Smart Water Magazine Bimonthly 15

Elektra

you to monitor and manage your dosing equipment 24/7 via smartphone for a new standard in operational efficiency and accessibility in water-treatment applications. www.seko.com

SekoWeb Data on demand

• Access data and system status via smartphone or PC • Adjust programming instantly • Discover the true cost of your application

• Identify anomalies and prevent unplanned downtime

FROM THE EDITOR

INNOVATION, SUSTAINABILITY AND OTHER WORDS FOR THE WATER SECTOR

Innovation and sustainability are two words intimately and intrinsically linked: given the current situation, with a climate crisis with little prospect of abatement and the relentless escalation of prices, especial ly in the field of energy and raw materials, it is now impossible to conceive of one without the other. In the water sector, this relationship is particularly evident: the cir cular nature of the water cycle, the constant commitment to savings and efficiency and the progressive digital transformation com plete a fertile field for implementing sus tainable solutions and value propositions that successfully address the present and fu ture challenges of water, which are also to a large extent those of the planet we inhabit.

For this reason, we wanted the cover of this fifteenth issue of SWM Bimonth ly to feature Jorge Malfeito, Director of

Innovation of the Water Business in AC CIONA, who in a complete interview signed by Cristina Novo details the com pany’s research and innovation strategy, in addition to confirming the commit ment to professional development, mul tidisciplinary collaboration and team work to achieve the objectives set in this regard. All these factors underpin and characterize ACCIONA’s good work in sustainable innovation.

On the other hand, these elements are not at odds with growth, although there are those who believe that it is not possible to reconcile them in this complex scenar io. A clear example is the case of Miya, the company led by Noam Komy, which has made efficiency its corporate flag. In the talk with the CEO included in these pag es, the search for new opportunities in the

MENA region, Southeast Asia, LATAM and other European countries and the di versification of investments play a key role in the next steps of the company, which is not forgetting its roots (and goal) of be coming a large water company.

In short, in this magazine we talk about innovation, sustainability and efficien cy, without forgetting the road travelled so far and which involves terms such as digitalization, Sustainable Development Goals, research or entrepreneurship. Be cause if there is one thing we can say, it is that in the water sector there is room for all of them, and in SWM Bimonthly there is room for almost all of them.

Enjoy the magazine.

Águeda garcía de durango - Chief editor

PUBLISHER

iAgua Conocimiento, S.L.

C/ José Ortega y Gasset, 22-24, planta 5, 28006 - Madrid info@iagua.es

MANAGEMENT

Alejandro Maceira Rozados

David Escobar Gutiérrez EDITOR

Alejandro Maceira Rozados

EDITORIAL STAFF

Águeda García de Durango Caveda

Laura Fernández Zarza

Paula Sánchez Almendros

Olivia Tempest Prados

Cristina Novo Pérez

ADVERTISING

Javier de los Reyes

ART AND GRAPHIC DESIGN

Pablo González-Cebrián

Esther Martín Muñoz

CONTENTS NUMBER 15 - NOV/DEC 2022

INTERVIEW

FEATURE OPINION FEATURE RDI IS GOOD FOR BUSINESS

Pg. 26 In our cover, Jorge Malfeito, Director of Innovation of the Water Business in ACCIONA, explains the com pany’s research and innovation strategy.

‘MADE IN EUROPE’ DIGITAL WATER

Pg. 82 Hidroconta works with French partner Hydralians supplying IRIS equipment to support digitalisation in France’s water market.

LEGIONELLA CONTROL IN WATER SYSTEMS

Pg. 76 SEKO provided a safe, reliable, cost-effective solution to meet a cus tomer’s needs concerning Legionella compliance in water systems.

NEW PUMPING CHALLENGES

Pg. 80 Maria Elena Rodríguez Hernández, from Ingeteam, discusses the benefits of submersible pumps to face the impacts of climate change.

CONTENTS NUMBER 15 - NOV/DEC 2022

FEATURE FEATURE INTERVIEW

INTERVIEW TALKING ABOUT SUSTAINABILITY

Pg. 20 Aqualia has recently partici pated at several international events, where discussions focused on the sustainability of public services.

ZEROING IN ON WATER EFFICIENCY

Pg. 40 Noam Komy, CEO of Miya, discusses in an exclusive interview with SWM the company’s most recent trajectory and future business plans.

SMART METERING TO TACKLE NRW

Pg. 60 In this case study, Brønderslev Water Company (Denmark) reduced NRW thanks to a water loss manage ment solution by Diehl Metering.

SUPPORTING WATER COMPANIES

Pg. 16 We hear from Ignacio Morcillo about how Minsait is supporting the water sector with its solutions in the field of digitalisation.

WE SAVE WATER SO THE FUTURE IS SUSTAINABLE

At ACCIONA we design innovative water treatment solutions to ensure universal water access and to guarantee that this resource is managed sustainably. We look after water as part of our commitment to the fight against the climate emergency.

FEATURE

INTERIM

PROJECT

SERVICES

Pg. 44 Agenda21500 presents its core business: Interim Project Management, and introduces several projects completed in the Balkan region.

INTERVIEW

THE FUTURE OF DESALINATION

Pg. 56 CEO of Almar Water Solutions Carlos Cosín takes stock of his term as president of the International Desalination Association (IDA).

INTERVIEW

TACKLING THE SANITATION CHALLENGE

Pg. 104 SWM speaks with Valentin Post, CEO of FINISH Mondial, to learn about the partnership’s work to provide access to safe sanitation.

OPINION

AMBASSADORS FOR WATER SOLUTIONS

Pg. 54 Emilio Gabbrielli discusses the social dimension of current options to ensure access to clean water, such as desalination and reuse.

INTERVIEW

WATER MANAGEMENT FOR MINING

Pg. 66 Jo Burgess, Managing Director for South Africa at Isle Utilities reviews the challenges of water management in the mining sector.

GENDER DYNAMICS AND WATER CONFLICT

Pg. 34 Jenniver Sehring (IHE Delft) shares some insights on gender dynam ics in transboundary water governance and how to address the gender gap.

