Designing Natural Assurance Schemes with Integrated Decision Support and Adaptive Planning

Abstract Defining and managing integrated urban, river basin and climate adaptation plans towards sustainable development, good ecological status as well as reduced water-related risk is challenging. Uncertainties regarding the future of cities and river basins require these plans to be adaptive. NBS are increasingly put forward as relevant measures to cope with climate related risks and challenges. However, the greening of climate adaptation planning with NBS in a context of risk, requires a well-structured decision-making process that enables the integration of NBS into national, regional and catchment planning processes and financing structures. To facilitate this integration, it is important to connect NBS with Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR), Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) and Climate Change Adaptation (CCA) frameworks, amongst others. Decision-making, however, is not a one-off action. To ensure the implementability of NBS, it is necessary to take key decisions in different steps of the planning, design and management phases. The use of tools and methods in these different steps can help informed decision-making, and as a result the formulation of evidence-based, reliable and well accepted solutions.