Three criteria for evaluating the possible performance of water resource systems are discussed. These measures describe how likely a system is to fail (reliability), how quickly it recovers from failure (resiliency), and how severe the consequences of failure may be (vulnerability). These criteria can be used to assist in the evaluation and selection of alternative design and operating policies for a wide variety of water resource projects. The performance of a water supply reservoir with a variety of operating policies illustrates their use.

Different methods for allocating the joint costs of water supply projects among users are compared on the basis of certain commonsense principles of equity. We contrast the separable costs-remaining benefits (SCRB) method with simple proportional allocation schemes and more sophisticated methods from cooperative game theory, including the Shapley value and variants of the core. Advantages and disadvantages of the methods in practice are examined using a regional water supply system in Sweden. It is argued that these principles provide a useful framework for choosing intelligently among methods. The appropriateness of a method depends on the context, especially on the reliability of information about costs and demands. The conclusion is that there is no one best method, although from a normative standpoint the SCRB method may be one of the worst.

When water resource systems investments are made there is little assurance that the predicted performance will coincide with the actual performance. Robustness is proposed as a measure of the likelihood that the actual cost of a proposed project will not exceed some fraction of the minimum possible cost of a system designed for the actual conditions that occur in the future. The robustness criterion is illustrated by its application to the planning of water supply systems in southwestern Sweden.

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