NEW BUSINESS OPPORTUNITIES

Pg. 32 Luis Navarro delves into emerging needs in the water sector and the technological and business development opportunities they generate.

OPINION OPINION

WATER RESEARCH PRIORITIES

Pg. 95 Dr Alesia Ofori describes the work of a water@leeds team to scope the most important water research questions for the coming decades.

EFFECTIVE PHOSPHOROUS REMOVAL

Pg. 72 In this interview we learn about Phoslock®, a solution to remediate excess phosphorous in water bodies, and a European case study.

INTERVIEW

INVESTORS TAKE

WATER ACTION

Pg. 46 Kirsten James (Ceres) tells us about the Valuing Water Finance Initiative, aiming to engage corporate water users to act on water.

A REWARDING EXPERIENCE

Pg. 96 Felicia Marcus, also known as “California’s Water Czar”, speaks to us about her successful career trajectory in the water industry.

DEALING WITH WATER CHALLENGES

Pg. 108 The Smart Water Magazine team has some proposals for you: something to read, something to watch, and something to enjoy.

THE DIGITAL PATH: MANAGING CHANGE

Pg. 86 In this interview, Jorge Helm brecht (Idrica) addresses the keys to the digital transformation, where change management is crucial.

INTERVIEW INTERVIEW

INNOVATION: KEY FOR RESILIENCE

Pg. 50 Lindsey Brown, Australian Market Leader, Water at GHD, shares her views on innovation and how the water sector is adapting to change.

APPOINT

MEET THE NEW FACES IN THE MOST IN

In this section we have compiled the most important appointments that have taken place recently, and entail taking up a position or role within influential entities (public, private or mixed) in the water sector.

MR FADY JUEZ

The International Desalination Association (IDA) announces that Mr Fady Juez, Managing Director of Metito Overseas, has been elected President by the Term 20 IDA board. Ms Shannon McCarthy has been re-appointed as the Secretary General of the Association.

“I aim to ensure IDA continues the tremendous global recognition and financial turnaround accomplished in term 19, under the leadership of Shannon McCarthy and Carlos Cosin, with the board’s full support. The IDA will celebrate its 50th anniversary in 2023, and it is my honor to lead the Board of Directors in this important term. Considering the growing need for non-conventional water solutions to offset the effects of climate change, population growth, and indus try needs, the board and I will continue the work to engage with the global stakeholder community to bring solutions to meet UN SDG 6 water for all. The special initiative to ensure a water positive world,” stated Mr Juez. Mr Juez has been an active member serving the International Desalination Associ ation Board of Directors for the last twenty years.

In addition to Mr Juez serving as President, Mr Alejandro Sturniolo, Global Head of Water Reuse & Strategic Partner ships, H20 Innovation, has been named 1st Vice President, and Mrs Jantje Johnson, CEO, OrangeBoat, has been named 2nd Vice President. The previous President had been Carlos Cosín, CEO of Almar Water Solutions.

MR FADY JUEZ ELECTED PRESIDENT OF THE INTERNATIONAL DESALINATION ASSOCIATION FOR 2022-2024

Mr Fady Juez, Managing Director of Metito Overseas, is elected President by the Term 20 IDA board

FLUENTIAL WATER SECTOR ENTITIES

ANNE-SOPHIE LE LAY

Anne-Sophie Le Lay has been appointed Group General Coun sel and member of the Executive Committee effective January 4, 2023. In this role, Anne-Sophie Le Lay will report to Sabrina Soussan, SUEZ Chairman and CEO. She will lead the Group’s global legal, corporate governance, compliance and ethics affairs.

Anne-Sophie Le Lay began her career as a lawyer in Paris and then Toronto. In 2001, she joined the Renault Group's legal de partment, before taking over as head of the Group’s legal depart ment in 2011.

Since 2018, Anne-Sophie Le Lay was Secretary General of Air France-KLM and member of the Executive Committee, in charge of Institutional and International Affairs, Legal, Commu nications and Sustainable Development, as well as Secretary of the Board of Directors.

Anne-Sophie Le Lay, 51 years old, is a director and member of the Audit and Ethics Committee of the Orano Group. She is also Vice-President of the Cercle Montesquieu. She is taking over from Philippe Andrau, who has decided to embark on a new professional project.

Sabrina Soussan, Chairman and CEO of SUEZ said: "I am de lighted to welcome Anne-Sophie Le Lay. Her extensive track-re cord, particularly in international and environmental issues, will be a key asset for the implementation of the Group's strategy and for the future. I would like to warmly thank Philippe Andrau for his work and commitment over the past ten years in the service of the Group's interests and those of our clients."

ANNE-SOPHIE LE LAY APPOINTED SUEZ GROUP GENERAL COUNSEL

Effective next year, Anne-Sophie Le Lay has been appointed Group General Counsel and member of the Executive Committee of Suez

ILAN GOLDFAJN

To be elected president, a candidate must receive a majority of the total voting power of the IDB’s member countries

Ilan Goldfajn was elected president of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB). The meeting was held at IDB Headquarters in Washington, D.C., with delegations attend ing virtually and in person. Nominated by Brazil, Goldfajn will take office for a five-year term on December 19, 2022.

As president, Goldfajn will manage the operations and administration of the Bank, which works with the public sector of Latin America and the Caribbean. In addition, he will chair the Board of Executive Directors of the IDB and the Board of Executive Directors of IDB Invest, which works with the region's private sector. The president also chairs the Donors Committee of IDB Lab, the Bank’s laboratory for innovative development projects.

To be elected president, a candidate must receive a majority of the total voting power of the IDB’s member countries as well as the support of at least 15 of the 28 regional mem ber countries (26 borrowing member countries, plus Canada and the United States). The IDB has a total of 48 member countries, with offices in all borrowing countries as well as in Europe and Asia.

The Board of Governors is the Bank’s highest authority. Each member country appoints a governor, whose voting power is proportional to the capital in the Bank subscribed by his or her country. Governors are typically finance ministers, central bank presidents, or other high-ranking economic authorities.

