Operation of Hydrosystems under Uncertain Decision Making Environments

Dealing with uncertainty in planning and management of water resource systems is a challenging task. Modelers of water resource systems are often confronted with uncertainty issues in handling the natural variability of a variety of hydrologic and physical processes, and systems with both stochastic and (not so) deterministic inputs in the modeling process. Approaches to handle imprecise and uncertain aspects of loss functions within optimization frameworks are addressed in this paper. Fuzzy mathematical programming models under uncertain environments are developed to address the issues of uncertainty and imprecision associated with the penalty coefficients and zones respectively. These issues are handled simultaneously in an optimization framework. The formulations are developed using linear and nonlinear programming methods within symmetric and non-symmetric fuzzy environments that are defined by the vague nature of constraints or objective functions or both. The models are applied.to a case study of existing reservoir in the state of Kentucky. Results suggest the utility of using fuzzy set theory concepts for handling problems in uncertain environments that cannot be addressed using traditional probability theory. Also, the use of fuzzy set theory within an optimization framework provides a number of advantages in dealing with the uncertainty associated with economic objectives.