Resilience assessment of water distribution networks – Bibliometric analysis and systematic review

Infrastructure resilience is quite an emerging topic that has captured tremendous interest among researchers and practitioners. Resilience of water distribution networks (WDNs) established itself as one of the most promising and growing hotspots in the realm of sustainable management against extreme hazards. This study aims to delve into the manifestation, genesis, progression, and gaps of the resilience research related to WDNs. The study comprises a meticulous quantitative and qualitative delineation of 184 articles between 2000 and 2021 utilizing a combination of bibliometric analysis and systematic review. Network analysis (co-word, co-citation, co-author, and clustering) was employed to determine and visualize the prominent topics, influential publications, citation patterns, and productive authors and countries along with their interconnections. Subsequently, text mining tools and critical content analysis were adopted to explore extant research characteristics and gaps. Three thematic clusters were identified 1) hydraulic simulation for resilience assessment, 2) surrogate measures and comparative studies, and 3) connectivity and topological metrics. A bias in the research literature towards classical resilience assessment overlooking organizational, adaptive, and interdependency aspects was reported. The in-depth understanding provided in this study is expected to unlock new research and investment opportunities in the domain of WDNs resilience.