Drought-Coping Capacity Assessment of Water Resources Projects and Regulation: A Technological Framework and Key Issues for Research

Water resources projects are key underpinnings of regional drought coping strategies. It is of great importance to optimize the overall arrangement and water resources allocation to tap the potentials of water resources projects in coping with droughts, and therefore to enhance the regional drought coping capacity. The definition of water resources projects was firstly given and then the connotation of drought coping capacity of the projects as well as drought coping mechanism, were systemically analyzed in this paper. Furthermore, a general technological framework of study on drought coping capacity assessment of water resources projects was proposed. Finally, some key scientific issues including drought risk assessment and carrying capacity of water resources under drought conditions, drought coping capacity assessment of water resources projects, optimization for drought-oriented water resources allocation and dispatching, and the drought coping management, were discussed.