Black-Swan Type Catastrophes and Antifragility/Supra-resilience of Urban Socio-Technical Infrastructures

This paper may be one of the first attempts dealing with the problem of creating, providing and maintaining antifragility of systems of interdependent urban critical infrastructures (CI) in the wake of black-swan type technological, ecological, economic or social catastrophes occurring in a municipality. A synonym is offered to describe antifragility from a positive psychology perspective, formulating the problem as the supraresilience problem. A brief description is given of the developed innovative approach for creating a supraresilient city/region using black-swan catastrophe and the antifragility concepts. Resilience metrics are formulated as well as methods of assessing damage, interdependence of infrastructures and convergent technologies and sciences needed for practical regional resilience and risk management of the system of systems (SoS) of interdependent urban critical infrastructures). © Published under licence by IOP Publishing Ltd

Towards a Common Language of Infrastructure Interdependency

Infrastructure systems can exist interdependently with one another either by design, necessity or evolution. There is evidence that interdependencies can be the source of emergent benefits and hazards, and therefore there is value in their identification and management. Achieving this requires collaboration and communication between infrastructure stakeholders across all relevant sectors. Recognising, developing and sharing multiple understandings of infrastructure interdependency and dependency will facilitate a wide range of multi-disciplinary and cross-sectorial work and support productive stakeholder dialogues. This paper therefore aims to initiate discussion around the nature of infrastructure interdependency and dependency in order to establish the basis of a useful, coherent and complete conceptual taxonomy. It sets out an approach for locating this taxonomy and language within a framework of commonplace stakeholder viewpoints. The paper looks at the potential structural arrangements of infrastructure interdependencies before exploring the qualitative ways in which the relationships can be characterised. This builds on the existing body of knowledge as well as experience through case studies in developing an Interdependency Planning and Management Framework for Infrastructure

Adaptation and Resilience of Interdependent Infrastructure Systems: a Complex Systems Perspective

The effects of disruption upon one or more components in interdependent infrastructure systems and the ability of the system to return to normal operations, is investigated in this paper. This addresses the concept of resilience, and examines the trade-off between redundancy and efficiency, as well as the adaptive ability of a system to respond to disruptions and continue to operate, albeit not necessarily as it did initially

A Socio-technical Analysis of Interdependent Infrastructures among the Built Environment, Energy, and Transportation Systems at the Navy Yard and the Philadelphia Metropolitan Region, USA

This paper reports on a research initiative that explores the interdependencies of the system of systems — the built environment, energy, and transportation — related to the redevelopment of The Navy Yard in Philadelphia and the Philadelphia Metropolitan Region. The overarching goal of the project is a clearer understanding of the dynamics of multi-scale interactions and interdependencies of systems of sociotechnical systems that will be useful to system practitioners. The understanding and the subsequent planning and design of sociotechnical systems are “wicked” problems and one characteristic is there is no definitive formulation. One of the main findings or lessons learned of the work reported for the understanding of interdependencies of infrastructure is the identification of what are the problems or challenges because for wicked problems “[t]he formulation of the problem is the problem!” We find that systems practitioners have an overarching concern of a fragmented regional policy and decision making process. Four main themes of 1. Vulnerability of aging infrastructure, 2. Integration of emerging technology into existing infrastructure, 3. Lifestyle and value changes, and 4. Financial innovations were identified as challenges. Continuing research work explores three possible infrastructure projects for further study as well as the development of a high-level systems of systems model. The principle outcome is the initiation of a planning process so that the system practitioners will learn to better understand the connections among related sociotechnical systems and the constellation of problems they face not within their immediate scope of responsibility yet influences the operations of their systems

Time granularity impact on propagation of disruptions in a system-of-systems simulation of infrastructure and business networks

System-of-systems (SoS) approach is often used for simulating disruptions to business and infrastructure system networks allowing for integration of several models into one simulation. However, the integration is frequently challenging as each system is designed individually with different characteristics, such as time granularity. Understanding the impact of time granularity on propagation of disruptions between businesses and infrastructure systems and finding the appropriate granularity for the SoS simulation remain as major challenges. To tackle these, we explore how time granularity, recovery time, and disruption size affect the propagation of disruptions between constituent systems of an SoS simulation. To address this issue, we developed a High Level Architecture (HLA) simulation of 3 networks and performed a series of simulation experiments. Our results revealed that time granularity and especially recovery time have huge impact on propagation of disruptions. Consequently, we developed a model for selecting an appropriate time granularity for an SoS simulation based on expected recovery time. Our simulation experiments show that time granularity should be less than 1.13 of expected recovery time. We identified some areas for future research centered around extending the experimental factors space.Comment: 26 pages, 11 figures, 2 tables, Submitted to International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health: Special Issue on Cascading Disaster Modelling and Preventio

System of Systems Perspective on Risk: Towards a Unified Concept

Many systems and projects that concern systems engineers, engineering managers, and business managers today can be defined as system of systems (SoS), which are described as ambiguous, uncertain and dynamic, among others. In addition to the traditional view on risk identification, analysis and management, the concept of risk should be considered with respect to these systems of systems. The purpose of this paper is to analyse both fundamental concepts and recent publications in system of systems, business and engineering management, as well as risk analysis, modelling, and management for the purpose of better describing the concept of risk with respect to system of systems. The ultimate goal is to provide engineering and business managers the necessary perspective on the concept of risk and its management for the next generation of systems – including various descriptions of risk and discussion of the relevance of properties of system of systems to sustainable management of risks in engineered systems. To achieve a truly sustainable management of risk, there has to be a change in paradigm from a traditional description of risk to that of a more holistic perspective

Infrastructure Interdependencies: Opportunities from Complexity

Infrastructure networks, such as those for energy, transportation, and telecommunications, perform key functions for society. Although such systems have largely been developed and managed in isolation, infrastructure now functions as a system of systems, exhibiting complex interdependencies that can leave critical functions vulnerable to cascade failure. Consequently, research efforts and management strategies have focused on risks and negative aspects of complexity. This paper explores how interdependencies can be seen positively, representing opportunities to increase organizational resilience and sustainability. A typology is presented for classifying positive interdependencies, drawing on fundamental principles in ecology and validated using case studies. Understanding opportunities that arise from interdependency will enable better understanding and management of infrastructure complexity, which in turn will allow the use of such complexity to the advantage of society. Integrative thinking is necessary not only for mitigating risk but also for identifying innovations to make systems and organizations more sustainable and resilient