Royal HaskoningDHV has appointed two new Global Di rectors: Sabine Bink will start as Global Director Industry & Buildings per 1 December 2022 and Jon Robinson will start as Global Director Water & Maritime per 5 January 2023.

Jon joins Royal HaskoningDHV from AECOM where he was Head of Water Sector, Europe. Within water, envi ronment, maritime and power businesses he has held oper ational, sector and strategy development roles in AECOM and predecessors.

As Global Director Water & Maritime he succeeds Niels Schallenberg who earlier this year decided to pursue his ca reer outside Royal HaskoningDHV.

JON ROBINSON

CEO Erik Oostwegel about the appointment: “Jon’s exten sive leadership experience in water and his strategic under standing of maritime, coupled with his ambition to deliver on our purpose of Enhancing Society Together, make him ex cellently positioned to lead the Business Line Water & Mari time. He will bring experience in new service and innovation development, as well as fresh insights and dynamics.”

Jon Robinson, Global Director Water & Maritime (per 5 January 2023), said: "The capability, strategic focus and drive of Royal HaskoningDHV’s people are deeply impressive. The Water & Maritime sectors directly face some of the greatest challenges of our times but also offer huge opportunity for sustainable growth and outcomes that deliver enhanced value for our clients, society and environment."

JON ROBINSON APPOINTED GLOBAL DIRECTOR WATER & MARITIME AT ROYAL HASKONINGDHV

Jon joins Royal HaskoningDHV from AECOM where he was Head of Water Sector, Europe

ILAN GOLDFAJN IS APPOINTED IDB PRESIDENT

Aurecon has appointed Vivian Lee as its Executive Director, Water, Sustainability and Climate Change for Greater China to lead its environment and sustainability business in the re gion. This strategic appointment aligns with Aurecon’s com mitment to support its clients transition to a low carbon en ergy economy and to build a greener future. According to the Asian Development Bank, there were more than 225 million displacements due to natural disasters from 2010 to 2021 in the Asia Pacific region, as the impact of climate change deep ens. As such, more governments and businesses are paying greater attention to environmental and sustainability efforts with added urgency.

China has pledged to reach peak carbon emissions before 2030 and be carbon neutral by 2060, while Hong Kong has expressed its commitment to achieve carbon neutrality before 2050. With net zero commitments gaining momentum, the region presents new growth opportunities for Aurecon, espe cially in the areas of environmental management, water infra structure engineering, sustainability and climate change.

Based in Hong Kong, Vivian has over 25 years of experience in the environment and sustainability fields. Over the course of her career, Vivian has been deeply involved in numerous sustainability-related projects of various scale and complexity. She will be responsible for leading the growth of Aurecon’s environment and sustainability business in Greater China, especially in water.

Brown and Caldwell announced Vice President Sarah Reeves has been made a Fellow of the Water Environment Federa tion (WEF).

WEF is a not-for-profit association that provides technical education and training for thousands of water quality profes sionals worldwide who clean water and return it safely to the environment. The prestigious, peer-nominated Fellow desig nation recognizes members’ achievements, stature, and con tributions to the preservation and enhancement of the water profession. With over 25 years of experience, Denver-based Reeves has amassed specific expertise in water quality policy and regulation, focused on developing and driving stakeholder involvement to influence solutions for community and envi ronmental benefit.

As director of treatability services at Brown and Caldwell, she works with the firm’s technical experts and industry in novators to identify, test at a bench- and pilot-scale, and im plement solutions to help municipalities, private industry, and government agencies overcome the most complex wa ter-related challenges.

Furthermore, she leads the Colorado Monitoring Framework, a non-profit organization consisting of industry leaders who collaborate to tackle state-wide water quality issues, including nutrient removal and contaminants of concern, such as PFAS.

Reeves has been involved with WEF for 24 years. She has been chair and vice chair of the federation’s Program Committee.

VIVIAN LEE

LEE APPOINTED

WATER, SUSTAINABILITY AND CLIMATE CHANGE AT AURECON

SARAH REEVES

SARAH REEVES FROM BROWN AND CALDWELL ELECTED WEF FELLOW

WEF is a not-for-profit association that provides technical education and training for thousands of water quality professionals worldwide

VIVIAN

EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR,

Aurecon makes key appointment to spearhead water, sustainability and climate change practice in Greater China

PERSON OF THE MONTH

DR MUSONDA MUMBA

NEW SECRETARY GENERAL OF THE CONVENTION ON WETLANDS

Dr Musonda Mumba, an environmentalist with over 25 years of global experience in environmental management and sustain able development, was appointed the new Secretary General of the Convention on Wetlands last August and assumed her new role on October 1st, replacing Ms Martha Rojas Urrego.

Born in Zambia, Dr Mumba founded the Network of African Women Environmentalists (NAWE) and was named one of the 100 most influential African women in 2021. She was also hon oured as one of the 16 women from around the world restor ing the Earth by the Global Landscape Forum on International Women’s Day 2022.

She worked at the global headquarters of the UN Environment Programme for 12 years on climate change adaptation and a diversity of environmental issues. In 2021 she joined the UN Development Programme as Director of the Rome Centre for Sustainable Development; she also took on a role as senior ad visor for the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration.

Prior to joining the UN, she worked for the World Wide Fund for Nature, for the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands as a junior professional, and for the Zambian government. Dr Musonda has a PhD in wetland conservation and hydrology from Univer sity College London.

BUSINESS

IGNACIO MORCILLO

DEVELOPMENT MANAGER – WATER AT MINSAIT (INDRA)

Minsait: Driving digitalisation in the water sector

The water sector is facing more extreme challenges every day. Valuing and emphasizing the importance of this sector’s activity is key, especially as more countries will experience water stress. Public-private collaboration has been a successful tool, and we must continue to promote these partnerships to achieve the objectives ahead of us.

Minsait, as Ignacio Morcillo, Business Development Manager for Water, tells us in this complete interview, supports the sector by offering its capabilities and solutions in the field of digitalisation.

