International Journal of Critical Infrastructure Protection 28 (2020) 100340

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International Journal of Critical Infrastructure Protection

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijcip

Resilience for whom? The general public’s tolerance levels as CI

resilience criteria
Laura Petersen a,∗, Emma Lundin b, Laure Fallou c, Johan Sjöström b, David Lange d,
Rui Teixeira e, Alexandre Bonavita c
a
UIC, 16 rue Jean Rey, 75016 Paris, France
b
RISE Research Institutes of Sweden, Box 857, 501 15 Borås, Sweden
c
European-Mediterranean Seismological Centre (EMSC), C/o CEA, Bt. Bard, Centre DAM - Ile de France, Bruyères le Châtel, 91297 Arpajon, France
d
School of Civil Engineering, The University of Queensland, Brisbane Queensland 4072, Australia
e
Divisão de Águas e Saneamento, Barreiro Municipality, Portugal Rua dos Resistentes Antifascistas - Edifício TCB, 2830 - 523 Barreiro, Portugal

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: While maintaining a minimum level of service and rapidly restoring services to normal are key compo-
Received 29 October 2019 nents of critical infrastructure (CI) resilience, who should and how to define these parameters remains
Accepted 11 February 2020
under debate. Rarely solicited in the debate, yet integral actors in CI resilience, is the general public. In
Available online 26 February 2020
response to this, this paper presents a questionnaire-based methodology for determining public tolerance
Keywords: levels for service reduction and recovery rapidity. This paper explores this under-researched area using
Resilience a case-study of the Barreiro Municipal Water Network. It draws on key themes that emerged from the
Critical infrastructure literature as well as interviews with the CI operators in order to develop a tolerance questionnaire, im-
Tolerance triangles plements said questionnaire (N = 1005), and analysizes the results. Results demonstrate that the method-
Crisis communication ology works for collecting tolerance levels, that when taking into account vulnerable groups, public tol-
IMPROVER erance levels appear higher than CI operator capability and that communication expectations are high.
© 2020 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction Adding to this complexity, CI is defined differently by different

The H2020 European project IMPROVER (Improved risk eval-
uation and implementation of resilience concepts to critical
infrastructure) defines critical infrastructure (CI) resilience as:
“the ability of a CI system exposed to hazards to resist, absorb,
accommodate to and recover from the effects of a hazard in a
timely and efficient manner, for the preservation and restoration
of essential societal services.” This is a modified version of the
definition of resilience as given by the UNDRR [50]. Key aspects
associated with CI resilience then are the abilities to maintain a
minimum acceptable level of service and to rapidly restore full
service in relation to a crisis event. However, there is currently
no consensus on the definition of these terms. This most likely
stems from the fact that resilience is a ‘formal’ concept, in that it
does not say “what the functions are that a system should be able
to maintain but rather that resilient performance is the ability to
keep or enhance certain – still to be decided – functions” [11].
∗
Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: laura.petersen1@gmail.com (L. Petersen), emma.lundin@ri.se
(E. Lundin), fallou@emsc-csem.org (L. Fallou), johan.sjostrom@ri.se (J. Sjöström),
d.lange@uq.edu.au (D. Lange), RTeixeira@cm-barreiro.pt (R. Teixeira).
jurisdictions around the world. For example, the European defini-
tion is “An asset, system or part thereof located in Member States
which is essential for the maintenance of vital societal functions,
health, safety, security, economic or social well-being of people,
and the disruption or destruction of which would have a signifi-
cant impact in a Member State as a result of the failure to main-
tain those functions.” [12]. Other definitions, such as in the NIS
directive of the EU, focus on the operators of services which are
essential for the maintenance of critical societal and/or economic
activities [10]. Regardless, whether it is a service or an asset that is
deemed to be the CI, they are often characterised as complex sys-
tems that are subject to state ownership, investment or regulation.
The impact to a community of damage to these systems is high, as
are the replacement or upgrade costs. They therefore form a vital
part of the risk profile and mitigation capacity of a community.
However, when developing investment strategies associated
with the replacement or upgrade of CI, the concept of resilience
as defined above is not enough on its own to motivate any
decision-making process. This concept may be defined as re-
silience “analysis”, and the process accompanying this concept is
a study which has as its output information about how resilient
an infrastructure is; i.e. what is the minimum service level when

