, the constitutional significance of the MLG model in the context of the NGEU recovery package will be evaluated in light of the principles of solidarity, subsidiarity, proportionality and partnership. This paper ultimately aims to offer broader insights into NGEU’s role in the ongoing EU federalisation process and its shortcomings with respect to national decentralised systems.

The twin green and digital transition: High-level policy or science fiction?

This paper contributes to the literature that critically engages with the so-called ‘twin green and digital transition’ by assessing the twin transition as a policy discourse. Our research question is: why and how is the twin transition legitimised and implemented in the European Union (EU) despite recognised pitfalls and uncertainties? The analysis is based on interpretative text analysis of high-level EU policy documents about the twin green and digital transition and of Member States’ resilience and recovery plans. The paper assesses the political and socio-economic context as a central factor that explains how the coupling of the green and the digital comes to be seen as desirable. Our results show that innovation associated with the digital imaginary is used to discursively reframe tensions between economic and sustainability policy aims as synergies. Legitimacy is derived not only from the promise of win-win ideas but also from the claimed ability of governing institutions to steer the twin transitions in the desired direction and avoid the recognised risks. With regard to implementation, the twin transition logic guided the allocation of funds by framing the need to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic as an opportunity to accelerate the green and digital transitions. Hence, the digital imaginary merges environmental governance with the governance of innovation.

Xaminer: An Internet Cross-Layer Resilience Analysis Tool

A resilient Internet infrastructure is critical in our highly interconnected society. However, the Internet faces several vulnerabilities, ranging from natural disasters to human activities, that can impact the physical layer and, in turn, the higher network layers, such as IP links. In this paper, we introduce Xaminer, the first Internet cross-layer resilience analysis tool, to evaluate the interplay between physical-and network-layer failures. Using a cross-layer Internet map and a failure event model, Xaminer generates a risk profile encompassing a cross-layer impact report, critical infrastructure identification at each layer, and the discovery of trends and patterns under different failure event settings. Xaminer's key strengths lie in its adaptability to diverse disaster scenarios, the ability to assess risks at various granularities, and the capability to generate joint risk profiles for multiple events. We demonstrate Xaminer's capabilities in cross-layer analysis across a spectrum of disaster event models and regions, showcasing its potential role in facilitating well-informed decision-making for resilience planning and deployments. The Xaminer tool is available as open-source software.

Environmental quality between regulatory synthesis and project verification

Regulatory references governing design activities have gradually expanded, and national and EU regulations often overlap redundantly. This aspect is particularly evident in environmental obligations, where the Italian requirements about Minimum Environmental Criteria (CAM) have been supplemented by the constraints of the Do No Significant Harm principle (DNSH) introduced for all PNRR (National Recovery and Resilience Plan) measures. A process of rationalisation and synthesis has been conducted for the regulations to address their interpretational complexity, enabling the differentiation of overlaps and novel elements. The result is a tool to support designers, validating authorities and administrations responsible for measures. It is helpful in guiding design choices, monitoring compliance with different requirements and verifying environmental quality.

Integrating Fail-Safe and Safe-to-Fail practices in resilience planning

Integrating Fail-Safe and Safe-to-Fail practices in resilience planning

Pandemic Unveils Transportation Sector's Financial Resilience

This study investigates the financial performance of transportation and logistics companies listed on the Indonesia Stock Exchange (IDX) during the period of 2017-2022, specifically focusing on the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic. Analyzing key financial ratios including Return On Assets (ROA), Current Ratio (CR), Debt To Equity Ratio (DER), and Total Asset Turnover (TATO), the research aims to identify differences in performance before and during the pandemic. Utilizing a comparative research design and employing the Wilcoxon signed rank test for data analysis, findings reveal a significant decrease in Total Asset Turnover during the pandemic, indicating decreased asset efficiency. However, no significant differences were observed in ROA, CR, and DER, suggesting relatively stable profitability, liquidity, and solvency ratios despite the challenges posed by the pandemic. These results offer valuable insights for industry stakeholders, policymakers, and investors, aiding in strategic decision-making and resilience planning for future crises. Highlight: Examines financial performance of transportation companies during Covid-19 pandemic. Significant decrease in Total Asset Turnover (TATO) during pandemic. Stability observed in ROA, CR, and DER despite pandemic challenges. Keyword: Transportation industry, Financial performance, Covid-19 pandemic, Indonesia Stock Exchange (IDX), Comparative research.