First of all, we would like to know your professional background up to the po sition you currently hold. My professional career has been linked to the water sector from the beginning. When I finished my degree in Agricul tural Engineering at the Polytechnic University of Madrid, I obtained a schol arship to do my Final Project in Chile on wastewater treatment issues.

I started working at Canal de Isabel II – the water utility in Madrid – manag ing projects related to the water-energy nexus. It was then that I decided to spe cialise in the water sector, doing a Master

in Water Management and Technology taught by Aqualogy-UPC (nowadays Water School), where I had the oppor tunity to meet great water professionals. During those years, I participated in the creation of the Spanish chapter of the Young Water Professionals of the IWA.

Subsequently, I have worked in com panies that offer advanced technological solutions for the digitalisation of water services. This has allowed me to know the market in Spain, UK and LATAM.

To complement my education, I recent ly graduated from IESE’s Executive MBA. Interested in future digitalisation strategies, I joined Minsait, a Spanish multinational company, a leader in digital technology.

As Global Business Development Manager - Water at Minsait, what would you say are the objectives of the department you lead?

At Minsait, we want to serve the water market, taking into account our capac ity in other sectors. Within this market, I am responsible for the water unit, from which we deal with projects in the wa ter sector at an international level, with a significant presence in Spain, the Philip pines and LATAM.

Our main objectives at the water unit are to identify the needs of the sector to gen erate the right offer as well as the needs of our individual clients, in order to help them prioritise and undertake their dig italisation projects as part of the digital transformation of their companies.

To this end, we rely on product management and on other companies in our group to offer a suite of solutions based on the Onesait platform and specific technologies suited for the operation of processes in both water supply and sanitation. We work on the integra tion of measurements, data processing (ML, AI...), and modernisation of ap plications. We also provide consulting services for transformation and change management projects and we are stra tegic partners of the leaders in business software (CRM, ERP...).

How is the company driving the activ ities of the water sector?

We truly believe that the sector has tre mendous potential, both in Spain and globally, due to the challenges we face in terms of sustainability, extreme weather phenomena and climate change.

In this context, within Minsait, more resources are being allocated to advance the sector, adapting the entire portfolio of solutions to the new market demands. All the technology, experience and knowledge acquired over the years in sec tors which are further advanced in terms of digitalisation is enabling us to position ourselves with a strong value proposition for the water sector.

BUSINESS

"Transparency with the user is fundamental for progress in the water sector. We must make it visible and value the sector’s activity"

Z Águeda García de Durango - G González-Cebrián

For example, in the electricity sector we are working on the Siord Project, an information system for distribution net works that allows us to interconnect the information from the systems of the dif ferent operators in real-time. This type of project is fully transferable to the man agement by public water authorities.

We are currently going through a crisis that is resulting in rising energy costs. How do you think this increase is af fecting the water sector?

Unfortunately, the current energy crisis is seriously impacting operators. Many of the operating contracts that are in place are becoming unsustainable due to the increase in energy costs and inflation. We must take into account that the average energy consumption of integrated water cycle management is close to 1 kWh/m3 Desalination and wastewater treatment, because of the processes involved, are the most energy-intensive services water util ities provide.

These types of operations are the most critical nowadays and those that are suf fering the most in order to be able to pro vide their services. Precisely in the area of wastewater treatment, I would like to highlight our product Oblysis, a disrup tive technology that makes it possible to reduce the energy consumption of the

biological process of activated sludge in a WWTP by up to 40%. This energy-saving measure can be integrated into a global energy management platform that allows operators to continuously monitor and optimise their operations to increase energy efficiency.

Minsait is a strategic partner for com panies going digital. How would you describe the process of providing sup port to these companies?

Indra is one of the leading global technol ogy and consulting companies, a technol ogy partner for the key operations of its clients’ businesses around the world. In this sense, we not only work by offering our own digital solutions or implement ing software from strategic partners, but also, thanks to our extensive experience worldwide, we provide excellence in endto-end support to our clients.

Some of the hallmarks of the company are a solid analysis of the starting points combined with realistic objectives, con tinuous monitoring, improvement anal ysis and post-implementation support.

We specialise in prioritising digital projects, articulating transformation of fices and collaborating with companies in change management. Throughout the process of digitalisation of water com panies, I am certain that new talent will

be attracted, facilitating the coexistence of very different profiles with different needs and aspirations, which are essential for the transformation.

Cybersecurity is a key issue when it comes to digitalisation. What role does it play at Minsait, and what projects are being carried out in this regard?

Cybersecurity has been part of Minsait’s core solutions since its inception. How ever, two years ago, with the acquisition of the company SIA, it has become one of the company’s strategic commitments. SIA is an international leader in cyberse

Supporting companies in their digital transformation is essential to obtain the desired results and manage change

curity and offers differentiating solutions and services in the market. With this in corporation, our team has more tools to support our clients and advise them in their implementations with a 360º vision and with a commitment to sustainability and the continuity of public services.

We are undertaking very diverse pro jects such as the implementation of cyber security plans, business continuity plans or digital signature projects. Let’s not for get that the water sector has critical infra structure that must be properly secured in the convergence between OT and IT, to avoid undesirable cyber attacks.

In which countries does Minsait oper ate in the water market? What are your growth prospects in this regard?

We are present in more than 140 countries around the world, working on different projects simultaneously. Within the water sector, we have a significant presence in LATAM and the Philippines, but we are also working in other geographies through projects dealing with a diversity of topics.

We currently have projects in countries such as Italy, Chile, Brazil, Peru, Mexico, the Philippines and Spain, among others. Although the growth of the company is fundamentally organic, in 2019 we ac

quired the US company Advanced Con trol Systems, adding to our current offer our own manufacturing of SCADA and network operating systems. With this acquisition, our presence in the United States also gains great relevance, with the possibility of attending new opportunities.

Finally, how does digitalisation im prove operational efficiency?

Digitalisation is a process that, among other things, seeks to reduce the oper ating costs of water services in the long term, diagnose with greater certainty and help to achieve better planning. Invest ing in digitalisation is a strategic com mitment, promoted by Europe and be ing adopted by leading companies.