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijcip.2020.100340
1874-5482/© 2020 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
2 L. Petersen, E. Lundin and L. Fallou et al. / International Journal of Critical Infrastructure Protection 28 (2020) 100340
the infrastructure is exposed to a certain magnitude of event and
how rapidly can the infrastructure recover. However, it is not
sufficient to simply know the level of resilience of a system. It
is also necessary to know if a given CI is resilient enough. Thus
criteria for what “minimum” and what “rapidly” mean should be
established that could be used in a resilience evaluation process
that follows the resilience analysis.
As there is no universally accepted resilience level, defining
these terms is a values-based decision and will depend on what
goal is attributed to CI. Considering that the main purposes of CI
is to deliver services to society and improve or maintain commu-
nity well-being, IMPROVER, while acknowledging the importance
of other options such as legislative requirements or basic needs,
suggests to ask the general public to define these parameters. This
perspective builds on the link between social resilience and CI re-
silience. Many existing social resilience analysis methodologies in-
clude indicators relating to CI (e.g. [1,16]), and CI require human
actors to function. Being able to tolerate a reduction in the qual-
ity, quantity, or availability of a service provided by a CI demon-
strates coping capacity, a key factor in social resilience. Thus, there
is a positive feedback loop that exists between social and CI re-
silience. Indeed, tackling this question from the viewpoint of CI
being providers of essential services allows one to easily answer
the pertinent “resilience for whom?” question [7,8]. Furthermore,
despite fears to the contrary, previous work has found that the
general public have reasonable expectations of CI operators in cri-
sis times [34]. As an added bonus for CI operators, going beyond
meeting needs or legislative requirements to meeting public expec-
tations helps maintain CI reputation during a crisis [2]. However,
few studies have examined public tolerance levels of CI during cri-
sis, choosing instead to focus either on normal times or on expert
opinion. This may pose an issue as expert priorities and opinions
are likely to differ from those of the general public [49] as are ex-
pectations during normal vs. crisis times.
Thus, IMPROVER has attempted to operationalise the defining of
performance criteria (“minimum” & “rapidly”) via the creation of
a questionnaire survey to the public determining their perception
of their own coping capacity when faced with a crisis. The goal of
the questionnaire is to have a comprehensive understanding of the
local population’s coping capacity, expectations and/or tolerance
levels during crisis situations. Questionnaires have been previously
used to determine people’s ability to deal with disturbance and
change in various domains [25,30]. Previous research into cus-
tomer preferences and satisfaction has also used questionnaires to
establish coping capacity in times of service reduction, although
not necessarily in crisis times [41,49]. Thus, using a questionnaire
methodology to study coping capacity in crisis times is, so far as
can be ascertained by the authors of this paper, a new endeavour.
This article explores the rationality behind the development of
a tolerance questionnaire and then examines the results of the fi-
nalized questionnaire methodology as applied to the Barreiro Mu-
nicipal Water Network case study. It does so by first examining
public expectations for water in crisis times in the literature and
describing the case study. It then presents the methodology for
the questionnaire design, the results of the questionnaire and a
discussion of the results. Results demonstrate that the methodol-
ogy works for collecting tolerance levels, that when taking into ac-
count vulnerable groups, public tolerance levels appear higher than
CI operator capability and that communication expectations are
high.
1.1. Public expectations for water in crisis times
Despite water being a basic need, previous research on expec-
tations/satisfaction of water service disruptions have shown that
attitudes are not very strongly held on this subject matter [49].
Research also demonstrates that the general public is not prepared
to be self-sustaining in case of water shortages caused by disas-
ters [47,48]. Research into water customer preferences have been
used to establish coping capacity in times of water shortage due to
planned or unplanned works, but outside the scope of a disaster.
Unsurprisingly, costumers had a higher tolerance for planned inter-
ruptions than unplanned [41]. During normal times, Speers et al.
[41] found that at a duration of 7 h or greater, the majority of cus-
tomers are dissatisfied with the water service. MacDonald et al.
[27] found that 61% of residents of Adelaide, Australia, had already
experienced a service interruption, and 52% of them found the
event to be “inconvenient.” While focus groups in that same study
listed providing an alternative water supply and improved commu-
nication with customers as important mitigating factors for service
interruption, the accompanying willingness to pay model demon-
strated that customers are not willing to pay for these services
and are only willing to pay more to ensure that their water sup-
ply is less frequently interrupted. However, in a disaster situation,
using a willingness-to-pay model seems inappropriate. After a cri-
sis, people will need to have access to water as a basic human
need, regardless of cost. A more recent study by Petersen et al.
[34] examined tolerance levels during a crisis situation for the
following four service disruption scenarios: drinking water from
tanks provided, bottled drinking water provided, water still on tap
but need to boil it and reduced pressure. The study found that
drinking water from tanks was mostly accepted in the short term
whereas reduced pressure appeared to be well accepted on the long
term [34].
1.2. Barreiro municipal water network living lab case study
The IMPROVER project uses Living Labs in order to study vari-
ous aspects of critical infrastructure resilience. Living Labs are a re-
search concept that create an open-innovation ecosystem and use
a systematic user co-creation process. This means the actors of a
Living Lab are not simply subjects but also active participants in
the research process. Living Labs have been the focal point of the
scientific work carried out within IMPROVER and have been used
to test various project methodologies, including the creation and
implementation of tolerance questionnaires. One such Living Lab is
the Barreiro Municipal Water Network.
The city of Barreiro is part of the Lisbon metropolitan area, lo-
cated on the south bank of the Tagus River estuary, about 40 km
from the city of Lisbon. It has a population of almost 80 0 0 0 peo-
ple with an area of 36.41 km2 . Ferries and two bridges connect
Barreiro to Lisbon. The Barreiro Municipal Water Network deliv-
ers potable water to the municipality of Barreiro and serves 42,400
customers. It is the only water operator in Barreiro. It has an an-
nual water flow of 620 0,0 0 0 m3 . The drinking water comes exclu-
sively from an underground aquifer. Several hazards may influence
the water network in Barreiro including earthquakes (leading to
severe ground shaking or liquefaction), droughts and heatwaves. A
historical example includes the 1755 earthquake which devastated
the area with ground shaking as well as a tsunami. A more recent