Climate-resilient urban drainage planning: An approach using a GIS-based SCS-CN model

ABSTRACT Inexorable urbanization continues apace across the world and urban flooding in megacities is now frequently evidenced due to extreme rainfall events due to climate change (CC). Climate-resilient urban drainage planning is critical towards making sustainable cities or any new urbanization. This paper presents an approach through an insightful assessment of climate resilient urban drainage applying GIS-based Soil Conservation Service-Curve Number (SCS-CN) model of a new urban growth of megacity Dhaka, Bangladesh. A precise DEM (Digital Elevation Model) of the study area has been used for catchment delineation using ArcSWAT. Localized climate anomalies of rainfall of around 11% have been identified during monsoon from statistical downscaling and included in the cumulative rainfall event of 5 days. The effect of historical and CC-induced rainfall have been used to identify and map the peak discharges of sub-catchments considering the return period of 5-day cumulative rainfall for 10, 25, and 100 years of the urban catchment for both existing and future land-use scenarios accounting for the change in CN. The varying results of the peak discharges of the sub-catchments for resilient drainage planning is not only dependent on the increase in rainfall but also the combined response of the land-use and soil profile.

Europeanisation in the aftermath of COVID-19: the organisational adaptation of the central governance of the National Recovery and Resilience Plan in Italy

AbstractWhile much of the recent literature on the impact of COVID-19 has focussed on governance at the EU level and specific policy areas, the changing political institutional arrangements within the EU Member States themselves have received significantly less attention. This article aims to contribute filling this gap by asking: how, and to what extent, has the core executive in Italy changed to manage and implement the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP)? Italy has been heavily hit by the COVID-19 pandemic and has subsequently been allocated the largest proportion of the Next Generation EU (NGEU) funds: it is therefore a ‘most likely’ case of organisational adaptation. We argue that the implementation of the NRRP triggers centralisation of power in the core executive. Such concentration of power, however, takes different forms depending on the composition of the executive. We also find that ‘coordinative’ Europeanisation occurs through the continuous interaction and exchange between the executive actors (political and administrative) based in Rome and the European Commission in Brussels. Such interaction showcases the attempt to manage both further integration and politicisation of the EU. The collaboration between the European Commission and the national executive is based both on the recognition of the value of the political ownership of the NRRP and the importance of the EU support for post-pandemic recovery.

Enhancing Supply Chain Resilience: Proactive Strategies for Disruptive Events

Purpose: This paper emphasizes the significance of proactive strategies in enhancing supply chain resilience against disruptions, focusing on natural disasters, geopolitical instability, and pandemics. Through risk assessment, scenario planning, and proactive measures like diversification, inventory optimization, and technology adoption, it proposes an integrated methodology for resilient supply chains. Methodology: Drawing from literature and real-world examples, this study develops a framework for supply chain resilience, emphasizing contingency planning and implementation techniques. Findings: The integrated methodology enhances companies' resilience and recovery capacity, mitigating the severity of disruption effects. Practical recommendations are offered for developing resilient supply chains in uncertain business environments. Unique Contribution to Theory, Practice and Policy: This study contributes by offering actionable recommendations, bridging theory and practice, to fortify supply chains against instability and uncertainty, thereby advancing both theoretical understanding and practical applications in supply chain resilience planning.

Assessing flood risks in the Taquari-Antas Basin (Southeast Brazil) during the September 2023 extreme rainfall surge

This analysis delves into precipitation dynamics in the Bacia Taquari Antas region, with a focus on September 2023. Employing a multi-scale approach encompassing monthly, daily, and subdaily analyses, the study unveils a consistent precipitation distribution throughout the year. September 2023’s anomaly, the second-highest in the dataset, prompts investigation into potential climatic variability. Notably, the daily analysis highlights September 4th, 2023, as significant, emphasizing the importance of historical context in evaluating weather event severity. Subdaily scrutiny of September 4th reveals intense, localized precipitation, raising concerns about hydrological impacts such as flash floods. Positive trends in Rx5day (maximum consecutive 5-day precipitation amount) and R25 (number of days in a year when precipitation exceeds 25 mm) indices indicate an increase in heavy precipitation events, aligning with broader climate change concerns. Shifting focus to flood extent and impact assessment in the Taquari-Antas Basin, a simulation model depicts the temporal evolution of the flood, reaching its peak on September 4th. Examination of affected areas, rainfall volumes, and impacts on census sectors, cities, and buildings furnishes critical data for disaster management. This study contributes to localized precipitation comprehension and broader issues of climate trends, flood risk evaluation, and urban vulnerability, providing a basis for informed decision-making and resilient planning strategies.

