2012 Blue Paper

2012

CONTENTS 01 A Note from Professor Tommy Koh 02 Singapore International Water Week 2012 Closes on a High 04 Executive Summary 05 In Conversation with Helen Clark 07 Meeting the Challenges of Urban Water and Environment 10 Water Planning for Liveable and Sustainable Cities 13 More from the Water Leaders 20 Closing Thoughts 22 The Singapore Water Lecture - Innovations in Used Water Treatment 23 Cutting-Edge Technologies for Sustainable Cities 24 Unlocking Innovation - Advancing the Water Industry through

Policy, Portfolio Planning and Project Delivery 25 Inaugural Industrial Water Solutions Forum:

Towards Water Sustainability in the Industrial Sectors 27 Acknowledgements

A Note from Professor Tommy Koh

Dear Friends, It was my great pleasure to serve as the Chairperson of the Singapore International Water Week - Water Leaders Summit 2012.

The Singapore International Water Week is a global platform for the sharing and co-creation of innovative water solutions.

This year’s Singapore International Water Week, themed “Water Solutions for Liveable and Sustainable Cities”, was held in conjunction with the 3rd World Cities Summit and the inaugural CleanEnviro Summit Singapore. The co-location of the three events allowed for an integrated look at the co-creation of water solutions in the broader context of sustainable and liveable cities, and offered participants richer discussions and more networking opportunities. The event again hit a new high, with more than 19,000 participants from 104 countries/ regions, and 750 participating companies.

Having chaired the Water Leaders Summit for the past 5 years, I have thoroughly enjoyed these sessions where the movers and shakers from the water industry get together to share insights and solutions. In the process, I have also learnt a lot from both the speakers and participants. I would like to share six of my key takeaways as follows:

4. We should be agnostic about whether we rely on the public sector or the private sector to deliver water service to our people. There are successful examples from both the public sector (e.g. Singapore, Phnom Penh) and the private sector (Manila). The World Bank and ADB have accepted that water is a viable industry and have endorsed private-public partnership as an option for solving the water problem.

5. Water issues often fall between many portfolios. The ideal situation is for each government to have one minister in charge of water.

6. Governments should create a conducive environment to promote research and development.

The Blue Paper documents the key discussions at the Water Leaders Summit. There may be multiple facets to water challenges, but with strong political will and an open mind, I am hopeful that the water leaders can work together to overcome these challenges and for a sustainable water world.

I wish you an enjoyable read.

1. We need to teach people to treasure water. People are not going to treasure water if it is given away for free or if it is heavily subsidised.

With best wishes,

2. Our political leaders need to recognise that safe drinking water and basic sanitation are basic human rights and an important aspect of human security.

Prof Tommy Koh Chairperson Singapore International Water Week 2012 – Water Leaders Summit

3. There is no country which is too poor to afford to all its people, rich and poor, access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation. What is required is political will and good governance.

Ambassador-at-Large, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Singapore and Chairman, Governing Council of the Asia-Pacific Water Forum

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Singapore International Water Week 2012 Closes on a High Event’s success reinforces its status as the leading global platform for the sharing and co-creation of innovative water solutions, and cements Singapore’s position as a hub for water research and technologies.

Singapore International Water Week (SIWW) 2012, held from 1 – 5 July and themed “Water Solutions for Liveable and Sustainable Cities”, achieved a new record of S$13.6 billion in total value for the announcements on projects awarded, tenders, investments and R&D MOUs made at the event.

Held together with the World Cities Summit and CleanEnviro Summit Singapore, the event attracted more than 19,000 participants from 104 countries / regions, and welcomed a record 750 participating companies. This year’s Water Expo had 16 international group pavilions, including first-time participants, State of Illinois and Trenchless Asia 2012. Housed within 17,000 square-metres of covered exhibition space on a single floor, the Water Expo saw a two-fold increase in the number of participating companies since the inaugural event in 2008.

This year’s focus on sharing and co-creation of water solutions was brought into sharp focus with a host of announcements on joint collaborations in R&D. A number of new projects and investments were also announced at this year’s Water Week, reinforcing SIWW as a key platform for water companies to share market trends, opportunities and explore collaborations.

“This year, we reinforced the stage with a strong focus on industrial water solutions and commercialisation of innovative water technologies. It is in line with our commitment to continue to add value to our delegates and partners and stay relevant as a key global water event.”

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Key highlights: • At the Middle East and North Africa Business Forum, Saudi Arabia’s National Water Company announced that they would be investing approximately S$11 billion on capital expenditure on municipal water infrastructure such as water & used water treatment plants, networks and mains etc, for four major cities – Riyadh, Jeddah, Makkah and Taif – over the next five years.

• The Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System (MWSS), the Philippines’ leading water authority, announced its US$1.5 billion investment programme to establish a Water Security Legacy (WSL) for the 15 million residents of Metro Manila.

• Singapore-based United Engineers Limited (UEL) announced three environmental engineering contracts worth over S$70 million, including two projects at the Changi Water Reclamation Plant and one for a waste-to-energy project at a poultry farm in Singapore.

• Home-grown water company Hyflux also officially launched its Hyflux Innovation Centre, serving as the nerve centre of Hyflux’s global operations. Besides the executive and corporate offices, the centre will also house its engineering design and technology commercialisation departments, and the R&D laboratories.

With an encouraging turnout of over 200 participants, the inaugural Industrial Water Solutions Forum presented key industry perspectives on the challenges faced by the oil and gas, food and beverage, mining, and chemical sectors and how innovative solutions can turn these challenges into business opportunities.

TechXchange this year saw strong interest with a turnout of over 200 participants, double that of the inaugural event in 2011, as well as a line-up of 21 water R&D innovations from Singapore and all over the world. Feedback from the workshop has been positive, with investors expressing interest in several of the technology providers.

Prototypes of some of the new, cutting-edge local technologies, such as the Fish Activity Monitoring System, Aquaporin-based biomimetic membranes and the Parasitometer presented at the TechXchange, were also showcased at the Water Innovations@SIWW booth.

“We’re very grateful for the stronger-than-ever industry support and delighted that the success of this year’s event has strengthened its stature as the global platform for the sharing and co-creation of innovative water solutions,” said Mr Maurice Neo, Managing Director of the Singapore International Water Week. “This year, we reinforced the stage with a strong focus on industrial water solutions and commercialisation of innovative water technologies. It is in line with our commitment to continue to add value to our delegates and partners and stay relevant as a key global water event.”

The five flagship programmes - the Lee Kuan Yew Water Prize, Water Leaders Summit, Water Expo, Water Convention, and Business Forums – yielded insights by some of the world’s leading personalities including Helen Clark, Administrator of United Nations Development Programme and Former Prime Minister of New Zealand, HE Kamal Nath, India’s Minister of Urban Development, HE Shintaro Ishihara, Governor of Tokyo, Pamela Cox, Vice-President (East Asia and the Pacific) at World Bank, Dr Vivian Balakrishnan, Singapore’s Minister for the Environment and Water Resources, as well as Professor Mark van Loosdrecht, the 2012 Lee Kuan Yew Water Prize laureate.

Co-located with the third edition of the World Cities Summit and the inaugural CleanEnviro Summit Singapore, this year’s Singapore International Water Week also delivered even greater value to the delegates with broader opportunities for cross pollination of ideas and access to integrated solutions for sustainable urban development.

“Sustainability issues are at the forefront of development planning for cities and countries around the world, and water is a critical component that they have to incorporate early into this process,” said Mr Chew Men Leong, Chief Executive of PUB, Singapore’s national water agency. “It is encouraging to see that SIWW has become an important meeting place for many of the leaders in this field, to share and exchange ideas and solutions with one another to address global water challenges. Sustainable water management is a critical issue that the world will need to solve through collaboration, and Singapore will continue to contribute in any way we can.”

