Risk Assessment and Resilience Strategies
Maintaining secure and reliable water resources and systems in the face of highly variable and emerging risks is critical for water and wastewater utilities. From cyber-attacks and climate events to newly-discovered contaminants, Carollo works with our clients to develop risk management strategies and response plans that identify and categorize these risks, assess system vulnerabilities, and enact measures to minimize service disruptions, narrow recovery times, and safeguard resilient water systems.
- Holistic system risk identification and vulnerability assessment
- Operational security evaluations and development (AWWA G430)
- Security and natural hazard risk analysis and planning (AWWA J100)
- Cybersecurity studies and implementation
- Security and resilience policy and procedure development
- Climate adaptation and resilience planning
- Mitigation strategies and procedure development
- System design, start-up, and implementation
- Emergency response plan (ERP) development
- Business Continuity Plan (BCP) and Continuity of Operations Plan (COOP) development
- Emergency response training/exercises
Plan to be prepared
Has your utility assessed its vulnerability to these existing and emerging threats? Do you have a plan in place to address them?
Climate events
Cyber and malevolent attacks
Drinking water contamination
Demand fluctuations
Supply chain issues and staffing shortages
Aged or failing infrastructure
Asset loss and service disruptions
Release of hazardous gas
Stay primed and ready
Over the last 100+ years, rapid technological advances, growing urban density, and increasing global interconnection have led to significant changes in the tools utilities need to maintain operations and minimize service disruptions. Using a risk and cost-benefit based decision-making framework, Carollo helps clients develop and implement courses of action that prioritize critical upgrades, protect infrastructure, and support resilient solutions. These detailed and defensible plans leave our clients better prepared and able to respond to and alleviate impacts from future threats, and rebound more quickly, even when facing unexpected events.
America’s Water Infrastructure Act
The America’s Water Infrastructure Act (AWIA) is the most holistic risk management/emergency response planning undertaking the water industry has seen to date. While previous vulnerability assessments primarily focused on a terrorism threat basis, the AWIA includes a wide range of malevolent threats, natural hazards, contamination, and cyber threats, as well as proximity and dependency hazards.
AWIA is currently required for only drinking water systems. However, future updates are likely to include wastewater and reclaimed water utilities.
Planning and Certification
Any utility serving more than 3,300 people must conduct a risk and resilience assessment (RRA), develop an emergency response plan (ERP), and submit certification of completion of both to the EPA. Recertification is required every five years.
Maximizing compliance, minimizing risks
Carollo has guided more than 100 security and resilience planning, design, construction, and commissioning projects since 2003, and has consulted on more than 30 AWIA-specific projects. We work closely with AWWA and EPA to advance best practices, enhance evaluation tools and techniques, and support development of holistic risk management and resilience practices throughout the industry.
From identification to action
You’ve completed your RRA and ERP – now what? Carollo has helped numerous clients mitigate risks through development of implementation plans, detailed Standard Operating Procedures, and training activities/exercises designed to validate emergency planning approaches and systems.
We will work with you to prioritize and implement cost-effective, sustainable solutions and training exercises that mitigate your risks and increase resilience, and are integrated with your other operational and financial drivers.
Climate Change and Resilience
With increasingly variable weather due to climate change, extreme weather events are becoming more regular, more frequent, and more impactful. From drought and wildfires to flooding and sea level rise, water and wastewater utilities must understand how these events will impact their operations and the availability of water resources. We help utilities identify climate change threats and vulnerabilities and develop proactive mitigation plans and adaptive management strategies that aid in building long-term resilience.
Let us help you prepare.