example comes from 1969, when Barreiro’s water network endured
moderate damage due to a 6.8 Magnitude earthquake event (epi-
centre some 340 km southwest of Barreiro) which led to the un-
availability of potable water for 24 h. [24]. While the water net-
work in Barreiro is not designated as CI in Portugal, it clearly falls
under the definition as given above and is similar in composition
to other potable water networks throughout Europe.
Within the IMPROVER project, a previous study also using ques-
tionnaires was implemented in various living labs, including the
Barreiro Municipal Water Network. The non-representative, online
study found that respondents expected CI operators to provide dis-
aster related information via traditional media (97%), on their web-
 L. Petersen, E. Lundin and L. Fallou et al. / International Journal of Critical Infrastructure Protection 28 (2020) 100340
site (79%), by calling a telephone number (77%) and social media
(69%) [33]. Further, 63% of respondents expected CI operators to re-
spond to comments and queries on social media (idem). Previous
research by IMPROVER also found that nationality affects expecta-
tions for post disaster service levels and that Portuguese respon-
dents were the least likely to tolerate a reduction in service (when
compared to French, Swedish or Norwegian respondents, the other
nationalities studied) [34], showing the impact of cultural factors
on public expectations.
2. Methodology
Operationalizing public tolerance levels as resilience criteria
was done by 1) exploring relevant aspects to the questionnaire de-
sign 2) interviewing the living lab 3) designing the questionnaire
in close collaboration with the resilience analysis team based on
relevant input from the interview and 4) implementing the ques-
tionnaire, targeting Barreiro residents.
2.1. Questionnaire rationale
2.1.1. Comparability
In order to use public tolerance levels as resilience criteria they
must be collected in such a way that they are comparable to the
indicators or metrics that are being used to analyse the technical
resilience of the CI. Otherwise, the tolerance levels cannot be used
to assess the CI performance but will instead function as a stand-
alone qualitative indicator of the expectations from the public that
the CI serves. Resilience analysis can take many forms depending
on the resilience domain one is interested in. That said, within the
IMPROVER project a resilience analysis using the IMPROVER Tech-
nical Resilience Analysis (ITRA) methodology is defined [20]. This
methodology outputs a version of the performance loss and re-
covery function, or resilience triangle, as defined by Tierney and
Bruneau [46]. Thus, the questionnaire has been designed to pro-
vide results corresponding to these results. A pilot case study of
the Hungarian M1 Highway has already been performed to ensure
the compatibility of this [35]. As technological resilience is typi-
cally hazard dependant, having a strong link to risk analysis, and
declared tolerance levels have been found to be dependant on the
type of crisis at hand [35], both ITRA and the questionnaire are
scenario-based. Thus, the same hazard scenario, the defined func-
tionality and ways of measuring performance need to reflect one
another.
2.1.2. Influencing factors
Public tolerance levels for service reduction in crisis times are
neither homogenous nor static. Thus, simply asking the public
what they can cope with in terms of “minimum” and “rapid” con-
cerning CI is not enough. In fact, previous research has found
that tolerance levels are influenced by crisis communication, risk
awareness, previous disaster experience and demographic factors
[34]. Thus, the questionnaire should be designed in such a way as
to take into account these factors. While the questionnaire will es-
tablish tolerance levels for a given time, understanding the factors
which influence tolerance levels allows one to further comprehend
the expectations of the public and create a criteria level which goes
beyond that given time.
Crisis communication: Information related to CI is of great in-
terest to the public in times of crisis and information provision of-
ten leads to changes in individuals’ perceived coping capacity. For
instance, Bylund & Lille [4] found that Swedish communities who
were informed about water disruption ahead of time were willing
to go without water service for longer periods of time than those
who had not been informed. Further, citizens are likely to expect
regular updates on progress towards the restoration of services
3
provided by CI operators [33]. Recent research has shown that the
public do expect CI operators to provide disaster related informa-
tion via both traditional and social media [33]. When expectations
of communication are not met this can lead to further discontent
and frustration within the affected communities [6,26]. Moreover,
several case studies have demonstrated that a lack of communica-
tion from the perceived responsible actor will often lead to the rise
of fake news and even conspiracy theories [15].
Thus, in order to fully understand the tolerance levels of the
general public, one must also examine communication expecta-
tions. The positive feedback-loop-like relationship between com-
municating about the crisis and the public’s willingness to tolerate
a reduction in CI service means that it is of interest to know how
to best reach and what kinds of information to share with the pub-
lic in order to, in the future, influence their stated tolerance level,
if those levels fall below operator capabilities.
Further, when it comes to crisis communication the presence of
trustworthy sources is recognized as more fundamental than the
choice of the channel [38]. People will look for information from
a source that they consider trustworthy and legitimate [45]. As
demonstrated in the CARISMAND project, trust during a crisis con-
text is highly cultural. The actor that will be considered a trusted
source by the population depends on cultural factors and previous
experience [29]. This emphasises the need for CI operators to eval-
uate these expectations beforehand.
Risk awareness & previous disaster experience: Risk culture as
a whole can influence the public’s expectation. Taking the exam-
ple of flood risk, Samadaar et al. [37] have shown that risk aware-
ness influences the type and level (e.g. local or national) of author-
ity people will trust in case of disaster, as well as the authority
that will be perceived as legitimate to communicate preparedness
information. Moreover, results show that trust established before
the disaster through effective communication will contribute to a
higher risk awareness and to a better resilience level. Unsurpris-
ingly, research has shown that experiencing a previous disaster af-
fects the expectations of those individuals towards CI operators. Of
particular relevance to this study, Petersen [34] found that people
who had previously experienced a disaster were more willing to
accept the reduced service level of drinking water being provided in
tanks than those who had no such experience.
Demographic factors: Age, gender, nationality, education level
and socio-economic status influence declared tolerance of reduc-
tion in CI service. For example, younger respondents were either
equally or more accepting of service reductions than other age
groups, women were less likely to say they accept a given wa-
ter service reduction than men and that, as previously stated, Por-
tuguese respondents were less likely to accept service reductions
compared to some other nationalities [34]. As such, using an aver-