“In addition to our founding sponsors and strategic partners, we will also be working with other partners including the International Water Summit in Abu Dhabi, the Dutch water industry, and the Global Water Intelligence to organise discussion platforms for specific topics. This will pave the way for insightful conversations at SIWW 2014, which will be held together with the World Cities Summit and the CleanEnviro Summit Singapore,” added Mr Neo.

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Executive Summary

With cities becoming the preferred habitat for more people, the management of their water, energy, waste, food and in fact, their entire environment is assuming unprecedented importance. Keeping this in view, this year’s Singapore International Water Week (SIWW)’s overarching theme was “Water Solutions for Liveable and Sustainable Cities” and the event was held concurrently with the 3rd World Cities Summit and the inaugural CleanEnviro Summit Singapore.

In a world where more than half the population already live in cities and another 2.5 billion people are expected to move to cities by 2050, the future is undoubtedly urban. In his opening speech, Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong pointed out that with proper planning, efficient administration and public support, cities could shed their negative image of overcrowding and degradation of environment.

How the used water generated from cities is innovatively managed and integrated with other urban services is going to be crucial for the future of the world’s cities. This was highlighted during the Singapore Water Lecture delivered by Professor Mark van Loosdrecht, winner of the Lee Kuan Yew Water Prize. He shared with the audience his journey towards the formulation of the Anammox process, which has helped in making the treatment of used water less energy-intensive and more resource-efficient.

The lecture delivered by the winner of the Lee Kuan Yew World City Prize (a representative of the City of New York) brought attention to the city’s remarkable efforts to improve liveability and sustainability.

The “In Conversation” segment of this year’s Water Leaders Summit, a flagship event of SIWW featured Helen Clark, Administrator of United Nations Development Programme and a former Prime Minister of New Zealand. Ms Clark called for building up of capacity in water governance and a renewed focus on sanitation, the “unfinished business” of the Millennium Development Goals.

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The joint opening plenary session saw a convergence of leaders from politics, industry and global organisations to discuss the theme of “Sustainable Development – Our Cities, Water and the Environment”. The leaders outlined the ongoing struggle of various countries to overcome the challenges of building infrastructure to keep pace with rapid urbanisation. Many successes were also mentioned such as India’s urban renewal mission which includes a strong water component, Vietnam’s urban upgradation projects and China’s plan to invest 4 trillion yuan in the water sector over the next decade. Singapore’s Minister for the Environment and Water Resources Dr Vivian Balakrishnan put it all together by calling for “dense, open, integrated, well-connected and well-planned cities” as well as finding “honest, competent and visionary leadership”.

The Water Leaders Roundtable themed “Water Planning for Liveable and Sustainable Cities” debated on how to make water a part of the urban planning process. The speakers agreed that working with water in a holistic, multi-disciplinary way in order to realise its value as an urban asset requires a totally different mindset.

Two workshops were conducted at the Water Leaders Summit, one organised by Siemens on ‘CuttingEdge Water Technologies for Sustainable Cities’, and the second by Black & Veatch on ‘Unlocking Innovation’.

The closing remarks at the summit highlighted the need to be flexible to change even as we carried out long-term planning. The three pillars of governance, economics and technology would need to be strengthened in order to transform cities into better habitats for the world’s population.

In Conversation with Helen Clark

Helen Clark, Administrator of the United Nations Development Programme and three-time Prime Minister of New Zealand took the stage along with Professor Tommy Koh, Singapore’s Ambassadorat-Large on the first day of the Water Leaders Summit 2012. In the session titled ‘In Conversation’ Ms Clark fielded a variety of questions from Professor Koh and the audience.

The Rio+20 Legacy With the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+20) having just concluded a week earlier amidst much condemnation by the media, Professor Koh was keen to hear Ms Clark’s assessment of the outcomes. “In the current polarised international environment, it is not so easy for big international summits to reach binding agreements of a comprehensive kind,” said Ms Clark. She was appreciative that thousands of people from civil society organisations, governments at national and sub-national levels as well as millions of netizens online got together to discuss subjects of such vital importance. “I think there was a real prospect that there might not have been an outcome, which would have been a disaster,” observed Ms Clark. She lauded that there was an outcome, and that Brazil put its full weight behind that outcome. Also, the fact that 700 voluntary commitments amounting to US$500 billion were made is no mean feat.

Ms Clark said the Rio+20 outcome document offered many pathways to green the world’s economies and societies. Rather than being prescriptive, it called on people to follow their own preferred pathways.

“There is heavy responsibility, in my opinion, on developed countries to get this right, because the legacy of pollution by greenhouse gases is very much bequeathed by the old industrialised and

developed world to us all,” she said. According to her, if these countries keep their word on the proportion of Gross National Income they would spend on supporting the Green Climate Fund, it would greatly hasten green growth. She also called for making development assistance smarter and more catalytic than in the past.

Complete the unfinished business of the Millennium Development Goals The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) have played an important role in setting the agenda for development until year 2015. The major target of reducing the number of people living in poverty by half is on the way to being accomplished. According to Ms Clark, the overall verdict on the MDGs is that they have been a success. “They were few in number, they were measureable, they had a timed target, and they were very easy to communicate,” she explained. Many international summits have set too many goals in the past which few can remember. The MDGs are concise and have enabled countries to plan around them. But the next generation of development goals must look at the “unfinished business of the MDGs” such as sanitation, hunger and pregnancy-related deaths of women, she said. At the same time, the goals must be more strongly rooted in the principles of environmental sustainability.

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Green Economy and Inclusive Growth go hand-in-hand “At UNDP we have been advocating that achieving greater equity and greater sustainability are absolutely linked themes, and we will not achieve one without the other,” said Ms Clark. Only when the three strands of sustainable development – economic growth, social development and environmental sustainability are integrated and strengthened can

“I see incredible things happening for sustainable development across the strands from the poorest countries to the richest countries; I think we have to spread the message that this is possible, and that we need to learn and share from each other,” she said.

Building Governance Capacity

Many countries are already integrating the three strands of sustainable development. For example, India has adopted the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act. This includes the world’s largest wage guarantee programme — providing employment to approximately 54 million households. It increases food security by conserving water, soil fertility, and biodiversity; it also sequesters carbon. Almost 50 percent of the programme’s workers are women; 43 percent are from historically disadvantaged groups.

Having water infrastructure in place is often not enough. “A well-intended initiative works for a while, but because the capacity to fix or sustain it was not built, it doesn’t succeed for a longer term,” said Ms Clark. Technological or financial solutions alone do not suffice. Capacity has to be built to help developing countries absorb development finance and innovative technologies as well as to avoid high-carbon development paths, while reducing poverty and inequality. Making effective laws and implementing them are crucial. Parliaments can thus be powerful agents of change for sustainable development. But first, their capacity needs to be strengthened.

Ms Clark commended countries such as Ethiopia, Brazil, South Africa and Nigeria that have taken significant steps towards “triple win programming”.

“It is the basic building up of capacity of governance - who is accountable here - that needs to be put into the whole mix,” asserted Ms Clark.

they lead to “triple win outcomes”.

Key Messages from In Conversation • The Rio+20 Summit yielded a positive outcome at a time when it is so difficult for governments to arrive at comprehensive binding agreements at international summits.

It continues to be an important platform for global sustainability. It is commendable that about 700 voluntary commitments amounting to US$500 billion were made.

• The Millennium Development Goals have largely been successful but now it is time to focus on the unfinished business of providing sanitation to the unserved millions.

• Only when the three strands of sustainable development – economic growth, social development and environmental sustainability are integrated and strengthened can they lead to “triple win outcomes”. Many countries have taken the right steps and they need to share their learning.

• Capacity has to be built to help developing countries absorb development finance and innovative technologies as well as to avoid high-carbon development paths, while reducing poverty and inequality.