Assessing Vulnerability and Prioritization of Cultural Assets for Climate Change Planning in Collier County, Southwest Florida

Cultural resources are often overlooked in climate change and resiliency planning, despite them being integral to community identity and the restoration of a sense of normalcy after significant weather events. This vulnerability assessment demonstrates how cultural resources can be included in planning efforts, and how they can be prioritized based on specific criteria. To complete this assessment, a working group with local land managers and cultural resource professionals was formed, and members employed a sophisticated Geo Tool, ACUNE (Adaptation of Coastal Urban and Natural Ecosystems) for climate adaptation, to predict how cultural resources throughout Collier County, Florida, would be impacted in two specific climate scenarios. The working group selected ten significant sites in the county and used ACUNE to prioritize action at these sites, using a matrix of hazard exposure, sensitivity, adaptive capacity, and the environmental, social, and economic consequences of the loss of these sites. Based on the results of our case study vulnerability assessment of cultural resources in Collier County, the next decade (2020 to 2030) has the potential to increase the number of sites at risk of storm flooding from 267 to 318, alerting managers that immediate action is needed for the sites of greatest value. The analysis of 10 case study sites is presented to demonstrate an approach for land managers and other cultural resource professionals to prioritize action at their own sites.

A new organizational model of primary healthcare in Liguria, Italy. Insights and implications.

After years of cost-containment policies, the Italian National Health Service (NHS) has now the chance to change and improve, especially thanks to the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP). The plan serves as a catalyst for reform, allocating substantial funds to reinforce proximity networks, facilities, and telemedicine for territorial healthcare. Mission 6, specifically dedicated to health, focuses on integrating primary healthcare, hospital, and specialty care networks, underscoring the importance of a robust primary healthcare system. In alignment with NRRP objectives, the Ligurian model introduces innovative structures, such as Community Houses (CdCs), Community Hospitals (OdCs), and Territorial Operation Centres (COTs). These interconnected components form a dynamic network designed to enhance healthcare accessibility, prevent inappropriate hospital admissions, and facilitate efficient patient transitions. The model prioritizes multidisciplinary collaboration, community engagement, and the integration of socio-healthcare services. Despite substantial NRRP funding for infrastructure, challenges related to staffing and human resources persist. The social and epidemiological context highlights concern about the economic feasibility of the reform, potential workforce shortages, and the imperative for updated regulatory frameworks. The strategic reallocation of personnel from acute hospitals to new facilities is crucial, requiring meticulous workforce planning, role definitions, and trainingIn conclusion, the Ligurian model emerges as a proactive response to the structural vulnerabilities exposed by the pandemic, aligning with international trends in emphasizing primary care, prevention, and community-based services.

Agile Transformation through the Performing Management of It and Cyber Security Projects, at the Government Level

Abstract Modern theories of intelligence have developed from the observation that the person, throughout life, is in constant development. In order to be successful, certain conditions must be met. These conditions for achieving success in life depend on the skills that are formed during formal education, or at least should be pursued as goals, beyond the disciplines. In a current information society, the quality of life as well the perspectives of social change and economic development depend on information and its exploitation, especially in the institutional field of managing computer applications for the absorption of European funds, becoming a matter of national importance, with critical values for national security, characterized by the state of economic equilibrium. Scientific knowledge and information are of particular importance in the global information society by: supporting innovation through technology, promoting economic development through the use of emerging technologies, making decisions efficiently and transparently at government level. The implementation and use of intelligent technologies have a decisive role in the development of the degree of digitization of public services through non-refundable funding from European funds and the National Recovery and Resilience Plan. The reinvention of the government can be transformed into a reality through the digitization and computerization of the public administration, assuming the modernization of the infrastructure through specific sources of funding, such as European funds, ensuring security through advanced cyber protection and defense capabilities against possible vulnerabilities, risks or cyber-attacks. Achieving performance within the public institution requires an increased concern for innovation, creativity and change.

