Across the globe, flood control standards for reservoir engineering appear different due to various deciding factors such as flood features, society, economy, culture, morality, politics, and technology resources, etc. This study introduces an in-depth comparison of flood control standards for reservoir engineering for different countries. After the comparison and analysis, it is concluded that the determination of flood control standards is related to engineering grade, dam type, dam height, and the hazard to downstream after dam-breaking, etc. Each country should adopt practical flood control standards according to the characteristics of local reservoir engineering. The constitutive flood control standards should retain certain flexibility in the basis of constraint force. This review could offer a reference for developing countries in the enactment of flood control standards for reservoir engineering.

Drought impacts not only nature, but also the socioeconomic system and results from the imbalance of water supply and demand. It is necessary to estimate the ability of drought mitigation on the basis of water allocation. In this research, the drought mitigation ability index (DMAI) was constructed by the ratio of theoretical water supply and demand obtained from the optimal water allocation. Then, the DMAI was applied to Daqinghe watershed for temporal-spatial validation compared with the agricultural affected areas and the distribution of groundwater overexploitation. In addition, the historical (1961–2010) and future (2020) DMAI in Daqinghe watershed were analyzed. The results show that DMAI can overall represent the temporal-spatial characteristics of the drought mitigation ability. Furthermore, the DMAI of Daqinghe watershed is significantly decreased in the last 50 years, and groundwater resources play a prominent role in drought mitigation. Although the water from the South-to-North Water Transfer Project (SNWTP) can improve DMAI of Daqinghe watershed, the drought risk continues to be serious in the future.

Flood control risk is one of the main risks affecting the safe operation of large-scale water transfer projects. Systematically identifying the flood control risk in the project and carrying out risk classification and hierarchical management are problems for project managers. Based on the theory of system and risk assessment, this paper starts with the various risk sources and risk events involved in the whole process of the flood disaster chain, the risk of flood disaster factors, the exposure of the disaster-bearing body, and the vulnerability of the disaster-originating environment are combined. Then, we systematically and comprehensively identify the flood control risks of a large-scale water transfer project, which are divided into four types of risk elements: rainfall–runoff; confluence and flow capacity; the geological characteristics of canal section; economic and social layouts. Specific risk factors are identified for each type of risk element, and a flood control risk evaluation index system for a water transfer project is proposed. According to the framework of the analytic hierarchy process (AHP), a quantitative assessment of comprehensive flood control for water transfer projects is carried out. Taking the middle route of the South-to-North Water Transfer Project in China as an example, this paper evaluates the integrated flood control risks of 39 engineering units, identifies six units with higher risk levels, analyzes the causes, and suggests engineering and non-engineering countermeasures to prevent and reduce the occurrence of risk accidents. This method is not only used for comprehensive flood control risk assessment and risk management in the operation and management stage of the large-scale inter-basin water transfer project, but also has a reference value in considering the optimal layout of the project water transmission line from the perspective of flood control in the planning and design stage.