age value as resilience criteria masks the heterogenous aspects of
society and puts one at risk of leaving out vulnerable populations.
Often in disaster situations, women, who are already more vulner-
able than men in normal times, are at an even greater disadvan-
tage. Knowing that women have lower tolerance levels than men
for water service would allow the operator to provide water ser-
vice in line with the expectations of this group. Thus, knowing the
demographics allows operators to better understand the declared
tolerance at a given time but also to change their crisis response
to better meet the needs of all citizens.
2.2. Interview with the living lab
Semi-structured interviews were held with employees from the
Barreiro Municipal Water Network in order to further the under-
standing of the system function as well as how they would act
in the case of a crisis. The interviews were also used to deter-
mine which crisis scenario to study, define the CI functionality and
4 L. Petersen, E. Lundin and L. Fallou et al. / International Journal of Critical Infrastructure Protection 28 (2020) 100340
the ways in which to measure CI performance. In order to more
fully understand the public’s tolerance levels, discussions around
their current crisis communication practices took place. The
interviewees included an actor from the wastewater and water
supply management, an environmental engineer for water quality,
and the manager of new technologies and the Water Security Plan.
The first interview was conducted in English on 18–19 February
2016 and, as part of an iterative process, data continued to be col-
lected during the entire project lifetime (May 2015 to June 2018).
If a crisis situation leads to a water outage longer than 24 h, the
operators shared that they plan to use two water tanks of 80 m3
capacity, provided by Barreiro Firefighters, to provide water to the
public. This water will need to be boiled before use. Part of recov-
ery will include clearing activities, which will differ in length based
on locality, in order to enable maintenance operators to access the
affected areas. Following which water may again be available on
tap, depending on the sector. Realistically this will be possible af-
ter each stand-alone sector has been fully repaired and then prop-
erly flushed. In the ITRA study the time to flush a system sector
was anticipated to 1–2 weeks. The operators use the World Health
Organisation (WHO) recommendations in terms of minimum water
to be made available to Barreiro residents during a crisis and plan
on making about 20 L/person/day available. For recovery times, the
operators shared that it is heavily dependant on the scale of the
disaster:
“For example, if it affects one supply zone or even one of the
3 sectors [stand-alone pressure zones], we can always provide
[potable water] through the others [zones] and in any of these
cases…30 min would be enough time to make tanks available
with drinking water. If the catastrophe were larger, affecting our
entire system, it [water] would have to come from neighbouring
municipalities or even farther away and by then we would be
talking about one to a few hours depending on where the water
would come from.”
Thanks to the interview as well as continued input from the op-
erators over the course of the project, realistic performance mea-
sures, recovery times, hazard scenario and media channels were
chosen for the questionnaire. Normal performance was considered
as the normal domestic water use, covering consumption (drink-
ing and cooking), hygiene (both personal and domestic cleanli-
ness) and amenity use (e.g. watering plants, washing bikes) as
listed by WHO (Howard & Bartram, 2003), which equates to about
200 L/person/day in Barreiro, based on average water consumption.
As stated in the introduction, using public perception of their own
coping capacity in crisis times as a criterion for resilience requires
obtaining it in such a way as to be comparable to technical re-
silience analysis results. Thus, these same performance measures
were used for both the questionnaire and the ITRA study, inspired
by David [9]:
1. Water delivery: Percentage of the population served by the pipe
system through water on tap but the water delivered may not
meet the quality or quantity requirements (if additional purifi-
cation of water is needed this must be noted by the operators).
2. Water quality: Percentage of population that have access to wa-
ter at pre-event standards, here meaning at drinkable standards
without further purification and at minimum pressure require-
ments.
3. Water quantity: Litres of water available per person per day
from any type of delivery source.
The IMPROVER project carried out an expert elicitation to dis-
cover which hazard scenarios were most relevant for Barreiro to
consider in a resilience analysis [24]. During this study the opera-
tors made known that the scenario the most relevant for them out
of those proposed would be liquefaction following a severe earth-
quake, thus this scenario was chosen for further study.
Lastly, how the operators communicate during crisis was dis-
cussed. While admitting that “communication tends to fail during
incidents,” the operators made known the importance they accord
to crisis communication and their desire to improve this aspect. In
that vein, they are working on a smartphone application to provide
the public with information and also to gather information from
the public. As the municipality of Barreiro has a high percentage of
elderly residents that do not have access to the internet, they are
also focusing on developing automatic communication via SMS to
reach those residents. They also stated that the most used means
of communication with the public is the telephone and that they
provide a call centre. It also seems that most of the communica-
tion with the public comes from the municipality in general, and
not from the infrastructure operators themselves, with the munic-
ipality using a website, an FAQ page, social media platforms and
traditional media to communicate with citizens.
2.3. Question design
The questionnaire was designed as a telephone questionnaire in
order to reach the population, including those who do not have
internet access, and was carried out in the local language, Por-
tuguese. Responses were translated back to English for data analy-
sis. The full questionnaire is available in the annex.
The questionnaire started by asking questions intended to es-
tablish attitudes towards the operator (how satisfied are you with
your current water provider?) as well as previous disaster experi-
ence (have you ever witnessed a disaster?) and a question designed
to gauge risk awareness (do you have enough water stocked for an
eventual water shortage?).
Based on the expert elicitation the following scenario was pre-
sented: “Imagine that a high magnitude earthquake occurs, where
a large part of the population is left without access to potable wa-
ter on tap without any previous warning.” The scenario was meant
to establish the fact that the water service will be affected due to
the severe earthquake. It was also important to state that there
would be no warning, as having information beforehand affects
people’s willingness to cope with lower service levels.
Questions to measure tolerance were asked for the three per-
formance measures identified using situational, laymen’s terms in-
stead of technical vocabulary for clarity (for more on the impor-
tance of the understandability of questionnaires, see [31]). Based
on the operators’ emergency strategy, the scenario of water in
tanks was used in the questionnaire and bottled water as an alter-
native level of service was not proposed. The recovery times given