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Meeting the Challenges of Urban Water and Environment Three concurrent events – Singapore International Water Week, World Cities Summit and CleanEnviro Summit Singapore were brought together in an Opening Plenary on July 2, 2012. Leaders from government, industry and global organisations came together to discuss the theme “Sustainable Development – Our Cities, Water and the Environment” in a session moderated by Professor Tommy Koh.

From ancient times, towns have been built on river banks or close to water bodies. The towns became magnets for people and centres for economic growth. But as towns grew into cities and mega-cities, they began to exhaust and degrade the very water sources that first gave them life, thereby stifling their own future.

Infrastructure lags behind

Good Governance is the key

“Our biggest challenge is bridging the urban infrastructure deficit,” said Kamal Nath, India’s Minister of Urban Development. He observed that despite whatever India built in the next five years, it would only be catching up with the past, and not building for the future.

India’s Minister Nath spoke about the huge task of building capacity in governance in the world’s “rowdiest democracy” which has so many levels of governance, going down to the municipal and village levels. Making governance both transparent and participatory was another challenge to be surmounted.

India’s urban population has increased from 285 million to 400 million in the period 2001-2011.

The number of towns has increased from 5,161 to 7,935 in the same period, said the Minister.

There are 53 cities with over a million people.

Even though only 31% of the Indians live in urban centres, India still has the second largest urban population in the world. According to the Minister, providing water, sewerage and transportation to the unserved millions is a huge challenge as well as an opportunity for India.

Political leaders from other countries such as Indonesia, Nigeria and China spoke about similar challenges being thrown up. “About 48% of our people live in urban areas,” said Ama Pepple, Nigeria’s Minister of Land, Housing and Urban Development. The country has 20 cities that have a population of over 1 million. “Obviously, this creates problems for us, because you plan for a population of one or two million in a particular city, but the growth rate becomes so high,” she said and listed the challenges of providing roads, drains, water, electricity, streetlights and waste disposal facilities. “This undermines economic efficiency and competitiveness of African cities in the global economic environment,” she rued.

Vivian Balakrishnan, Singapore’s Minister for the Environment and Water Resources urged governments to invest in infrastructure and push for good governance. His prescription for facing the urbanisation challenge is to have “honest, competent public authorities capable of envisioning the future, inducting the latest technology, working with a competitive private sector, to not only build infrastructure, but to maintain and renew that infrastructure”.

Urbanisation by design not default How can we have urbanisation by design rather than by default as it is happening now? This question was discussed by many assembled leaders at the opening plenary. It was agreed that dispersal of economic activity and provision of good transportation could help to disperse urbanisation. Examples of suburbanisation and building of twin cities which are well-connected by transportation systems were cited. The high-speed train link between Tokyo and Osaka has helped to dissipate the concentration of population according to Shintaro Ishihara, Governer of Tokyo.

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The need for spatial planning in cities was highlighted

by Djoko Kirmanto, Indonesia’s Minister of Public Works who said that green, open spaces should be incorporated into the design of cities for residents to enjoy.

Henri Proglio, Chairman of Electricité de France (EDF) pointed out that impacts of infrastructurerelated decisions could be felt for extended time periods, therefore long-term vision was essential.

“We have to anticipate innovation and technological development, as well as behaviour changes and new policies,” he said.

Singapore’s Dr Balakrishnan reminded the audience that the land on which they were sitting was reclaimed land which took 30 to 40 years to envision and execute. “If you look outside now at the waters around us, this used to be an open sewer, but in ten years we converted an open sewer into a river which will supply fresh water into Marina Bay,” he said, emphasizing on the importance of long-term planning.

Put the money where the mouth is Qian Min, Commissioner of the Huai River Water Resources Commission informed the audience that China would invest 4 trillion yuan in the water sector during the decade 2011 to 2020. By increasing the funding for the water sector, China has indicated the high priority it attaches to water management and its desire to “encourage all levels of government, industry and the whole society to participate in water conservation”.

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Indian Minister Nath informed that his government is about to launch the second phase of its urban renewal mission for which it will allocate about US$40 billion. Water and sanitation will form a significant component of the mission. Private sector companies including foreign entities are being invited to bid for India’s urban infrastructure projects.

Revealing an important philosophy underlying his country’s policies, Singapore’s Minister Balakrishnan said that subsidising energy, water or any consumption would not be encouraged in a resource-constrained society. “But we ensure that we give cold, hard cash to those members of our society who may be less well off,” he explained. Thus the lesser well-off could “decide on very rational grounds how to use their own hard-earned income plus the hard cash that the government has supplemented with, to consume water, food, transport and all the other essentials of life.”

Involve the private sector All the political leaders assembled at the Opening Plenary indicated the importance of involving the private sector in infrastructure-building activities.

There is clearly a strong demand for Public-PrivatePartnerships (PPPs). According to Roland Busch, CEO, Cities and Infrastructure, Siemens AG, this is because the private sector brings finance as well as shares risks.

Pamela Cox, a Vice-President at the World Bank listed three advantages of involving the private sector.

Citing the example of Manila Water Company, she

said it was “more efficient in delivering water, so it was delivered at lower cost”. Secondly, it “retrained the workers that were working in the existing water company, so they upgraded their skills.” Thirdly, it “brought water to very poor communities” with the help of those very communities. “This is a wonderful example of not only providing clean water more efficiently at lower cost, but getting it to very poor people who did not have it before,” she said.

Adding a Singapore government perspective, Minister Balakrishnan said cash flow needs were never the driving force for PPPs in his country on account of a healthy fiscal position. On the other hand, Singapore sought PPPs for the “financial discipline” brought by the private sector. “It helps ascertain whether the project is viable or not” and “provides another set of rigorous testing on the necessity and viability of a project,” he said.

Singapore also values the latest technologies brought in by the private sector. “If we leave it entirely within public hands, the temptation is to just make incremental improvements or maintenance, but you are not going to get a radical proposal, which could theoretically even strand your previous investments,” said Minister Balakrishnan. “So you need the possibility that someone will come up with an idea that will completely change your business model, and your cost structure,” he said.

However, he cautioned that a PPP is not a substitute for long-term planning. Public authorities still need to know how much water or energy is needed, so planning is essential. “The related corollary is that the government agencies that are making decisions on PPPs need to be honest, otherwise the whole process is subverted,” he said. “Secondly, they need to be competent enough to be able to intelligently assess the proposals which land on the table. So all I am saying is that PPP is a good idea if the circumstances are right, but it is not a substitute for planning. It is not a substitute for integrity, and it is not a substitute for the lack of familiarity with the latest technology.”

Key Messages from the Opening Plenary Session • Bridging the infrastructure deficit is the biggest challenge facing countries such as India and Indonesia, but could also be perceived as an opportunity.

• Capacity has to be built in governance. It is important to have honest, competent public authorities capable of envisioning the future, inducting the latest technology and working with a competitive private sector.

• Long-term planning is important to have urbanisation by design rather than default.

Dispersal of economic activity can help to disperse urbanisation.

• Under the right circumstances, public-private-partnerships are a good idea, but they cannot be a substitute for long-term planning by governments or the integrity of public servants.

• Incremental improvement infrastructure is no longer sufficient. New technologies, innovations and solutions are needed to cope with future challenges.

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Water Planning For Liveable and Sustainable Cities

“Water can be a boon, or a bane for cities,” said Khoo Teng Chye, Executive Director, Centre for Liveable Cities, Singapore. He was chairing the Water Leaders Roundtable on the theme “Water Planning for Liveable and Sustainable Cities”.

Water is an environmental, social and economic boon, but with increased urbanisation, poor water management and the impact of climate change, water can become a bane in the form of floods, drought and pollution.

Explaining how Singapore had turned water from a bane to a boon, Mr Khoo recalled that in the 1950s, when the population was just 1.5 million, the city suffered from all the problems typical of unsustainable urbanisation – floods, poor sanitation, pollution, disease, crime and traffic congestion.