If we compare the water sector with the electricity sector, we could say that it is lag ging behind in digitalisation. This can be explained by the fact that water manage ment is usually the responsibility of local governments and, with some exceptions, there are no economies of scale. However, there are many similarities between the two sectors. All the digital solutions that have already proven to improve management in the electricity sector can be replicated in the water sector. Asset and infrastructure management, many of them critical, are a core activity. The challenges and needs of industrial plants are similar, and the obso lescence of networks, the need for mod ernisation, maintenance optimisation, and digitalisation of processes... are similar.

Transferring the successful experiences of other utilities is a challenge ahead of our team, dedicated to offering solutions to the water sector. "Minsait is allocating more resources to advance the sector, adapting the entire portfolio of solutions to the new market demands"

In recent weeks, several capitals around the world have hosted meetings to discuss and study the sustainability of public services. Aqualia has participated in these fora which, from Paris to Cartagena de Indias, passing through Riyadh and Copenhagen, have analysed the best processes to promote compliance with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) promoted by the United Nations and have presented examples of good practices associated with them.

Internationalisation is, together with digitalisation, one of the key axes in Aqualia’s present and future perfor mance. Both challenges, which are close ly related to sustainability, “make up the company’s roadmap”, as Félix Par ra, CEO of the company, points out in #Act, the 2021 Sustainability Report.

Aqualia’s activity is closely linked to sustainable growth and international ex pansion that responds to the global need for clean water and sanitation, especially in Europe, America, and MENA. With in this framework, the company has re cently participated in various key events for the water sector in Colombia, France and Saudi Arabia.

Andesco 2022 Congress, in Cartagena de Indias (Colombia)

Aqualia actively participated in the Congress “Interconnection: the future of utilities, ICT and TV”, promoted by Andesco, the National Association of Public Utilities and Communications Companies of Colombia.

The event, held during the first week of September in the city of Cartagena

de Indias, focused on economic reacti vation and included a top-level agenda. Freddy Durán, Aqualia’s Deputy Direc tor of Production in Colombia, partic ipated in the event with a presentation entitled “Circular water economy: from waste to raw material”, in which he explained how the company faces the global challenges for the sustainable use

Freddy Durán, from the Production Department in Colombia, presented Aqualia’s advances in wastewater treatment and re-use during the Andesco congress in Cartagena de Indias, Colombia.

and management of water, through a circular economy model based on the recovery and transformation of organ ic material to convert it into organic by-products that can have a new life. In this sense, Durán explained Aqualia’s objective of converting wastewater treatment plants into circular stations or biofactories capable of transform

ing and recovering waste into usable resources, using them for agricultural purposes or for energy recovery.

With close to 3,000 attendees and 6,000 virtual attendees, and more than fifty hours of content, as well as an extensive commercial exhibition, the 2022 Andesco Conference has become the most important meeting of the wa

ter sector in Colombia and, this edi tion, the most successful to date. The event was attended by the Ministers of Finance, José Antonio Ocampo; of Environment and Sustainable Develop ment, Susana Muhamad; of Mines and Energy, Irene Vélez; and of Housing, Catalina Velasco.

In her speech, Muhamad invited organisations and municipalities to think about a national biogas policy based on organic waste, and to work for innovation and increased citizen participation in territorial social agree ments. “The work in the area of biogas is notorious, it is necessary to gener ate innovation cycles and contribute to the energy transition through collective work with a common purpose: Collaborative Governance”, said the president.

Gustavo Petro, recently elected president of Colombia, closed the XXIV Andesco Congress.

Part of the Aqualia team in Colombia in front of the company’s stand at the Andesco congress.

In closing, the manager of Andesco, Cami lo Sánchez, highlighted public-private col laboration as a lever to steer Colombia to wards sustainability: “We must accelerate the energy transition without ignoring the competitive advantages we have as a coun try. Here we are looking for a solution and working with all the different sectors. We have public, private, and mixed companies that want to have the best solutions and prices for the country’s citizens”.

To conclude, Gustavo Petro, recently elected President of Colombia, closed

Aqualia’s objective is to generate value and well-being by promoting social cohesion transforming cities into smart and sustainable spaces

the Congress with a speech in which he made special mention of the problem of rising energy costs and their impact on the lives of citizens.

Espace Collectivités, the meeting point for municipal service managers in France

Aqualia’s objective is to generate value and well-being by promoting social co hesion, and collaborating with public administrations and social agents in the transformation of cities into smart and

sustainable spaces. In a context marked by the persistent drought that is sweep ing Europe, the Espace Collectivités event, held in Paris in September, has become, in its 38th edition, a municipal meeting point in which to propose responses to the great challenges of the future, such as urban development, ener gy supply, sustainable transport, efficient management of the water cycle, ecolog ical transition and social cohesion and solidarity policies.

Aqualia, present in France since 2019 when it acquired the companies SEFO and GEG, which operate in the area near Paris, has demonstrated at this event that it is already a leading player in the French market with the management of municipal water and sanitation services for 300,000 French citizens.

At the Espace Collectivités event, Aqualia presented its most advanced technological solutions for dealing with the climate emergency (waste-water reuse, intelligent network management and digitalisation, among other tools) and its firm commitment to sustainability.

In this regard, the company has tak en advantage of the fair to launch the French version of its #Sosteniblómetro project, with which it aims to determine the degree of commitment of citizens and communities to sustainability and to raise awareness of environmentally friendly daily behavioural habits orient ed towards sustainable development.

“The future of desalination”, under debate in Riyadh

At the same time as these two events, in Riyadh, the capital and main business centre of Saudi Arabia, Aqualia participated in the congress “The fu ture of desalination”, sponsored by the public company SWCC (Saline Water Conversion Corporation) and promot ed by the British media Global Water Intelligence.

The meeting focused on debating the keys to sustainable desalination from an environmental and financial point of view. To this end, it was attended by hundreds of delegates from the Saudi public administration, especially from the world’s largest desalination off tak er, the SWCC, and executives from the main companies in the sector.