in the survey were developed with a view to the real-world per-
formance capabilities of the Barreiro operators and were <12 h;
12–24 h; 1–2 days; 3–4 days; 5–6 days; 1 week; 2 weeks; 2 weeks
– 1 month; More than 1 month.
To better understand the information-seeking behaviours of the
local population and thus better understand their expectations as
per the literature review, questions about mobile phone and Inter-
net access as well as frequency of use of social media sites were
asked, followed by specific questions regarding which communi-
cation channels would be used to find out information about 1)
the earthquake generally and 2) water service specifically. Next,
respondents were asked about which kind of information they ex-
pected to receive from the water operators, via which channels,
after how much time and whether there was an expectation for
communication to be two-way. Questions were also created to
learn more about the population’s desire for SMS alerts, a smart-
phone app, and crowdsourcing to align with the findings of the
interview. Understanding the importance of trustworthiness when
it comes to crisis communication (see literature review above), re-
 L. Petersen, E. Lundin and L. Fallou et al. / International Journal of Critical Infrastructure Protection 28 (2020) 100340
spondents were asked their trust level for relevant stakeholders,
including, due to the current crisis communication situation in Bar-
reiro, the municipality. Lastly, the questionnaire asked about demo-
graphic information.
2.4. Questionnaire implementation
A representative sample of 1005 (with a confidence level of
95.5% and an error value of +/- 3%) based on age and gender of
Barreiro residents was interviewed. The questionnaire was carried
out by Pitagórica - Investigação e Estudos de Mercado SA who
used a Quantitative Methodology, with the realization of telephone
interviews in a CATI philosophy – Computer Assisted Telephone
Interviewing, conducted with automatic validation and supported
by an Auto Dial System. A few face-to-face interviews were also
held following a TAPI philosophy – Tablet Assisted Telephone In-
terviewing, as there were issues finding enough young adults to
answer the questionnaire via the telephone and these TAPI inter-
views make up part of the 1005 sample. Data collection was from
11 October 2017 to 5 November 2017. The questionnaire received
ethics approval from the project ethics officer. Respondents were
informed of their right to withdraw from the survey at any time
and that the anonymized data from the questionnaire could be
used in publications, presentations and reports. Chi-squared tests
were performed to explore any significant differences across re-
sponses. The null hypothesis used was “a particular variable is not
correlated to a particular tolerance level or communication prefer-
ence.”
2.5. Questionnaire sample characteristics
The target population for the questionnaire was residents of
Barreiro, Portugal aged 18 years and over. As per the Barreiro cen-
sus [23], 53% of respondents identified as female and 47% identi-
fied as male. Whereas only 15% of the Barreiro population has a
university level education, 32% of respondents declared an educa-
tion level of university or higher. 15% of respondents stated that
they do not have internet access, and 70% stated that they use
the internet at least once a day. This is similar to Internet access
statistics for Portugal, where access is at 70% of the households,
and 69% of individuals have used Internet in the last three months
[14]. Respondents were asked if they use the following social me-
dia platforms: Facebook (68% use), Instagram (27% use) and Twitter
(9% use). Most respondents have some kind of mobile phone, with
62% owning a smartphone and 36% owning another kind of mobile
phone.
3. Results
3.1. Disaster preparedness
Most Barreiro residents (77%) are satisfied with the Barreiro
Municipal Water Network service. This despite the fact that most
of (70%) the residents of Barreiro have experienced a water short-
age in the past, mainly due to network rupture. Few respondents
(9%) were dissatisfied with how the operators handled the situa-
tion (Fig. 1). Despite high previous levels of experiencing a water
shortage, 64% of respondents do not have water stocked in case of
water shortage. No respondents reported suffering a water short-
age due to disaster, probably because only 24% report having pre-
viously experienced a disaster. Those who had, mostly experienced
fire, earthquake and flood (Fig. 2). Lastly, 84% of respondents be-
lieve the period after a crisis be a good time to implement im-
provements to the water service.
5
Fig. 1. Satisfaction with how operators handled previous water shortages.
Fig. 2. Types of disasters experienced, based on the 24% of respondents who stated
they have experienced a disaster.
3.2. Tolerances
As CI resilience is often portrayed as a resilience triangle [3],
here we propose to transpose the results of the questionnaire into
what we are calling “tolerance triangles” [21]. Thus, a tolerance tri-
angle is created by the accumulated percentages of respondents
willing to tolerate a given service reduction for a given time frame.
Before the earthquake, it is assumed there is a normal performance
level, reflected by a value of 0 (i.e. in normal conditions, people
will not tolerate having to get water from tanks, boil the water, or
limits on water consumption), creating the triangle shape. While
research has shown that some tolerance exists for water perfor-
mance to dip below normal even in non-crises times, as this ques-
tion was not asked in our questionnaire, we assume a tolerance of
0 for normal times.
When it comes to water delivery, the majority of respondents
(67%) are willing to get water from tanks for up to 2 days post-
earthquake (Fig. 3). For water quality, almost half of respondents
(47%) are willing to go up to 1 week post-earthquake during which
they need to boil the water (Fig. 4). Unsurprisingly, when it comes
to water quantity, the less water available the less long respon-
dents are willing to tolerate that situation (Fig. 5). For example,
10 L per day is tolerated by the majority of respondents for only 1
– 2 days, whereas 100 L is tolerated for 2 weeks (Fig. 5).
For all tolerance triangles, significant differences were found
based on demographic factors. Concerning gender, differences were
slight. However, respondents with a university or higher educa-
tion were willing to tolerate service reductions for longer periods
of time when compared to those with a lower education level
(Fig. 6). When it comes to boiling water, the relation between the
variables was statistically significant, and we reject the null hy-
pothesis (no differences between education levels) with a confi-
dence of 87%. For example, the majority of respondents with a
university or higher level of education tolerate boiling water for
1 week, whereas the majority of respondents with a high school
or lower level of education tolerate boiling water for only 3 – 4
days. Difference in tolerances could also be noticed between in-
come levels. Respondents with lower income levels were willing
to tolerate service disruptions for less long than those with higher
income levels (Fig. 6). When it comes to boiling water, the relation
between the variables was significant, and we reject the null hy-
pothesis with a confidence of 99.5%. For example, the majority of
respondents earning less than 800 € per month are only willing to
6 L. Petersen, E. Lundin and L. Fallou et al. / International Journal of Critical Infrastructure Protection 28 (2020) 100340

