Chicago Department of Water Management

Water Security and Preparedness Master Plan and Capital Improvement Program
Chicago Department of Water Management (DWM)

The Chicago Department of Water Management (DWM) operates the two largest capacity conventional water treatment plants in the world. Together the two facilities process almost a billion gallons of water every day, supplying water to the city of Chicago and 125 suburban communities in Illinois, U.S.

To help ensure continuity of this critical service, AECOM completed a threat and vulnerability assessment (TVA) update for the department using the J100, Risk Analysis and Management for Critical Asset Protection (RAMCAP) Standard for Risk and Resilience Management of Water and Wastewater Systems. This project was one of the first full-scale applications of the J100 methodology for a large water utility.

During the work, we identified critical assets; determined appropriate threats and hazards; estimated consequences, effectiveness of existing mitigation measures, and threat likelihood for critical threat-asset pairs; calculated the baseline risk; and applied mitigation measures and evaluated the cost benefit of implementing various mitigation suites. The AECOM team evaluated the resiliency of the supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) hardware and software, system access vulnerabilities, malware prevention and control, and performed penetration testing and rogue wireless testing.

We worked with the Chicago utility to develop a security and preparedness capital improvement plan that prioritizes the investments that the city will make to improve the security and resiliency of their critical infrastructure.