Víctor Monsalvo, head of the Eco-ef ficiency area in Aqualia’s Innovation & Technology department, presented the company’s strategic lines in this field and two of its most ambitious projects: Rewaise and Sea4value, projects that

Aqualia presented its most advanced technological solutions and its commitment to sustainability at the Espace Collectivités (Paris)

Luis de Lope, Aqualia’s International Director, performing the Sosteniblómetro test (“Le Durablomètre” in French) at the Espace Collectivités event, held in Paris.

Aqualia’s stand in the exhibition area of the Espace Collectivités event.

promote new business models based on the circular economy.

Farid Fentazi, Head of Production at the Cap Djinet desalination plant in Al geria, also spoke at the event, presenting the success story of this important de salination plant in the Maghreb, which has been producing 100,000 m3 of de salinated water per day for a decade in

a region with chronic water deficits and guaranteeing the economic and social development of the region.

Recognised by the IWA in Copenhagen

In parallel to these international events, Copenhagen (Denmark) hosted the IWA World Water Congress and Exhibition, where the International Water Associ ation recognised Aqualia as one of the leading companies in sustainable water management (Climate Smart Utility). The award recognises the contribution of companies linked to the end-to-end water cycle that carry out differential ac tions for the climate in three pillars: ad aptation, mitigation, and leadership.

Eva Martínez, head of the Smart Management area in Aqualia’s Innovation and Technology department, par ticipated in one of the sessions in which the IWA recognised the leading utilities in carbon footprint reduction, held un der the title “Towards Climate Smart Utilities”. Martínez also took part in the session “Road to Net Zero”, which addressed the solutions supported by new technologies that can be used to mitigate and alleviate the effects of cli mate change and achieve sustainability in public water services.

At the same event, Zouhayr Arbib, head of the Sustainability area of Aqualia’s Innovation & Technology department, moderated the workshop “Sustainable Small Wastewater Treatment Plants: Present, Future, Opportunities and Challenges”, in which the IntExt project, already implemented at the Talavera de la Reina wastewater treatment plant (To ledo, Spain), was presented.

Internationalisation is, together with digitalisation, one of the key pillars of Aqualia’s present and future performance

In Riyadh, the capital and main business centre of Saudi Arabia, Aqualia participated in the congress “The future of desalination”

Victor Monsalvo, head of the Eco-efficiency area of Aqualia’s R&D Department (first on the left), presented two of the projects in Riyadh that promote new business models based on the circular economy: Rewaise and Sea4value. At his side, Costas Benissis, General Manager of Haaisco, Aqualia’s subsidiary in Arabia; and Farid Fentazi, Head of Production at the Cap Djinet desalination plant in Algeria, which was presented as a case study.

This project represents a revolution in the field of wastewater treatment, as it proposes flexible and adaptable solu tions to the different types of wastewa ter from different territories. The great contribution of IntExt is that it makes it possible for small and medium-sized populations to have access to advanced wastewater treatment, which is usually associated with large cities.

Patricia Zamora, head of projects in Aqualia’s Innovation & Technolo gy Department, also took part in the workshop “High value products based on carbon in wastewater - How do we select and is it sustainable?”, where she presented the Deep Purple Project and showed her poster “Low-cost Waste water Treatment for Small Populations Using Purple Phototrophic Bacteria In Anaerobic Photobioreactors”.

Aqualia’s presence at these four international events not only highlights

the company’s geographical expansion and reinforces its example of end-to-end water cycle management throughout the world, but also places the organisation at the forefront of players who take on sus tainability as a global challenge.

Aqualia is the only company in the water management sector that accredits

its contribution to the SDGs through the integration of management sys tems in its international policy. In ad dition, it shares with its stakeholders the firm objective of integrating triple sustainability as a transversal aspect of the strategy to be followed in the com ing years.

Aqualia’s performance in recent years places the company at the forefront of actors that take on sustainability as a global challenge

Eva Martínez, head of the Intelligent Management area in Aqualia’s Innovation & Technology department, during her speech at the “Road to Net Zero” session at the IWA World Water Congress and Exhibition, held in Copenhagen.

ACCIONA develops technologies that are used in water treatment plants around the world. Smart Water Maga zine interviewed Jorge Malfeito, Director of Innovation of the Water Business in ACCIONA to learn about the compa ny’s research and innovation strategy, the transfer process to industrial-scale imple mentation and some successful cases of innovation projects that have resulted in solutions currently in use in water treat ment plants operated by ACCIONA.

First of all, could you tell us briefly about your professional career and your current role at ACCIONA?

After finishing my postgraduate studies in Chemical Sciences and Polymer Technology, I joined Pridesa as a researcher with the responsibility of creating a new Research, Development and Innova tion (RDI) department and starting up the company’s membrane development project. Subsequently, I went on to lead the RDI activities of ACCIONA’s water business, which include activities related to the development of new projects and processes as well as technical assistance to all departments of the company, until I reached my current position as Director of Innovation of the Water Business in ACCIONA. In addition, I am a member of the Steering Committee of the Euro pean Desalination Society (EDS) and the Steering Committee of the Europe an water platform Water Europe (WE). I am also a member of the International Desalination Association (IDA) par ticipating in its RDI Committee and a member of AEDyR, the Spanish Desal ination and Reuse Association.

Can you tell us about the lines of re search you are working on, and what was the strategy followed to identify these lines?

First of all, I have to say that our actions are aligned with ACCIONA’s strategy and its Sustainability Master Plan, where decarbonisation, the circular economy,

JORGE MALFEITO

OF INNOVATION OF THE WATER BUSINESS IN ACCIONA

The research, development and innovation (RDI) activities of ACCIONA’s water business include the development of new projects and processes as well as technical assistance to all departments of the company.

Z Cristina Novo Pérez - G González-Cebrián

the development of sustainable infra structure and having a positive impact on the planet are major themes in all ACCIONA’s projects. In this regard, the strategic innovation lines in each of the main areas (desalination, wastewa ter treatment, reuse and drinking water treatment) are comprised of lines such as energy minimisation and use of renewa ble energies, resource recovery and val orisation, and digital innovation.