Fig. 3. Tolerance level for water not delivered on tap but provided via tanks (water delivery). The ordinate shows percentage of the respondents willing to accept the
limitation for a certain period of time.

Fig. 4. Tolerance level for boiling drinking water (water quality).

Fig. 5. Tolerance level for a given amount of water per person per day (water quantity).

Fig. 6. Tolerance level for boiling drinking water (water quality) by monthly income in €.
 L. Petersen, E. Lundin and L. Fallou et al. / International Journal of Critical Infrastructure Protection 28 (2020) 100340 7

Fig. 7. Tolerance level for water not delivered on tap, but provided via tanks (water delivery) by Age.

Fig. 8. Sources “very likely” & “likely” to be consulted for earthquake-related information and water specific information. For Facebook and Twitter, the question was only
asked of those respondents who declared to use those platforms. Website of water provider and calling the water provider were not asked for general earthquake information.

boil water during 1 – 2 days (64%) whereas the majority (57%) of
respondents earning more than 2400 € tolerate 1 week (Fig. 7).
Age clearly affects tolerance levels with a 100% confidence for
a rejected null hypotheses (age cannot explain differences in toler-
ance) for water delivery and quality, and 50% for water quantity.
Highest tolerance for delivery interruptions can be found in the
age categories 45–54 and 35–44 years old. For these groups half
the respondents accepted water not being delivered on tap for a
duration of 4–5 days whereas the tolerance decreases distinctly for
both younger and older respondents (Fig. 7). The same variations
are found for water quality where the majority of young respon-
dents (aged 18 −24) are only willing to tolerate boiling water for
1 – 2 days, whereas the equivalent tolerance time for respondents
aged 25 – 54 is 1 week. Again, for age category 65 years and over
the willingness stretches a shorter duration; 3 – 4 days of having
to boil the water.
3.3. Crisis communication
3.3.1. Information sources
When asked which sources respondents would use to look for
disaster related information following an earthquake, TV news was
the most often referenced, by 79% of respondents (Fig. 8).
Respondents were then asked which sources they would go to
for information related to the water service in the case of an earth-
quake. With the exception of official Twitter accounts and web-
site of local authorities, all sources were less often chosen by re-
spondents for information regarding water information compared
to general earthquake-related information. That said, TV news re-
mains the most often cited main source of information in both
cases. Age was the only studied variable that significantly (88%
confidence) could explain variations in the results. Indeed, younger
respondents were more likely than older respondents to look for
earthquake information on online news sites (84% for respondents
aged 18 – 24 vs 34% for respondents aged 65 years and older).
3.3.2. Sharing of crisis messages
The most commonly asked for crisis information for water op-
erators to provide was estimated restoration times (43%) followed
by ways to work around the lack of water (25%) (Fig. 9). The com-
munication channels respondents expected operators to use were
mainly TV (74%) followed by Twitter (19%) (Fig. 10). Only 3% of re-
spondents didn’t expect operators to provide information (Fig. 10).
Respondents are pretty divided on how quickly operators should
start providing crisis information, with 20% expecting information
to be shared within 10 min of the event whereas 28% are expecting
information to be shared after 1 h from event onset (Fig. 11, left). A
large majority of respondents (75%) expect operators to respond to
questions and comments on social media (Fig. 11, middle), and out
of those respondents, about half (52%) expect a response within
1 h (Fig. 11, right). While few respondents (2%) listed SMS as a
source they expect operators to provide information, when asked
if interested in a free SMS alert system, 63% of respondents stated
yes. In contrast, respondents were almost equally divided in their
interest to have a smartphone app (49% yes and 51% no). 71% of
respondents who said they wanted a smartphone app also said
that they would use the app (very likely & likely responses com-
bined). When it comes to participating in a crowdsourcing initia-
tive regarding water supply, respondents were also divided. Lack of
availability (37%) and privacy issues (29%) were the two most given
8 L. Petersen, E. Lundin and L. Fallou et al. / International Journal of Critical Infrastructure Protection 28 (2020) 100340

Fig. 9. The kind of information that water providers should share in the case of an earthquake or another natural disaster, in the event of the water distribution network
being affected. Respondents could provide multiple responses.

Fig. 10. Channels respondents expect the water service provider to use to provide crisis related information. If 2% or less listed the channel, it is regrouped under “Other.”.

Fig. 11. Time elapsed since the event that respondents consider appropriate for the water provider to start providing disaster related information (left); Expectation for
operators to respond to queries and comments on social media (middle); Acceptable length to respond to a comment or query posed by a respondent on social media, only
asked for respondents who stated “yes” to Q16 (right).

reasons for not wishing to participate in crowdsourcing. No signif-
icant differences were found based on demographic factors, except
for communication channel for information sharing, whereby age,
education and income level were shown to be significant (Figs. 12
and 13).
3.3.3. Trust
Respondents have high expectations that the water provider
and the municipality will provide information in the event of a
water shortage and they also highly trust these two sources. No
significant differences were found based on demographic factors.
4. Discussion
4.1. The general public tolerate service reductions in the case of an
earthquake
The tolerance levels of the general public are dependent on the
performance measure studied. Using the demographic information
provided by respondents, we are able to analyse the questionnaire
results with a view of taking into account vulnerable groups and
thus set resilience criteria to meet their expectations.
For water delivery, when having to get water from tanks, the
majority of the general public are willing to accept this service re-
duction for 1 – 2 days. This is consistent with the majority choice
for groups with the lowest tolerance level (respondents aged 18 –
24, respondents earning less than 800€/month/household, respon-
dents without previous disaster experience, for example), who also
chose 1 – 2 days. Thus it is recommended to use this time frame
as a resilience criteria for “rapidly” restoring services. The expecta-
tions of receiving water on tap seems to be higher than what could
be a likely scenario in the event of a severe earthquake.
Regarding quality, respondents had a higher tolerance level for
having to boil the water than for that of getting water from tanks.
Almost half of respondents were willing to boil water for 1 week.
However, for this service reduction to be acceptable to all sub-
groups, and notably to younger respondents and those earning less
than 800 €/month/household, only 1 – 2 days should be used as
 L. Petersen, E. Lundin and L. Fallou et al. / International Journal of Critical Infrastructure Protection 28 (2020) 100340 9

Fig. 12. Interest in a free SMS alert program, interest in a free smartphone app & interest in participating in a crowdsourcing initiative. SMS only asked of respondents who
had a mobile phone. App only asked of respondents who had a smartphone. The remaining percentage responded “I don’t know.”.

Fig. 13. In the event of water shortage, which of the following agents should provide information? And would you trust the information given by any of those agents?
Strongly agree & agree responses combined, trust a lot & trust responses combined, disagree & strongly disagree responses combined, distrust & don’t trust at all responses
combined.

