Socioeconomic capacity includes two government expendi-tures: (1) the total annual budget for flood control (e.g. floodcontrol projects along the rivers and coastal areas, regional drainageprojects etc.); and (2) the government employees’ salaries for rep-resenting the extent of human resources of different cities to floodcontrol or management. Man-made capacity includes: (1) the totalemergy content of sand, stone, and cement embodied in dikesand levees; and (2) the total construction and maintenance costof pumping stations. Finally, the emergy value of socioeconomiccapacity and man-made capacity are summed to represent totaladaptive capacity. If the urban system has a higher adaptive capac-ity, it will be able to reduce vulnerability by alleviating the potentialdamage in any specific area