Water Resources: Balancing too Little Versus too Much

Water resources management decision-making is a complicated matter, which encompasses reliance upon nature to assist in the prediction of unknown rainfall events. Unfortunately, for whatever reasons, there seems an ever-increasing shift in climate patterns towards extreme weather events with impacts that appear to be exacerbated by human activities in the built environment arena. As a result, this is causing widespread droughts and flooding to be commonplace for some countries, as shown in this chapter. The examples of such instances illustrate the necessity for water resources managers, water engineers and water policy-makers to ensure that they produce accurate and well-informed decisions to guarantee the sustained delivery of potable water supplies and the continued protection of society from floodwaters. The chapter presents the reasons for water scarcity and flooding. It also highlights the contents of other chapters in the Water Resources in the Built Environment: Management Issues and Solutions.