“Today, we have more than tripled the population at 5.2 million and we are roughly the same island... slightly larger with reclamation,” said Mr Khoo.

“But, not only do we no longer have serious water problems, but, Singapore is rated one of the most liveable cities in the world.”

Beyond managing water as a resource, through recycling and desalination, it has been integrated with the city through the ABC Waters or Active, Beautiful and Clean Waters Programme that aims to turn its reservoirs, rivers and waterways into vibrant water bodies that will enhance the value of Singapore’s urban landscape and bring people closer to water.

Role of water in cities of the future Water is the most essential resource for the life, health and prosperity of cities, and this is a role it will continue to play in the future. It plays a vital role in transport and commerce. In addition, it helps to transport waste. Another significant role of water, which is not highlighted enough is as “a source of beauty and inspiration”, according to Paul Brown, Executive Vice President, CDM Smith.

He said the “divide and conquer” approach to water should make way for the “integrate and adapt” approach. Calling for a “re-purposing” of “linear conveyance systems” in cities into “closed loop integrated systems” using technology, he said that a green infrastructure could be created which would “feed the soul of a city” with its beauty and inspiration.

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The 5Ds used by the Dutch “Our delta programme is not a mere reaction to a disaster,” said Bart Parmet, Acting Commissioner of the Netherlands’ Delta Programme. “This is a long-term programme to stay ahead of the next disaster and to keep disasters away,” he said. He used five ‘Ds’ to describe the programme – the Delta Programme, the Delta Act, Delta Fund, Delta Commissioner and Delta Decisions. The Delta Programme aims to protect the Netherlands from flooding and to ensure that there is enough supply of freshwater. The programme includes both short-term and long-term measures with flexibility forming an important component. The Delta Commissioner, whose position is anchored in the Delta Act administers the programme while liaising between ministries, national government and regional bodies.

From 2020, an annual sum of at least one billion Euros will be deposited into the Delta Fund. Until then, the fund will be fed from current resources earmarked for water security, freshwater supply and water management. Thus the Dutch have ensured that there is continuous investment into the security of their delta. Mr Parmet spoke about the attempts in the Netherlands to integrate urban flood management (UFM) with the upgrading programmes in urban areas. This concept stemming from the need to be more resilient with UFM is being developed by the Dutch in the city of Dordrecht.

The Dordrecht project aims to use flood risk as a design parameter for integrated spatial planning.

Practical strategies are being developed to cope with and communicate risk.

Water Sensitive Urban Design Professor Tony Wong, Chief Executive of Monash University’s Centre for Water Sensitive Cities called for a move towards a new paradigm in the planning and design of urban environments that are sensitive to the issues of water sustainability and environmental protection.

He asserted that urban water systems need to move away from focusing only on single objectives such as water supply or used water disposal (taps and toilets). Instead, they must transform by design into multiple-objective, flexible systems that

integrate various sources of water, operate through a combination of centralised and decentralised systems and deliver a wide range of services to communities (such as ecosystem services, urban heat mitigation).

Conventionally, urbanisation removes vegetation and introduces impervious surfaces, thereby reducing the amount of water that is evapotranspired back into the atmosphere.

An example of a multi-objective response to stormwater management could be the ‘riparian sponge concept’ applied in Victoria, Australia. The excess run-off caused by urban development could be detained and evapotranspired by vegetation and media acting like a sponge.

Professor Wong explained how stormwater harvesting combined with filtration, infiltration and irrigation can reduce run-off volumes to pre-development levels. It can reduce stormwater pollutant loads and concentrations to levels appropriate to receiving waters. Restoring the natural urban water balance to encourage higher rates of evapotranspiration can also naturally cool the urban landscape and minimise the heat island effect experienced by urban residents.

Taking the people with you Communication is not just about holding a public meeting. “I think we do an awful job of communicating what we are trying to do, the values we are trying to achieve - we don’t involve the stakeholder community sufficiently in the invention of solutions,” said Mr Brown. “We have frequently in the past, simply worked in a room, come up with a plan, and pushed it into a community and asked at that point - in a public meeting - for comments,” he said.

Emilio Gabbrielli, Vice-President of Business Development at Toray Membrane observed that even when people said that water was a key issue, they did not really understand what it meant at a personal level. He gave two examples, one of a survey carried out in Brazil, which revealed that people agreed that water scarcity and management were important issues, yet the same people refused to pay even one cent per cubic metre to fund

the sustainable management of a river basin. In another instance, in Rio, where the community was involved and educated by the local government in the “Favela-Barrio” (Slum to Suburb) programme, the people took great interest in maintaining their water infrastructure.

As cities grow, planning and decision-making becomes more centralised, which leads to a disconnect with the community. This needs to be reversed. Local contexts and community aspirations cannot be ignored. Communities must be empowered to make a meaningful contribution to urban planning. “Our role in this case is simply providing the tools for the decision making process - rather than actually making the decisions ourselves,” said Professor Wong. He pointed out that much of the blatant disregard for rules and plans within cities is rooted in the missing spirit of joint ownership between the government and communities.

Finance+ for the Asian region Dr Bindu Lohani, Vice President at Asian Development Bank (ADB) recalled a time when the institution was sought for cheap development finance. Today, more than just cost-effective finance, ADB is in the business of providing knowledge or “finance-plus with the plus being knowledge,” he said.

One of the pressing issues brought to the knowledge of policy makers by ADB is the loss of 29 billion cubic metres of water every year from the distribution networks in the region. By halving these water losses, about 150 million people could be provided with drinking water.

“There will always be some form of loss, and each utility will reach its own operational level of leakage which achieves a balance between prudent water management and sound economics such as 6% in Phnom Penh and less than 5% in Singapore,” said Dr Lohani. “A sub-optimal level of NRW (nonrevenue water) is a sign of an underperforming utility, with clear economic and social losses,” he stressed. “However, the major hurdle is the lack of financing due to low tariff levels which fail to cover the cost of water services, let alone finance NRW-reduction operations.”

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To zone or not to zone The Water Leaders Roundtable session saw an interesting discussion on the concept of zoning of cities. It was reported that the concept had been overworked in the US to the point that there were unwanted consequences. The segregation of land uses into residential and commercial zones had often led to people driving longer distances, which could be linked to obesity and diabetes. They could also represent lost opportunities, such as, when green zones only serve as disconnected places of amenity rather than spaces offering biodiversity, connectivity and flood passage.

The new thinking is to move towards integrated and mixed land uses such that “driving is taken out of the equation” and people are “put back on their feet” so that they can walk from one place to another. It would be regrettable if the rapidly growing cities in Asia and elsewhere “felt compelled to go through every stage of the evolution of infrastructure in the developed countries - make every mistake that they made, and ultimately come years later to the kind of corrective, retrofitting, redoing of infrastructure that they are trying to accomplish today in the United States and in the developed world.”

Can developing countries leap forward and try to find solutions that will work now as well as in the future?

Key Messages from the Water Leaders Roundtable • Water is the most essential resource for the life, health and prosperity of cities, and this is a role it will continue to play in the future.

• The “divide and conquer” approach to water should make way for the “integrate and adapt” approach.

• There are lessons to be learned from the Dutch about long-term planning for staying ahead of the next disaster.

• Urban water systems need to move away from focusing only on single objectives such as water supply or used water disposal. Instead, they must transform by design into multipleobjective and flexible systems that are integrated with each other.

• Communities must be empowered to make a meaningful contribution to urban planning.

• Water losses from urban water networks must be brought down to acceptable levels.

• Good governance is needed to ensure that master-plans are adhered to and building norms are not flouted.

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More From the Water Leaders The discussions at the Water Leaders Summit were not restricted to the stage but overflowed into corridors, rooms and even cyber space. Delegates brought their experience in various water-related disciplines to the table and shared ideas on how to overcome challenges.