The process to arrive at these lines of research involves several phases. On one hand, we analyse the environment using technology surveillance tools to identify global trends and priority lines of action related to sustainability and innovation in the water sector. On the other hand, the needs of stakeholders relating to ACCIO NA’s innovation activities are identified and analysed. Among the most relevant are the end users (external) and the dif ferent ACCIONA departments to which the results of innovation projects are

transferred (internal users) since collabo ration with them is fundamental for us.

All this is complemented by the ideas arising from the knowledge and activity of our researchers, to conclude with a selection and prioritization of the most relevant technologies for ACCIONA based on the current and expected lev el of development in the coming years, the existing capabilities and resources, either internal or as part of the compa ny’s innovation ecosystem and detailed technical information in scientific pub lications, participation in international conferences, etc.

“We conceive innovation as an integral part of all our actions, from design to operation and maintenance”

DIRECTOR

"Decarbonisation, circular economy, sustainable infrastructure and a positive impact on the planet are major themes in ACCIONA’s projects"

ACCIONA has a Water Technology Centre and several demonstration plants to carry out innovation activi ties. What role do they play in the de velopment of innovative solutions?

Innovation is something that is in the company’s DNA, and innovation ac tivities are carried out in all areas of the company. Our department is responsible for identifying and highlighting all inno vative activity and also for the develop ment of the Strategic Innovation Plan, which sets out the future lines of action that we believe we need to work on in order to maintain the leadership of AC CIONA’s water division.

From our Technology Centre we coor dinate all the activities we are involved in. On one hand, those carried out at the centre itself, where we start the first proofs of concept of new projects and where we have a water chemistry labo ratory equipped with the most advanced analytical techniques and a process labo ratory where we can carry out any type of small-scale tests and determine the hydraulic characteristics of all kinds of membranes.

Finally, we have pilot and demon stration plants, located in some of the plants we operate, including desalination plants, wastewater treatment and drink ing water treatment plants. In these pilot plants, we carry out the final tests of all the new processes with real water. They are fundamental to validate the results and obtain operating parameters of these processes that will later be transferred to the business and become part of the company’s technology portfolio.

What is the Open Innovation pro gramme to accelerate innovation?

It is a corporate program based on the conviction that innovation goes beyond the structure of the company, and that we must work hand in hand with the best talent to develop innovative tech nologies and help transform our business and those of our clients.

ACCIONA advocates an open collab oration model to underpin the sus tainability of its business and to enrich knowledge through the assimilation of external technological perspectives that promote innovation and sustainable de velopment. All of this forms part of our I’MNOVATION initiative, which sup ports the company’s innovative and cre ative approach, articulating co-creation between ACCIONA’s business and the entrepreneurial ecosystem.

ACCIONA promotes its open innova tion programme to accelerate innovation in the era of disruption. This is the first cor porate accelerator for infrastructure and re newable energy startups in Spain. Through open and collaborative innovation, we explore the co-creation of solutions and new sustainable value propositions to address the company’s strategic challenges and the challenges of the different business units by combining internal knowledge and the capabilities provided by the best startups. These startups that participate in the I’MNOVATION programme develop pilot projects together with experts from the company for three months, to validate them in real market environments. During that time they count on the collaboration, mentoring and funding from ACCIONA for their execution.

On the other hand, ACCIONA pro motes intrapreneurship through a pro gramme whose objective is for employ ees to become a fundamental pillar of transformation and the creation of new business models, supporting sustainable development from within the company. This initiative nurtures the profession al development of our people through cross-cutting and multidisciplinary col laboration, encouraging teamwork.

ACCIONA has developed technolo gies that are subsequently used in wa ter treatment plants around the world. Could you explain how the transfer process from the laboratory to indus trial-scale implementation works?

The ultimate goal of our activity is that the results of our projects constitute a fundamental technological base to have a competitive advantage and differentiate us from our competitors. The entire innova tion process is certified under the UNE 166002 standard (Spanish Association for Standardization), which also normalises the transfer of results both to the internal user, which is what commonly happens in ACCIONA’s Water Business, and to the external user. In short, the process begins with the identification of the results to be valorised and the identification of the de partments and people who could be recip ients of this transfer. Next, a work plan is established, with an allocation of resources and a budget, and finally, implementation takes place. Depending on the department or the technology to be transferred, the pro cedure could be simplified, but in any case, once the transfer has been carried out, it is assessed and monitored to know to what extent objectives were achieved, as well as the strengths, aspects to be improved and to assess new transfer opportunities.

Please tell us about some successful cases of innovation projects that have resulted in solutions currently in use in water treatment plants operated by ACCIONA.

The main objective of all our actions is that our developments and innovations have a business application that provides added value from the outset.

If we have to highlight one, it would be the flotation (Ultradaf®®) and flota tion-filtration (Actidaff®) systems that we have installed as pre-treatment in many of the desalination plants that we build and that constitute a robust barri er against variations in the quality of the water entering the desalination plants, including possible algae blooms. These same processes can be installed in drink ing water treatment plants. Focusing on the osmosis process itself, the RO-Save flux® configuration of the reverse osmo sis racks of desalination plants helps to reduce energy consumption. And finally, in the post-treatment stage, we have de veloped more efficient remineralization processes, which reduce the number of

"Our department is responsible for identifying and highlighting all innovative activity and also for the Strategic Innovation Plan"

We do an analysis to identify global trends and priority lines of action related to sustainability and innovation in the water sector

reagents used and avoid possible turbidity events in the produced water.

In the area of wastewater treatment, a good example would be the Niparmox® technology in which we use anammox bacteria highly specialized in the elimina tion of nitrogen. We use these bacteria to treat the water drained from the sludge, to eliminate the high nitrogen load. The application of the Niparmox® process provides additional capacity in the over all removal of nitrogen in a WWTP, re ducing by 25% the aeration needs in the biological reactor, with the impact this has on the energy consumed by the treat ment plant. In addition, it completely eliminates the need to provide external organic matter and reduces energy con sumption due to recirculation.

