Sustainable utilization of water resources in Tianjin based on system dynamics.

Water shortage in Tianjin is getting more and more serious. The total supply of water resources is insufficient to meet the demand and thus Tianjing has become increasely dependent on the water diverted from other areas. Based on the current situation and the characteristics of water use in Tianjing, this article established a model to predict the sustainable utilization of water resources from 2005 to 2020 by using Vensim, a system dynamics software. This model is composed of four interacting subsystems: population, economy, ecological environment and water resources. The prediction results were obtained by operating the model. The results show that the total water consumption will reach 4. 255 billion m³ in 2020 and the gap between supply and demand of water resources is 768 million m³. Furthermore, in order to find out the optimal solution for the sustainable utilization of water resource, the water resource utilization trends were simulated under five different programs by using computer simulation technology. The comparison of the water resource utilization trends under the five different programs indicates that the optimal solutions include saving water, industrial restructuring, improving sewage treatment technology and seawater desalination technology. The shortage of water resource can be effectively alleviated and the sustainable utilization of water resource can be boosted by improving the utilization rate of water and reduce water wastage and pollution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]