Scarcity of management and governance Despite all the talk about water scarcity, a view held by many water professionals is that there is no real scarcity of water resources; there is enough water for all. The only real scarcity lies in its management by various players or its governance by public authorities.

Bindu Lohani, Vice-President, Asian Development Bank:

The poor management of water resources and ineffective delivery of water services have resulted in the exploitation of critical water resources and the unsustainable provision of water supply and irrigation services.

It is important to make a distinction between the governance of water as a resource and as a service. As a resource, its management should be decentralised to levels that respond to river basin boundaries, groundwater aquifers, or hydrological regions. As a service (covering both water supply and irrigation), its delivery should be delegated to autonomous and accountable service providers. It would be helpful to establish national water sector apex bodies to serve as coordinating agencies.

Water Pricing – Populism should not get the better of realism Most delegates believe that an appropriate mix of tariffs, taxes and transfers can lead to sustainable cost recovery of water services. However, this has been consistently thwarted by short-term, vote-oriented political decision-makers. At the same time, unless there is an improvement in service, an increase in price is not acceptable to end-users.

Jack Moss, Aquafed:

It is hard to demonstrate the long-term benefits that are delivered by good quality water and sanitation services in the short-term political context. There is no doubt that water and sanitation generate significant economic, social and environmental benefits for societies.

However, establishing and running these services effectively requires significant outlays and the real benefit cost ratios (BCRs) are often hard to perceive. An increasing number of studies indicate that the BCRs are often better than 10:1 and can exceed 30:1. With such ratios, one could argue that communities cannot afford not to invest in such services.

It is also necessary to recognise that the service as a whole must be paid for reliably in order to make it accessible to everybody in a community. This means separating out those who can pay but will not from those who would like to pay but really cannot. The former require discipline, while the latter need genuine help. So, a clear policy and information system that supports the real poor is necessary.

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Cecilia Tortajada, Third World Centre of Water Management: It seems to me that we are focusing on the problem somewhat narrowly. We tend to talk about pricing but we seldom talk on the efficiency of the service. How could politicians talk about pricing water when they do not provide the appropriate service?

The price is not the cause and therefore is not the solution. The problem is the lack of an efficient and reliable service. Once this is sorted out, the price should logically follow.

The Challenge of effective regulation Often, when governments embark on reforms in the water sector, they introduce private sector participation or re-organise public utilities in order to make them perform more efficiently. Economic regulation ensures that utilities with natural monopoly in water supply and sanitation provide the services people want at reasonable rates. However, this is easier said than done.

Ramon Alikpala, Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System:

The practice of proper economic regulation is generally non-existent in most of Asia. Except for a few major cities, most tariff processes are marred by political influence, inadequate regulatory policies or ineffective and non-independent regulators.

In a typical cost-based regulatory regime, operators are allowed a return on investments made.

Regulators are expected to ensure that all expenses made are prudently and efficiently incurred.

Without a strict framework for what may be considered prudent and efficient, the danger of conflict is inevitable. A clear definition of expectations can help avoid these conflicts.

Jack Moss, Aquafed: Proper regulation is important for successful operation of water systems irrespective of whether they are managed by the public or private sector. However, in very many cases, the public sector is unregulated whilst the private sector is very rigidly regulated.

Many people argue that a regulatory system needs to be put in place before a public private partnership can be established. But good regulation depends on the regulatory framework of laws, regulations and reporting systems as well as on competent human resources. These are very unlikely to be established in a vacuum. It is for this reason that we suggest that all countries should first of all establish laws and regulations for their water sector as a whole and staff their regulatory administrations accordingly. These can then evolve to embrace public private partnerships if and when they occur. The history of the water sector in Chile provides a very good example of this approach.

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Speaking with one voice When stakeholders and water managers convey conflicting messages, the real message gets diluted.

Cindy Wallis-Lage, Black & Veatch: The water industry must come together and articulate the global challenges we face in a single, unified voice.

In my view, the importance of how and why the industry should work together cannot be overstated. For example, as water leaders we must all step away from traditional views where we look at wastewater, water and stormwater as separate entities. We must find a common path, message, one voice, and we must take this unified message to our politicians and to the public whereby we can affect change and help provide clarity on the true value of water.

The water-energy nexus Is there a better understanding of the water-energy nexus today as compared to a decade ago?

Cecilia Tortajada, Third World Centre for Water Management: Decision-makers have always been aware of the interdependence between energy and water. This topic is much more discussed now because it is fashionable, but it has been discussed for years.

Peter Gleick, Pacific Institute: Tremendous attention has been given to the water-energy nexus recently, as both researchers and water managers have better improved their understanding of the strong and close links. This is great news – it means that new ways of thinking about solutions, in a more interdisciplinary way, are being developed and implemented. I am seeing more efforts to address problems in both areas (energy and water) together, which can offer tremendous environmental, economic, and political advantages.

Gretchen McClain, Xylem: It takes energy to move and treat water, and it takes water to produce energy, and both are finite resources vital to our health and the economy. The link between water and energy is gaining understanding in industry, and we’re certainly hearing more about it year over year.

As the price of energy rises, our customers are demanding more energy efficient water solutions.

This can be especially important in countries where energy is in short supply.

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Jay Bhagwan, National Research Commission: A lot of emphasis is placed on energy efficiency in the supply of water services which is a small opportunity. There exists greater potential in the supply of water to tap excess energy and pressures from pressurised conduits, which can be used to offset existing consumption.

A well designed or retrofitted urban reticulation system can produce up to 30% of its energy consumption through this process.

Embracing Innovation How can greater innovation be fostered in the water sector?

Jonathan Clement, PWN Technologies: For innovation you need many elements: creative, intelligent people who have a mind set to innovate, a problem to overcome and capital. In the water industry, innovation must be optimised, proven, and tested and this requires significant amounts of finance.

Governments need to work closely with industry to identify the innovations of most value – those that will have a real impact.

As an innovation-driven company I can also add that SIWW, which brings in a diversity of water industry stakeholders is certainly helping to drive innovation. PWNT found many industries during SIWW that came forward with ideas for collaboration.

Corrado Sommariva, International Desalination Association: In desalination, the greatest contribution to innovation has been made in projects where the private sector has been engaged and where a lot of unnecessary requirements have been removed from the technical specifications.

An example of how the private sector can spur innovation is the introduction of Multi-Effect Desalination (MED) in the large Middle East private projects in the years between 2000 and 2008.

Those projects embraced the potential of MED as a more efficient desalination technology than Multi-Stage Flash (MSF). Contracts and specifications in this period were perhaps less prescriptive in terms of technical details but became much more structured towards the optimisation of the design and operational tolerance. This set the stage for continued innovation – since then, we have seen the gradual penetration of Seawater Reverse Osmosis in markets that were previously entirely dominated by thermal technologies.

SIWW has created a strong platform to spark innovation and encourage collaboration. IDA has been a strategic partner in SIWW since its inception, and we look forward to continuing this strong relationship.

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Cindy Wallis-Lage, Black & Veatch: Better public education is an area that will enable greater innovation across all three areas of policy, technology and finance. It is vital that we take a step back and understand what is causing barriers within our industry and look to treat the cause rather than just the symptoms.

Tang Kin Fei, Sembcorp: The public sector should ensure clarity in contract terms and provide an environment whereby there is protection of intellectual property to safeguard investments in applied research and innovation.

This will not only attract investments by the private sector, but also encourage innovation.

Integrated management of the water cycle The inefficiency plaguing much of the water sector today results from an age-old practice of managing raw water, treated water, used water and solid wastes in silos rather than an integrated whole.

