Modeling the interactions between water and energy is crucial to managing holistically these resources. Here, we simulate water allocations and energy dispatch in the metropolitan region of Phoenix, Arizona in 2008–2017 using the WEAP and LEAP models under different spatiotemporal resolutions and coupling configurations. We find that increasing the temporal resolution from annual to monthly allows capturing seasonal demands, which improves the simulation of water allocations from supply sources to all demand nodes; the simulation of energy fluxes is instead less sensitive to the model time step. Representing the domain with higher spatial granularity enhances the ability to model the correct water portfolio of the power plants. Finally, coupling the models to capture two-way feedbacks between water and energy systems improves the simulations of electricity generation and, in turn, of water fluxes. While related to Phoenix, our findings provide useful insights to improve water-energy nexus modeling at other sites.

对水和能源之间的相互作用进行建模对于全面管理这些资源至关重要。在这里，我们使用 WEAP 和 LEAP 模型在不同时空分辨率和耦合配置下模拟了 2008-2017 年亚利桑那州凤凰城大都市区的水资源分配和能源调度。我们发现将时间分辨率从每年增加到每月可以捕捉季节性需求，从而改进从供应源到所有需求节点的水分配模拟；相反，能量通量的模拟对模型时间步长不太敏感。以更高的空间粒度表示域增强了对发电厂的正确水组合进行建模的能力。最后，耦合模型以捕获水和能源系统之间的双向反馈，从而改进了发电模拟，进而改进了水通量的模拟。虽然与凤凰城有关，但我们的发现提供了有用的见解，以改进其他地点的水-能源关系建模。