the time frame for the resilience criteria. As the water network
must be flushed until water analysis show that the water meets
drinking water standards following severe damage to the water
pipe network, this suggested resilience criteria is unattainable. In-
deed, in the ITRA study, based on discussions with the operator, it
was assumed that it would take 2 weeks to flush each part of the
system and that it would be done with an increment of 20% at a
time [21].
The quantity of water that the operators intend to provide the
residents of Barreiro in the beginning of a crisis is 20 L, and this
amount of water is tolerated by the majority of respondents for
up to 6 days. However, the majority of respondents aged 18 – 24
are only willing to tolerate that level of water quantity for 12 –
14 h. For older respondents (aged 55 years and older), about half
are okay to tolerate these conditions for 3 – 4 days. After three
days, based on WHO recommendations, the operators will try to
provide 50 L of water/person/day, thus meeting expectations of all
respondents except for the youth. Surprisingly, being prepared for
a water shortage, i.e. stocking emergency water supplies in ones’
home, did not affect tolerance levels for water quantity. Respon-
dents appear willing to accept 50 L/person/day for a period of 1
week and 100 L/person/day for 2 weeks, suggesting that normal
water quantity of 200 L/person/day should be achieved by 2 weeks
post-earthquake. However, the amount which a person can carry
from a community supply point is limited. Thus, the quantity can
only realistically increase once the pipe system has been repaired
and water is delivered on tap.
In some cases, these tolerance levels are not reasonable or
within performance capabilities of the operators. When this hap-
pens, it is important to remember that changing service lev-
els is not the only way to enhance resilience. Indeed, as shown
in the literature review, communicating with the general pub-
lic is a great way to help them understand performance capa-
bilities and have more realistic tolerance levels if/when a cri-
sis hits. For example, a publicity campaign explaining why the
entire water network needs to be flushed before water can be
safely consumed from the tap could help increase tolerance lev-
els for this performance measure, especially considering that most
people are unfamiliar with how water networks function. Fur-
thermore, the comparisons provided here between operator abil-
ity and respondent expectations are not taking into account each
individual expectation. For example, those respondents willing
to wait 2 weeks may actually get water after 1 day, and vice
versa.
4.1.1. Some demographic factors affect tolerance levels
As seen in the results section as well as the previous sec-
tion, tolerance levels are highly dependent on demographic fac-
tors. Young respondents have the lowest tolerance levels for
service reductions. This is closely followed by elderly respon-
dents. The elderly often have special needs [44], which could
explain the lower tolerance levels. Similarly, respondents earn-
ing less than 800€/month/household have very low tolerance lev-
els, which most likely corresponds to the fact that they tend to
have more urgent needs during a disaster than their wealthier
counterparts [17], who can afford to perhaps leave the damaged
area. Respondents with a lower education level had lower toler-
ance levels than those with a higher education level. This is sim-
ilar to Caplan’s [5] findings that less educated members of the
public (i.e., those without university degree) are likely to hold
high expectations during disasters. A more recent study by Pe-
tersen et al. [34] found that education level seemed to influence
the acceptability of the minimum level of service for drinkable
water.
10 L. Petersen, E. Lundin and L. Fallou et al. / International Journal of Critical Infrastructure Protection 28 (2020) 100340
4.1.2. Other factors not found to affect tolerance levels
Despite research stating that previous disaster experience af-
fects how people react to disasters, the chi squared test did not
identify this variable as influencing tolerance levels. This is con-
trary to previous studies whereby previously experiencing a dis-
aster lead to a more accurate perception of risk [19] or to a
higher acceptance of drinking water from tanks during a disaster
[34]. Further, being prepared for water shortage by stocking wa-
ter at home, which was used as a proxy for risk awareness, also
did not affect tolerance levels. Thus, being aware of the earth-
quake risk and taking action to be prepared in case of a wa-
ter shortage following an earthquake does not appear to affect
the rapidity or minimum level of service expected from CI op-
erators. This further demonstrates the importance in the State
and other actors responsible for the crisis response taking on
a larger part of the burden in the shared responsibility of re-
silience. However, this proxy may not have accurately demon-
strated risk awareness, especially since we do not know what
prompted the few respondents who do keep water stored to
do so.
4.2. Public have high expectations for crisis communication from
operators
Almost all (93%) of respondents believe that the water service
should provide information related to a water shortage follow-
ing an earthquake, thus confirming the literature review whereby
people expect CI operators to communicate about crises. While
they are almost on-par for expectations of information from the
municipality (94%), the CI operator expectations vastly outweigh
other information sources more traditionally associated with dis-
asters such as the police, firefighters or journalists (by at least 30
points). Thus, it appears crucial for Barreiro operators to commu-
nicate about water shortages. Not only do they expect information
to be shared, but they expect it to be shared rather rapidly after
event onset. Indeed, only 28% are willing to wait over an hour
to be informed, demonstrating the importance in communicating
with the public ASAP. The need to be informed rapidly following
an earthquake has been shown in other areas [15] and the Red
Cross has declared that information sharing in a disaster is a basic
need [22].
The channel that the grand majority of respondents think
Barreiro water operators should use to communicate with them
through is television, vastly outweighing all other media types (by
at least a 55-point difference). This preference for television may
be linked to the high household share of television ownership
in Europe and that traditional media is highly trusted as a news
source. There is also some expectation (19%) that operators use
Twitter. Social media, like Twitter, generally encourages interaction
and dialogue between users, creating information space that is
essentially decentralized and devoid of hierarchy, inciting two-way
communication [18]. This is confirmed by respondents as 75%
expect operators to respond to comments and queries on social
media. Over half of respondents (52%) who expected operators to
respond on social media, expect the response to be within 1 h of
posting, further confirming the expected two-way nature of such
communication means. Using twitter as a two-way communication
method would be advantageous to CI operators. Indeed, two-way
communication has also been found to be fundamental in building
trust [28] and to be more effective in eliciting action during an
urgent situation [43].
4.2.1. Not all social media platforms are alike
The usage of a given media, while often indicative of the like-
lihood to use that media in a crisis, does not seem to apply to
Twitter in this case. Indeed, while only 8% of respondents declared
to use the social networking site, 19% of respondents expect the
water operator to use Twitter for crisis communication. Reasons
for Twitter’s popularity as an information source could be the fact
that news broadcasts on TV often cite Twitter as a source, and
TV was the most chosen information source of all. Another rea-
son that merits investigation could be that respondents clearly use
or intend to use Twitter more than they declared as their actual
current usage. The opposite appears to be true for Facebook. Al-
though 68% declare to use it, and of those 68%, over half (64% and
56%, respectively) stated they would look for earthquake informa-
tion and water supply information on Facebook, only 2% listed it
as a source they expected the water operator to use. Again, these
findings appear contradictory, but could be linked to the ways
in which the two social media platforms differentiate from each
other, with Twitter focusing much more on the now and Face-
book focusing on the longer term. Indeed, a recent Pew Research
center study found that 59% of Americans had followed a news
event as it was happening on Twitter, compared to 31% on Face-
book [40]. This discrepancy in views on the two social media plat-
forms shows the importance in knowing the expectations of the