Ramon Alikpala, Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System: The implementation of Integrated Water Resource Management (IWRM) though requires a difficult change management process – changing old practices of water management and encouraging participation where there used to be none. It requires providing players with the proper information to make decisions and encouraging them to dialogue across sectors. It also requires changes in management tools and legislation which may be achieved at a national level but IWRM is best implemented at the local or river basin level.

Almost all the countries in Asia have instituted IWRM in its national policies, requiring players to look at water management from a more holistic and participatory perspective. For this reason alone, IWRM has been successful.

But while IWRM as a concept has been accepted, the implementation will be arduous. In addition, we need to recognize that the private sector needs to be more involved in the process as an important stakeholder.

Gretchen McClain, Xylem: Singapore currently displays the very best examples for an integrated approach to water and wastewater. Through political and economic necessity, they’ve built awareness of the importance of managing water at every stage of the water cycle, and offer an excellent case study of how to make the most of a very limited resource, which includes the adoption of water re-use into everyday conversation. The rest of the world will have to get much more comfortable with water reuse if we are to ensure adequate water supplies for societies.

Much of the technology and expertise required to enable safe and efficient water reuse exists today, and wait only for political will, public understanding and adequate funding to implement solutions more broadly.

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Ma Lee Tak, Hong Kong Water Supplies Department: This year the Water Leaders Summit expanded its scope from the core water and used water agenda to cover integrated city planning. With cities being the nuclei for growth, we need to optimise their use of resources, I highly commend this expansion of scope. I would add that a high-level and transparent vision for the development of a city as well as good governance are essential as integrated planning and development often cuts across ministerial and departmental boundaries for joint use in the same footprint.

Cindy Wallis-Lage, Black & Veatch: There is a significant opportunity to integrate the management of water, wastewater and waste.

On a case-by-case basis, significant progress is being made in many locations around the world, and it points to the potential for greater integration of all these resources.

Given water supply constraints being faced in many regions throughout the world, recycling of wastewater for non-potable or indirect potable use is an obvious area of growing importance.

This is pioneered in places like the west coast of the US and Singapore, and many regions around the world are learning from best practices and taking a closer look at this critical area to overcome some of the perceptual barriers that exist.

Energy recovery from wastewater has long been a common practice throughout the industry.

Biogas recovered from the treatment processes has been used to generate electricity that has helped to power the process at plants for many years. This recovery of energy is being optimised further, and today, we are seeing how wastewater treatment plants can be become energy neutral through a combination of more efficient energy recovery, use of energy efficient equipment and synergistic digestion of supplemental organic waste streams. Similarly, processes for the recovery of phosphorous as a high-grade fertiliser material are gaining in popularity.

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Key Messages from Water Leaders Summit Delegates • The poor management of water resources and ineffective delivery of water services has resulted in the exploitation of critical water resources and the unsustainable provision of water supply and irrigation services.

• Only if water services are priced correctly, it will become possible to make it accessible to everyone in the community. However, before increasing prices, there must first be an improvement in services.

• Proper regulation is important for successful operation of water systems irrespective of whether they are managed by the public or private sector.

• The water industry must come together and articulate its global challenges in a single, unified voice.

• The water-energy nexus is gaining more attention over the years and new inter-disciplinary ways of thinking about solutions are being developed and implemented.

• Better public education will enable greater innovation across all three areas of policy, technology and finance.

• There is a significant opportunity to integrate the management of water, wastewater and waste.

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Closing Thoughts Even if 80% of the world’s people live in cities, life may not be unpleasant if efforts are made to render cities liveable, culturally vibrant, safe and sustainable, said Professor Tommy Koh. As in the previous years, he was summarising his reading of the Water Leaders Summit at its closing session.

The professor gave six important takeaway messages:

1.

We need to teach our people to treasure water. People are not going to treasure water if water is given away for free or if it is heavily subsidised. There is merit in the view that water should be priced for the full recovery of the cost of producing it.

2.

It is time for our political leaders to recognise that safe drinking water and basic sanitation are basic human rights and an important aspect of human security.

3.

There is no country which is too poor to afford to all its people, rich and poor, access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation. What is required is political will. We need good water policy and competent management. We need good governance in the sense of transparency, integrity and accountability.

4.

We should be agnostic about whether we rely on the public sector or the private sector to deliver water service to our people. In some cases, the public sector has succeeded – Phnom Penh and Singapore are examples. In some other situations, the private sector can do a better job, and Manila is an example of that. The World Bank and ADB have accepted that water is a viable industry and have endorsed private-public partnership as an option for solving the water problem.

5.

Water issues often fall between many portfolios. The ideal situation is for each government to have one minister in charge of water. When this is not possible, there is a need for a high-level coordinating mechanism, at the cabinet level, to oversee water in a holistic way, comprehensively from one end of the value chain to the other.

6.

Governments should create a conducive environment to promote research and development.

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Meanwhile, Singapore’s Minister for the Environment and Water Resources, Dr Vivian Balakrishnan made three points from his observations during the week: The need for an integrated systems approach: The Minister said that Singapore had adopted this approach to look at water as a whole. “In the case of Singapore, we have also been assisted immensely by the fact that our Prime Ministers have always taken a very deep interest in water,” he observed. “In fact, there has been a super Water Minister and it has always been the Prime Minister.”

Master plan with micro-implementation: “Our plans need to be flexible, scalable, modular, and they need to fit at the appropriate level of, in this case, probably a precinct,” said the Minister. “Even as we plan long-term, there is a need for us to be able to change, to use new technology, to adapt, to scale up or to scale down the necessary responses for water infrastructure,” He stated that even as communities get more involved, governments need to set overarching master plans, policies and frameworks. “But we need to find projects at a digestible level which people can identify with, belong to, make a difference, and therefore ultimately help us to implement,” he added.

Honest and competent governance: Even if one of the three pillars of governance, technology and finance is faulty, the functioning of water infrastructure gets impeded. Therefore, Minister Balakrishnan called for honest and competent governance. “We need to provide opportunities for the private sector to do what they do best and we need to quickly allow technologies and discoveries to be implemented in the real world to solve real problems,” he asserted. The tagline for Rio+20 was “The future we want”.

According to the Minister, Singapore’s tagline was “We are building a working model of the future.”

He concluded with a hope that the delegates would take away a glimpse of the future, which worked.

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The Singapore Water Lecture – Innovations in Used Water Treatment

could be a very good alternative, which not only saves energy and money but also opens up opportunities for cooling systems, phosphorous recovery and a new type of granular sludge based wastewater treatment.”

An unexpected discovery of a shortcut in the nitrogen cycle by his seniors led Professor Mark van Loosdrecht to bring a paradigm shift in the understanding of used water treatment. Little surprise then, that the professor, who is the Lee Kuan Yew Water Prize laureate for 2012 delivered the Singapore Water Lecture on the theme of innovations in used water treatment. He emphasised that in our urbanized world “where water is used to transport waste out of the cities” it is essential to recover “water, nutrients, energy and chemicals to achieve a more sustainable society”.

Professor van Loosdrecht is known for pioneering an innovative biological process called Anammox, which makes use of a unique group of bacteria that is able to convert ammonia in used water to nitrogen gas, bypassing the formation of nitrate. By shortening the process, energy and chemicals are conserved while greenhouse gas emissions are reduced.

Dressed in a red jacket symbolising the colour of the Anammox bacteria, Professor van Loosdrecht recalled the work by earlier scientists and his own journey to engineer the Anammox process, which today has 16 referenced sites and more than 30 full-scale variant plants around the world.

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He called for a moving away from the traditionally linear model of innovation to a cyclic model where scientific research, technological development, product creation and the market interact in a cyclic manner. This, he said, would enable one innovation to drive the next one.

This is how Dutch organisations such as TU Delft, STOWA, Paques and a water board developed the Anammox reactor.

Professor van Loosdrecht stressed that used water management needs to be better integrated with other services in cities of the future. It should be at least energyneutral and make a positive contribution to the overall urban heat balance, while being a source of water and chemicals.

