Abstract
The pursuit of flood prevention safety and the mitigation of drainage contradiction against an unnecessary influx of floodwater require a modern and efficient model to optimize the management of the initial allocation of flood drainage rights. We attempted to formulate a framework for initial flood drainage rights allocation to promote the sustainable drainage of the Sunan Canal, China. The Pressure-State-Response (PSR) model was constructed using a literature review and interviews with experts and directors using 18 key indicators being determined from field surveys and library studies. We then assessed the flood status of Zhenjiang City, Changzhou City, Wuxi City and Suzhou City in the Sunan Canal zone using an entropy-based matter-element model. The flood drainage rights for a total of 400m3/s was allocated to the four cities in accordance with their flood status. Our research demonstrated that, overall, the four cities may gain the flood drainage rights of 106.67m3/s,120.40m3/s, 118.22m3/s and 54.71m3/s, respectively. Specifically, the calculation of the flood drainage for Wuxi was very close to the actual allocation in 2016, whereas there were differences in the other cities that should not be neglected.