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Critical Infrastructure: Water and Wastewater Systems Sector

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Encyclopedia of Security and Emergency Management

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Definitions

Critical infrastructure is comprised of those systems and assets, whether physical or virtual, that are so essential to a nation that any interruption could have a severe impact on national security, public health or safety, economic well-being, or any combination thereof (GAO 2011). Water and wastewater critical infrastructure includes the infrastructure necessary to transport, treat, store, distribute, and remove drinking water and wastewater and also to control water quantity and quality (Alcaraz and Zeadally 2015).

Introduction

A nation’s critical infrastructure, especially its water and wastewater treatment systems, provides the foundation for supporting public health, economic vitality, and healthy environment; defines its standard of living; and is the basis for a competitive advantage compared with other nations (Alcaraz and Zeadally 2015; EPA 2017; Jacobsen 2018). The reliability, performance, continuous operation, safety, maintenance, and protection of water and...

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References

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Future Readings

  • Clark, R., Hakim, S., & Ostfeld, A. (2011b). Handbook of water and wastewater systems protection. New York: Springer.

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  • Hamada, M., & Koike, T. (2015). Critical urban infrastructure handbook. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press.

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  • Lewis, T. (2015). Critical infrastructure protection in homeland security (1st ed.). Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Texas A&M University, College Station, TX, USA

    Kevin R. Gamache

Authors
  1. Kevin R. Gamache
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Correspondence to Kevin R. Gamache .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Dept of Security, Fire & Emergency Mgmt, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, New York, USA

    Lauren R. Shapiro

  2. Dept. of Security, Fire & Emergency Mgmt, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, New York, NY, USA

    Marie-Helen Maras

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Gamache, K.R. (2019). Critical Infrastructure: Water and Wastewater Systems Sector. In: Shapiro, L., Maras, MH. (eds) Encyclopedia of Security and Emergency Management. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-69891-5_63-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-69891-5_63-1

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-69891-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-69891-5

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