The professor gave several examples of innovations in the realm of used water.

He commended the pharmafilter project in the Netherlands which aims to treat hospital waste and used water in a manner that is cost-effective, easy and reduces the risk of contagion or surfacewater contamination. He informed the audience about Hong Kong’s practice of using seawater for flushing toilets instead of freshwater, which was saving US$140 million every year.

“Flushing toilets requires one-third of the city’s water consumption,” said Prof van Loosdrecht. “For coastal towns, seawater

Pointing out that there were many untapped opportunities in harnessing used water, the professor gave the example of “one low hanging fruit” in the form of thousands of tonnes of cellulose from toilet paper which were going into sewers and treatment plants everyday. He suggested that with the help of the already existing microsieve technology, it was feasible to recover the fibre and make toilet paper again.

Another opportunity highlighted by Prof van Loosdrecht was in bioplastics.

According to him, there is more potential in recovering chemicals than energy from used water. “Bacteria have the potential to convert all organic carbon into bioplastic which can replace polyethylene and polypropylene products,” he informed. “Currently we have small scale systems running where activated sludge accumulates these bioplastics up to 90% dry weight,” he added.

Alginate is another chemical that can be produced from used water, according to the professor. “Besides NEWater, we can then make artificial caviar out of wastewater,” he said. He asserted that with the right stimulus, many more innovative concepts could be developed following the line of development of the Anammox. There needs to be a space for curiosity-driven research and not just product-driven research, he felt. It is also equally important to have a fast process of “joint venture development between university, industry and potential clients”. “When done well wastewater treatment can significantly improve the sustainability of our cities by becoming an energy and resource-generating service,” concluded the professor.

Cutting-Edge Technologies for Sustainable Cities

Siemens and SIWW jointly organised a Water Leaders Summit (WLS) workshop titled, “Cutting-Edge Technologies for Sustainable Cities.” The theme for the discussion was close to the hearts of all water leaders – cities are growing faster than ever and continue to face numerous water-related challenges.

Rapid urbanisation and economic development in cities have led to a rising demand for water. Coupled with the challenge of rising energy costs, competition for resources and climate change, many cities are struggling to provide a sustainable and affordable supply of water.

Dr. Lukas Loeffler, CEO, Siemens Water Technologies Global Business Unit chaired an illustrious panel which focused on the importance of R&D and the use of innovative technologies for meeting the water challenges of cities and driving social and economic growth.

Mr. Nicholas You, Chair of the World Future Council’s Commission on Cities and Climate Change, presented key challenges for cities and the impact on water in addition to the importance of linking new technologies with urban planning and governance.

Mr. Tan Gee Paw, Chairman, PUB, discussed the government’s role in creating an “enabling environment” for new technologies.

Dr. Ruediger Knauf, Chief Technology Officer, Siemens Water Technologies, highlighted leading technologies for urban water needs during his presentation. Ms. Gretchen McClain, CEO, Xylem, shared how to identify relevant technologies that help drive growth and development of cities.

Professor Andrew Whittle, Professor at MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), delivered a presentation on managing a city’s water network and how technologies can minimise leaks, while providing specific examples of moving a technology from laboratory to market.

Professor Alexander Zehnder, Scientific Director, Triple Z Ltd, discussed how various stakeholders (government, industry, academia) can work together to address the gaps in the “here and now” and build a bridge to the future.

The following conclusions emerged from the discussion:

• Lastly, we cannot diminish the role governance plays in finally realising an environment of sustainable cities. For example, we need to be sure that, collectively, the industry is setting the right conditions and that appropriate incentives are in place for municipalities to drive a sustainable future. The world is heading in the right direction, but we still have a lot of work to do.

• In many cases, technology is developing faster than its implementation.

This means, we have developed and made available technologies to address many water challenges, but they may not be put to use yet in wide-enough circles. The reasons for this are varied and can be related to cost, the need for creating a greater sense of urgency, or simply that an aging infrastructure in many municipalities cannot support the investment or adoption of cuttingedge technologies. It is important to explore the obstacles and work to remove them.

• It’s paramount that, as global leaders, we create an enabling environment that brings together political leaders, planners, industry, researchers and academia to develop technology and innovation that address the water challenges for sustainable cities. The path forward is clearly to have a global environment that’s synonymous with Singapore.

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Unlocking Innovation – Advancing the Water Industry through Policy, Portfolio Planning and Project Delivery An innovative, interactive and fast-paced forum saw about 100 Water Leaders Summit (WLS) delegates share best practices that will help tackle pressing issues facing the water industry throughout the world. The workshop provided a fresh change of pace for participants on the second day of the WLS. Organised collaboratively by SIWW and Black & Veatch, the event examined innovation beyond technology.

The participants gathered across nine tables, with expert insights offered during three separate conversations covering three critical areas: water policy; resource portfolio planning; and project delivery.

“The water industry needs to reframe its thinking and embrace innovation at all levels,” said Cindy Wallis-Lage, President, Black & Veatch’s global water business when summarising the event at the WLS Closing Session.

“To solve our cities’ future water challenges, we need to be smarter about how we create policies, plan and deliver infrastructure.” The workshop’s broad diversity of ideas and collaborative thinking produced specific recommendations.

From the initial findings, a number of common themes emerged across the three areas.

Public education and communication were viewed as central to unlocking innovation on many levels. Better education, whether for the public or policy makers, often underlies the adoption of new methodologies and helps break down industry walls, participants said.

Other key topics included the value of active collaboration and the alignment of all interests. For example, greater alignment between private and public sectors was seen as one solution to stimulate further investment in muchneeded water infrastructure.

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Participants also highlighted the need to look holistically at the touch points of water with energy, food, and industry.

One group framed this as creating and capitalising on potential “economies of scope”. “Scope” was defined as including local market and community needs, as well as the financial impacts, when assessing resource recovery opportunities. Essentially, developing a full business case was seen as an essential part of creating successful and synergistic solutions.

A call for greater integration within the water sector and between other sectors with closely related environmental and infrastructure needs was also an important common theme among tables.

The event was led by nine distinguished chairpersons who guided three conversations in each of their assigned areas of expertise. With participants moving between tables, the room buzzed with excitement as leaders rolled up their sleeves and eagerly worked together to share the wealth of their experiences and knowledge.

The event also demonstrated how a platform such as the Water Week is integral to forging dialogue amongst industry experts to further collaborative discussion on innovation.

“Singapore International Water Week is an innovation by itself. The key part of the innovation is that we create the opportunity where we can bring the water leaders and their perspectives, put them together, synthesise and generate new insights to co-create innovative water solutions that are very much needed to solve the water challenges that we face around the world,” said Chew Men Leong, Chief Executive, PUB, Singapore’s national water agency.

In total, more than nine hours of enlightening conversation was captured.

The recordings will be compiled into an industry white paper on how to unlock innovation in the water industry across policy, planning and execution.

The white paper will be published later this year on www.waterdialogue.com, where full findings from last year’s similar session on Water Pressures can also be downloaded.

The interactive and high-tempo session was managed and steered with the help of the following distinguished industry leaders: • Margaret Catley-Carlson, Chair, Suez Environment, Foresight Advisory Committee • Chew Men Leong, Chief Executive, PUB, Singapore’s national water agency • Dr Peter Gleick, President & CoFounder of the Pacific Institute • Mr Ma Lee Tak, Director, Water Supply Department, Hong Kong • Peter Moore, Chief Operating Officer, Water Corporation • Colin Nicholson, General Manager, Sydney Water Corporation • Usha Rao-Monari, Global Head, Water and Waste, International Finance Corporation • Len Rodman, Chairman, President & CEO, Black & Veatch • BG (NS) Tay Lim Heng, CEO, Keppel Integrated Engineering • Dr Cecilia Tortajada, President, Third World Centre for Water Management, Mexico • Cindy Wallis-Lage, President, Black & Veatch’s global water business

Inaugural Industrial Water Solutions Forum: Towards Water Sustainability in the Industrial Sectors

The global industrial water sector ranks second in water consumption, consuming an estimated 25% of the global water demand. With energy and water intrinsically linked, industries are searching for innovative solutions to improve water sustainability across the value chain. Themed ‘Towards Water Sustainability in the Industrial Sectors’, the inaugural SIWW Industrial Water Solutions Forum offers a global view on the key water challenges facing the industrial sectors and how solutions can turn them into opportunities.

