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Water and the 4th industrial revolution
Held in Johannesburg and Durban on 7 and 10 October, the seminars attracted representatives from a wide range of sectors who all share water as a common interest. These include delegates from the food and beverage industry, forestry, pulp and paper, healthcare, fast-moving consumer goods and cosmetics.
Talbot’s strategic director, Helen Hulett, outlined the severity of the water risk. ‘If your production and revenue haven't been negatively affected in some way by water, it shortly will,’ she points out. ‘The condition of local water provision structures is arguably far worse and more difficult to rectify than our electricity supply.’
Hulett emphasised that South Africa is a water scarce country. It currently ranks 30 th in the world for baseline water stress. Climate change will further exacerbate the problem.
Delegates at the Second instalment of the Talbot 30 year Water Seminar Series presented in Johannesburg
This is not the sole contributor to short and medium-term water risk. Rapidly growing industrial, commercial and domestic demand for the resource continues to escalate the crisis.
‘In 1994, just 59 per cent of households had access to safe, clean water. By 2015 this had improved to 86 per cent, meaning that 20 years later, 8.5 million additional households are consuming water.’
In complete contrast to the rise in offtake, supply infrastructure is in a dire state of disrepair and lacks the skills necessary to operate efficiently.
‘Current statistics show that 44 per cent of water and 56 per cent of wastewater treatment plants are in a critical condition and 11 per cent of water treatment works are dysfunctional. The bottom line is that the water coming out of many of our taps is not fit for human consumption, something which will certainly not improve in the short term,’ she emphasises.
As things stand, the water deficit the country could face by 2030 might amount to between 2.7 and 3.8 billion m³.
Talbot helps its clients to understand and mitigate water risk and protect the sustainability of their businesses by analysing and assessing water use and developing tailored solutions.
Chief executive officer Carl Haycock describes how Talbot puts the ‘art of water’ into practice.
‘Our approach to delivering value for clients is to ensure that we provide bespoke solutions to address their specific challenges while supporting long term strategy drivers. Talbot is not aligned to a particular technology, but identifies and proposes the most suitable and robust solution for a particular situation.’
To help clients manage growing risk, Talbot has developed several services designed to harness the power of big data to drive resource optimisation, business profitability and sustainability. These services are entrenched in TalbotAnalytics, a web-based analytics application, which generates simple, yet high value analytics that direct change.