Community-Level resilience analysis using earthquake-tsunami fragility surfaces

This study introduces an advanced community-level resilience analysis methodology integrating 3D fragility surfaces for combined successive earthquake-tsunami hazard and analysis. The methodology facilitates comprehensive evaluations of spatial damage, economic loss, and risk under multi-hazard conditions. This study compares earthquake-only analysis results to the successive earthquake-tsunami analysis at the community level to reveal – and quantify - significant disparities in damage and loss estimations between the analyses, emphasizing the need to consider both hazards in community planning even at lower seismic intensities. Critical assessment of the FEMA combinational rule demonstrates its limitations in accurately predicting losses and damage patterns at higher hazard intensities, highlighting the necessity for refined models that accurately account for hazard interactions. This research advances multi-hazard community-level resilience analysis by offering a robust framework for earthquake and tsunami assessment, underscoring the need for integration of detailed multi-hazard analyses into resilience planning. Finally, it suggests future directions for enhancing framework applicability across diverse community settings and structural types, aiming to improve community resilience.

The Contribution of the National Recovery and Resilience Plan to the Development of Digital Skills in Romanian Public Administration

The Contribution of the National Recovery and Resilience Plan to the Development of Digital Skills in Romanian Public Administration

Future Changes in Regional Tropical Cyclone Wind, Precipitation, and Flooding Using Event‐Based Downscaling

AbstractUnderstanding changes in the hazard component of climate risk is important to inform societal resilience planning in a changing climate. Here, we examine local changes in wind speed, rainfall, and flooding related to tropical cyclones (TCs) and compare them across statistical and dynamical modeling approaches. Our focus region is the Delaware River Basin, located in the northeastern United States. We pair event‐based downscaling with large ensemble climate model information to capture the details of extreme TC wind, rain, and flooding, and their likelihood, in a changing climate. We identify local TCs in the Community Earth System Model 2 Large Ensemble (CESM2‐LENS). We find fewer TCs in the future, but these future storms have higher wind speeds and are wetter. We also find that TCs produce heavier 3‐day precipitation distributions than all other summertime weather events, with TCs constituting a larger percentage of the upper tail of the full precipitation distribution. With this information, we identify a small collection of 200‐year return events and compare the resulting TC rain and wind across dynamical and statistical downscaling methods. We find that dynamical downscaling produces peak rain rates far higher than CESM or the statistical downscaling method. It can also produce quite different future changes in precipitation totals for the small set of events considered here. This leads to vastly different flood responses. Overall, our results highlight the need to interpret future changes of event‐based simulations in the context of downscaling method limitations.

Examining spatial and socioeconomic disparities in internet resilience during extreme weather events: a case study of Hurricane Harvey and Winter Storm Uri

The resilience of internet service is crucial for ensuring consistent communication, situational awareness, facilitating emergency response in our digitally-dependent society. However, due to empirical data constraints, there has been limited research on internet service disruptions during extreme weather events. To bridge this gap, this study utilizes observational datasets on internet performance to quantitatively assess the extent of internet disruption during two recent extreme weather events. Taking Harris County in the United States as the study region, we jointly analyzed the hazard severity and the associated internet disruptions in the context of two extreme weather events. The results show that the hazard events significantly impacted regional internet connectivity. There exists a pronounced temporal synchronicity between the magnitude of disruption and hazard severity: as the severity of hazards intensifies, internet disruptions correspondingly escalate, and eventually return to baseline levels post-event. The spatial analyses show that internet service disruptions can happen even in areas that are not directly impacted by hazards, demonstrating that the repercussions of hazards extend beyond the immediate area of impact. This interplay of temporal synchronization and spatial variance underscores the complex relationships between hazard severity and Internet disruption. Furthermore, the socio-demographic analysis suggests that vulnerable communities, already grappling with myriad challenges, face exacerbated service disruptions during these hazard events, emphasizing the need for prioritized disaster mitigation strategies and interventions for improving the resilience of internet services. To the best of our knowledge, this research is among the first studies to examine the Internet disruptions during hazardous events using a quantitative observational dataset. The insights obtained hold significant implications for city administrators, guiding them towards more resilient and equitable infrastructure planning.