public and in not treating social media as a homogenous mass
when it comes to crisis communication, as has been stated in other
studies [13].
4.2.2. Barreiro operator suggestions for improving communication
appear of interest to respondents
Signing up and receiving SMS alerts from the operator is the
most well received of the three proposed initiatives (smartphone
app and crowdsourcing being the two others) with 63% of respon-
dents in support. This high amount of support may seem in con-
trast with the expectations to communicate via SMS, (only 2%),
this could be because currently no such SMS alert currently ex-
ists. Providing such a communication system would then go be-
yond meeting expectations and also be found of use by users.
Respondents were divided on whether or not a smartphone app
would be of interest to them. As these questions were only asked
of those respondents who own such a phone (smart or other-
wise), not owning a smartphone has no bearing on the lower
acceptable of a smartphone app. This could then have to do
with the practicalities associated with apps: having to down-
load it, it taking up space on the phone’s hard drive, etc. Based
on this, it is recommended that the Barreiro operators focus
their efforts on an SMS alert system rather than a smartphone
app.
4.2.3. Barreiro operators are a trusted source
Through the questionnaire, users have demonstrated not only
a high level of satisfaction with the regular service, but also a
high level of trust towards Barreiro water service operator. In-
deed, the operators are as trusted as the municipality, and only 1
point less trusted than firefighters. As stated in the literature re-
view, trust is primordial for efficient crisis communication. This
further points to the fact that the Barreiro operators should be
actively communicating directly to the public during crisis. More-
over, trust is a process that tends to reinforce itself. When a spe-
cific tool or actor becomes the dominant source of information
for a person’s needs, it becomes more trusted and more influ-
ential [42]. Becoming the dominant source of information then
would help Barreiro operators to ensure public expectations re-
main within operator capabilities and perhaps even increase the
trust level.
4.3. Success of the method and generability of the results
The questionnaire successfully obtained responses from Barreiro
residents to determine both tolerance levels for service reductions
 L. Petersen, E. Lundin and L. Fallou et al. / International Journal of Critical Infrastructure Protection 28 (2020) 100340
and crisis communication expectations. The three performance
measures were able to be transcribed as questions answerable by
the general public and provide useful information for operators
regarding not only minimum acceptable level of service but also
what constitutes “rapid” restoration of services.
Since a given questionnaire is scenario based, it is hard to gen-
eralize our results. Plus, demographic factors play key role in de-
termining tolerances/expectations, therefore it is recommended to
perform a questionnaire for each CI operator. However, every oper-
ator should be able to use the reported method to determine their
resilience criteria. Further, the method could be easily adapted to
other hazards.
An approach such as the one proposed here, that quantifies
the desired level of resilience for an infrastructure and that
could be compared against an analysis of infrastructure capac-
ities when it is impacted by a hazard of national or regional
significance is a strong motivator for investment to improve
the resilience of infrastructure. Without such information, the
impact of any measures taken to increase resilience is im-
possible to determine. However if the benefit gained by the
implementation of measures taken to improve resilience can be
quantified then investments in infrastructure are easier to jus-
tify. Regardless of how these desired levels are determined, this
would promote the uptake of the concept of resilience. However
the method that is illustrated here has the advantage that it
raises awareness of the potential impacts of a natural disaster
and also promotes shared ownership of the impacts of this on
infrastructure.
4.4. Limitations
When responding to questionnaire surveys, people often re-
spond by providing snap judgments based on available information
and may be influenced by emotional or contextual factors [39].
However, with purposeful survey design and adequate sampling
methods such as the one used here, many of these limitations are
reduced and even overcome [25]. Question wording could affect
stated tolerance levels, as research has demonstrated that when
asked if they care about a given issue, people state concern for
issues that do not exist (Herrmann et al., 1994). Further, respon-
dents may choose to answer in their own self-interest, claiming
to tolerate less so as to not give the CI operators an excuse to
perform any lower than absolutely necessary. The opposite may
be true, reporting that they are willing to tolerate more than
they actually could handle in order to appear heroic. Research
shows that most people don’t often think about water issues, and
when asked about something one does not often think about may
make it difficult to relate to the real-life consequences of such
a scenario and thus result in a biased or meaningless response
[49]. This could be an important factor considering only 24% of
respondents have experienced a disaster. Lastly, there seems to
still be a gap between declared tolerances and actual tolerances.
Research shows that disaster victims rarely passively wait around
for someone else to take care of their needs [36]. A previous
IMPROVER survey found that 78% expect aid from infrastructure
operators in the future [32]. Thus, there appears to be a gap
between public expectations of CI operators and the ability of
citizens to respond during crisis situations. However, ability to
cope with a given disaster situation and expecting to have to deal
with a certain situation following a disaster should not be equated.
Indeed, people may be able to tolerate more than they would like
to tolerate. As previously stated, meeting expectations during
crises helps maintain operator reputation and thus we believe that
11
it is important to study the tolerance level that is acceptable to the
public.
5. Conclusion
This paper used relevant literature and inputs from Barreiro
Municipal Water Network operators in order to create a method-
ology for using a questionnaire-based study to determine pub-
lic tolerance levels in crisis times. The questionnaire was scenario
based (earthquake leading to water outages) and asked about com-
munication expectations, as communicating about reduced ser-
vice leads to higher levels of tolerance. Lastly, it also exam-
ined demographic factors in order to ensure no vulnerable groups
were being ignored. Results demonstrate that the methodology
works for collecting tolerance levels, that when taking into ac-
count vulnerable groups, public tolerance levels appear higher than
CI operator capability and that communication expectations are
high.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The Authors declare to be unaware of any potential conflict of
interest.
Acknowledgments
We would like to thank all the participants in the survey and
the operators of the Barreiro Municipal Water network for their
time and insights. The IMPROVER project has received funding
from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation
programme under grant agreement No 653390.
This paper expands on work from ESREL2018. Petersen, L., E.
Lundin, J. Sjöström, D. Lange & R. Teixeira. [34]. Creating compara-
ble public tolerance and technical performance measures for criti-
cal infrastructure resilience evaluation. Safety and Reliability – Safe
Societies in a Changing World. Proceedings of ESREL 2018, June 17–21,
2018, Trondheim, Norway. doi: 10.1201/9781351174664
Annex
Tolerance questionnaire
Introduction: Hello! I’m an interviewer from XXX. We are con-
ducting a study about disasters and their possible consequences
on water supply infrastructures. A disaster would be an event
that significantly affects the quality, quantity, or availability of
the water service. You will be asked some questions about how
you think you would respond to hypothetical events. All the in-
formation you provide is absolutely confidential. If you are un-
comfortable about answering any such questions, you are not re-
quired to do so. The anonymized data from the questionnaire will
be used in publications, presentations and reports relating to un-
derstandings of crisis response. Thank you in advance for your
cooperation.
12 L. Petersen, E. Lundin and L. Fallou et al. / International Journal of Critical Infrastructure Protection 28 (2020) 100340
L. Petersen, E. Lundin and L. Fallou et al. / International Journal of Critical Infrastructure Protection 28 (2020) 100340 13
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