Assessment of Climate Resilience of Urban MSWM to Extreme rainfall in South Korea

This study provides methodological insights for adapting to climate crises in order to maintain urban functions in the field of waste management, where such efforts have not previously been undertaken. The purpose of this study is to develop a methodology for assessing the resilience of municipal solid waste (MSW) management to maintain normal functional performance during extreme rainfall events. The research procedure was structured as follows: 1. System structuring – defining the target waste streams and system boundaries, and establishing an evaluation framework in relation to extreme rainfall; 2. Causal loop diagram construction – identifying the impacts of heavy rainfall on MSW management functions as well as reinforcing and balancing factors; 3. Derivation of evaluation indicators – determining key factors from the causal loop diagram and extracting indicators capable of assessing these factors; 4. Application of the evaluation methodology (Anchored Min–Max Scaling, AMMS) – AMMS is an improved normalization technique that incorporates the modal interval and its midpoint to better represent typical conditions, thereby enhancing the realism of the assessment; 5. Resilience assessment – evaluating exposure, sensitivity, adaptive capacity, and their combinations. The methodology was applied to all 229 local governments in Korea, using indicator data for the year 2023. The results were visualized through map-based representations to facilitate intuitive interpretation. Based on these evaluations, spatial variations, inter-indicator differences, and regional vulnerabilities were analyzed. In addition, the study yielded important implications drawn from the evaluation results.