Ms Lisa Henthorne, Chief Technology Officer of Water Standard, chaired the forum which brought together prominent water users and water solutions providers to discuss the key challenges and opportunities in the various industries such as Oil & Gas, Mining, Food & Beverage and the Chemical sectors.

Mr Chris Gasson, Publisher of Global Water Intelligence, presented the water market outlook for the global industrial sectors. He highlighted the four key growth areas for water technology: (i) ultrapure water production, (ii) wastewater treatment from natural resource extraction, (iii) sea water desalination, and (iv) water reuse.

He concluded that the cost of water technology is shaping the market for water technology and in the longer run, biotechnology will revolutionise the relationship between water and industry.

Mr Jeremy Bentham, Vice President, Global Business Environment from Royal Dutch Shell presented the current world situation as “an era of volatile transition”, where energy consumption is putting increasing stress on our environment. He pointed out that freshwater withdrawal for energy is now moving at a much faster rate than freshwater consumption for energy, indicating the heavier responsibility of dealing with the water-energy nexus, and the urgency in establishing a deeper worldwide collaboration.

With growing demand for process water in the mining industry, companies are also forced to invest in technology to develop innovative water solutions that are environmentally sustainable.. Mr Doug Brown, Group Manager Water, Fortescue Metal Group, highlighted the key mining water challenges which includes water quality, catchment scale impacts, environmental and heritage approvals.

A veteran in the mining industry for more than 30 years, Mr Brown shared that the key influences on water solutions for the mining industry were scale and timing of water management, fast and changing

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mining schedules, appropriate technology support and the need for robust and simple engineering.

Mr José Lopez, Executive Vice President, Operations (GLOBE) of Nestlés shared on the close relationship between water and agriculture and its significance in ensuring food security. He spoke about sustainable agriculture which involved various stakeholders from the industry, government & civil society sharing responsibilities and how this will drive water stewardship.

Mr. Juan Aguiriano, Worldwide Managing Director, Sustainable Operations of Dupont, shared DuPont’s experience in water management. He highlighted the “DuPont Centre of Competency”, which applied a six-step approach to establishing water use reduction programs, namely (i) defining scope, (ii) developing the site water balance, (iii) identifying potential opportunities, (iv) ranking and screening opportunities, (v) reviewing, and (vi) implementing and sustaining the programme.

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The Forum concluded with a Panel Discussion, led

by Ms Henthrone, which went into a discussion on sustainable solutions for the industrial sectors. Experts from the water companies such as Mr Bob Card, President of Energy, Water and Facilities Division, CH2M HILL, Mr Foo Hee Kiang, Group Executive Vice President, Commercial Contracts & Industry Relations, Hyflux, Mr Sundaresan Janardhanan, Senior Vice President, Siemens Water Technologies, Mr Yves Caouette, Executive Vice President of Veolia Water Water Solutions & Technologies and Dr Johan Groen, Chief Technology Officer of Xylem joined the panel and shared their experiences and thoughts on innovating water solutions for sustainability in the industrial sectors.

Acknowledgements

The organizers of the Singapore International Water Week 2012 would like to thank the chairpersons and speakers of the Water Leaders Summit, our strategic partners, the International Desalination Association and the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, as well as all the delegates for their kind contributions and participation in the discussion sessions. We would also like to acknowledge the contributions from Sahana Singh, Editor, Asian Water Magazine, A.M.M Adeeb, Wee Cheng, Ranjani and Kelly Chen from the Institute of Water Policy (IWP).

Singapore International Water Week, World Cities Summit and CleanEnviro Summit Singapore – “In Conversation” Moderator: Prof Tommy Koh, Chair of the Asia Pacific Water Forum Governing Council and Ambassador-AtLarge, Ministry of Foreign Affairs Singapore

The Singapore Water Lecture Chairperson: Prof Kishore Mahbubani, Dean, Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy Speaker: Prof Mark van Loosdrecht, Winner of the Lee Kuan Yew Water Prize 2012

Speaker: Ms Helen Clark, Administrator of United Nation Development Programme and former Prime Minister of New Zealand

Singapore International Water Week, World Cities Summit and CleanEnviro Summit Singapore – Opening Plenary - “Sustainable Development – Our City, Water and the Environment” Chairperson: Prof Tommy Koh, Chair of the Asia Pacific Water Forum Governing Council and Ambassador-AtLarge, Ministry of Foreign Affairs Singapore Speaker: • HE Kamal Nath, Minister of Urban Development, India • HE Djoko Kirmanto, Minister of Public Works, Indonesia • HE Shintaro Ishihara, Governor, Tokyo, Japan • Ms Pamela Cox, Vice-President (East Asia & the Pacific), World Bank • Mr Qian Min, Commissioner, Huai River Water Resources Commission, China • Mr Henri Proglio, Chairman, Electricité de France • Dr Roland Busch, CEO, Infrastructure and Cities, Siemens AG • Dr Vivian Balakrishnan, Minister of Environment & Water Resources, Singapore

The Water Leaders Roundtable - Water Planning for Liveable and Sustainable Cities Chairperson: Mr Khoo Teng Chye, Executive Director, Centre for Liveable Cities Panelists: • Mr Bart Parmet, Acting Commissioner, Delta Programme, the Netherlands • Dr Emilio Gabbrielli, Vice President of Business Development, Toray Membrane & 2nd Vice President, International Desalination Association • Prof Tony Wong, Director and Chief Executive, Centre for Water Sensitive Cities • Mr Paul Brown, Executive Vice President, CDM Smith • Dr Bindu Lohani, Vice President (Knowledge Management & Sustainable Development), Asian Development Bank

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Water Leaders Summit Workshop – Session A: Cutting-Edge Water Technologies for Sustainable Cities Chairperson: Dr Lukas Loeffler, CEO, Siemens Water Technologies Panelists: • Mr Nicolas You, Chairman, World Future Council’s Commission on Cities and Climate Change • Mr Tan Gee Paw, Chairman, PUB Singapore • Dr Rudiger Knauf, Vice President, Siemens Water Technologies • Ms Gretchen McClain, CEO, Xylem • Prof Andrew Whitte, Professor, Massachusetts Institute of Technology • Prof Alex Zehnder, Scientific Director, Triple Z Ltd

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Water Leaders Summit Workshop – Session B: Unlocking Innovation - Advancing the Water Industry Through Policy, Portfolio Planning and Project Delivery Chairperson: Ms Cindy Wallis-Lage, President, Black & Veatch Water Panelists: • Mr Colin Nicholson, GM, Operations, Sydney Water • Dr Peter Gleick, Co-Founder, Pacific Institute • Mr Peter Moore, COO, Water Corporation • Mr Chew Men Leong, CE, PUB Singapore • Dr Cecilia Tortajada, Vice President, Third World Centre of Water Management • Ms Margaret Catley Carlson, Patron, Global Water Partnership • Mr Tay Lim Heng, CEO, Keppel Integrated Engineering • Mr Ma Lee Tak, Director, Water Supply Department, Hong Kong • Ms Usha Rao Monari, Global Head (Water and Utilities), International Finance Corporation

Special Thanks

Lee Kuan Yew Water Prize Sponsor:

Strategic Partners:

al es International D

ina tio nA ssociation速

Founding Sponsors:

29