TY - JOUR

T1 - Scaling Effects in Spatial Multi-Criteria Decision Aggregation in Integrated River Basin Management

AU - Taha, Rania

AU - Dietrich, Jörg

AU - Dehnhardt, Alexandra

AU - Hirschfeld, Jesko

N1 - Funding information: This research was funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung, BMBF), grant number FKZ 0330211. Deutscher Akademischer Austausch Dienst (DAAD) funded the postgraduate studies of Rania Taha under the EPOS program (Development-Related Postgraduate Courses). The publication of this article was funded by the Open Access Fund of the Leibniz Universität Hannover.

PY - 2019/2

Y1 - 2019/2

N2 - For river basin management plans (RBMPs), measures are aggregated from smaller spatial units (e.g., water bodies) to the catchment or basin scale. River basin management plans measures in integrated management are evaluated using multiple criteria, e.g., ecological and socio-economiccriteria, etc. Therefore, aggregation often combines spatial analysis and multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA). Herein, we investigate: (1) the effect of applying different aggregation pathways on the outcome of the RBMP using the technique for order of preference by similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS) as an MCDA method, (2) the scaling effects considering water body, sub-catchment, and river basin scales, and (3) the effect of using global and local criteria weighing on the final ranking of alternatives. We propose two approaches to aggregate ranks for the entire basin: using non-dominated alternatives only and using a normalized TOPSIS relative closeness value. The results show no variation in the final non-dominated alternative for both aggregation pathways. However, we note rank reversal among the dominated alternatives. These results suggest that scaling effects need to be considered in spatial MCDA.

AB - For river basin management plans (RBMPs), measures are aggregated from smaller spatial units (e.g., water bodies) to the catchment or basin scale. River basin management plans measures in integrated management are evaluated using multiple criteria, e.g., ecological and socio-economiccriteria, etc. Therefore, aggregation often combines spatial analysis and multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA). Herein, we investigate: (1) the effect of applying different aggregation pathways on the outcome of the RBMP using the technique for order of preference by similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS) as an MCDA method, (2) the scaling effects considering water body, sub-catchment, and river basin scales, and (3) the effect of using global and local criteria weighing on the final ranking of alternatives. We propose two approaches to aggregate ranks for the entire basin: using non-dominated alternatives only and using a normalized TOPSIS relative closeness value. The results show no variation in the final non-dominated alternative for both aggregation pathways. However, we note rank reversal among the dominated alternatives. These results suggest that scaling effects need to be considered in spatial MCDA.

KW - Criteria aggregation

KW - Multi-criteria decision analysis

KW - River basin management plan

KW - Spatial compensation

KW - Technique for order of preference by similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS)

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85061775393&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.15488/4726

DO - 10.15488/4726

M3 - Article

AN - SCOPUS:85061775393

VL - 11

JO - Water (Switzerland)

JF - Water (Switzerland)

SN - 2073-4441

IS - 2

M1 - 355

ER -