Continuing with wastewater treatment technologies, we have the DigestUp® process, a sludge pre-treatment aimed at increasing biogas production in the an

"Our intrapreneurship initiative nurtures staff’s professional development through multidisciplinary collaboration, encouraging teamwork"

aerobic digestion process. This technology can be applied in any treatment plant that has an anaerobic digestion process, both in existing and newly constructed plants. The advantages include improve ments in the anaerobic digestion process of sewage sludge in terms of energy, ob taining increases of 22% in the genera tion of biogas per day and increasing its methane content by 32%. In addition, the amount of sludge generated in the sewage treatment plant is reduced. There fore, more biogas of biological origin is produced, thus reducing the dependence of the treatment plants on other energy sources, increasing self-consumption and contributing to carbon neutrality and the circularity of the treatment process.

What is the role of collaboration with other entities, such as research centres and service providers?

As I mentioned earlier, our innovation activities follow a collaborative and open approach, so we cooperate with public and private entities, both universities and research centres as well as public and private companies, extending the scope of innovation to different areas of spe cialization and from different levels of technological maturity, which allows the company to position itself at the fore front of technology and helps us become

leaders in the sector. We also participate in international technological coopera tion projects in which the participation of different actors: universities, technolo gy centres, and small and medium-sized companies, is essential to successfully achieve the projects’ objectives.

Can you tell us about the European projects in which you participate?

At the moment, some European projects worth noting are LIFE INDESAL and LIFE PRISTINE. In the first one, not only do we seek to reduce specific ener gy consumption and the use of chemical reagents in seawater desalination plants,

Through open innovation, we explore the co-creation of solutions and new sustainable value propositions to address strategic challenges

but also to generate renewable energy and commodities from brine streams employing a saline gradient process pat ented by us. LIFE INDESAL thus man ages to align the desalination process with the circular economy concept, con sidering seawater as a source of resources and contributing to achieving Sustaina ble Development Goal 6, ensuring the availability of water and its sustainable management, in line with ACCIONA’s commitment to sustainability.

In the LIFE PRISTINE project, we aim to eliminate emerging pollutants in the integrated water cycle, an essential measure to promote alternative water

resources in the face of water scarcity, which affects more than 2.8 billion peo ple worldwide. The project aims to build a sustainable alternative to ensure the removal of emerging contaminants in the integrated water cycle, going beyond the limits established by the European Drinking Water Directive and the new European regulation on minimum re quirements for water reuse. LIFE-PRIS TINE focuses on emerging pollutants such as PFAS (perfluoroalkyl substanc es), pesticides, pharmaceuticals and per sonal care products, toxins, antibiotic resistance genes and microplastics. The project will contribute to reinforcing ex

isting regulations and will guarantee the use and reuse of water with maximum quality and safety guarantees.

And at the national level in Spain, I would like to mention the HADES project, within our Digital Innovation area. This project, funded by the Span ish Ministry of Science and Innovation, aims to validate a proof of concept of a decision support system in wastewater treatment plants capable of using near real-time plant data to suggest the opti mal operating strategy and a prediction of undesirable events in the plant, using artificial intelligence tools, predictive control models and a digital twin based on calibrated computational fluid dy namics (CFD) models throughout the plant and detailed WWTP models based on activated sludge models (ASM).

What do the activities of the Innovation department in the water area contribute to a company like ACCIONA?

The department’s activities are a point of reference for ACCIONA’s water business. Within our conception of in novation as an integral part of all our actions, from design to operation and maintenance, including construction, the innovation area not only develops strategic lines aligned with those of the company, but also provides continuous technical support in all phases of the life cycle of the company’s projects and services. It thus supports the compa ny’s activities and identifies innovation developed in all departments as well as technology transfer, without forgetting internal training.

"The ultimate goal is that the results of our projects constitute a fundamental technological base to have a competitive advantage"

LUIS NAVARRO

BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT MANAGER AT HACH

THE IMPORTANCE OF ECOSYSTEMS BASED ON COLLABORATIVE INNOVATION AND CO-DESIGN FOR SUSTAINABLE BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT IN THE WATER SECTOR

In recent years, the water sector is experiencing unprecedent ed technological acceleration. There are many perspectives on how to analyse this evolution in more depth, but this process is undoubtedly extending the prism of applications that are gen erating new fields of growth and business development across virtually the entire spectrum of the water sector.

Climate change, digitalisation, energy efficiency, new regulations, and sustainability, among others, are driving forces that are already on the scene and will trigger high intensity business activity in the water market over the coming years.

Ongoing climate disruptions are increasing global water scarci ty. More and more areas are becoming water-stressed, and expert sources indicate that this is not going to change. Therefore, there is a need to further develop new business fields in obtaining new water resources, where seawater de salination and reuse of reclaimed wastewater will play a crucial role in securing drinking water supply and in the future development of sustainable agriculture.

In addition, the new regulations advance new application vectors and extend to scales of treatment plants that were not previously on the roadmap. For example, in wastewater treatment, nutrient re moval processes (basically phosphorus and nitrogen) are already becoming more critical for small and medium-sized plants. The business opportunities here are more than significant, as large-scale processes and technologies need to be adapted in to economic models that can absorb this need for smaller-scale technological implementation. The development and validation of small-scale nutrient control and optimisation systems can provide a previously implementable business niche. Other reg ulatory issues that may lead to strategic business development spaces of interest are: (i) Emerging contaminants, mainly phar maceuticals and microplastics. (ii) Monitoring in sanitation sys tems and COVID-19 health information network. (iii) Moni toring and control of effluents. (iv) New indicator parameters.

For example, the implementation of TOC instead of COD for the regulation of organic load in wastewater.

Another point of great importance is energy. The use of green energy sources and the increase in energy efficiency are increas ingly present in regulatory models in which the use of higher percentages of renewable energies is already encouraged. This opens up significant business opportunities for the integration of photovoltaic and wind technologies in the water sector. Also, the production of biomethane from biogas to be fed into the grid and green hydrogen are areas of business development with great potential. Although this is more applicable to the munic ipal sector, it also applies to the industrial sector where private companies are starting to incorporate sound environmental and resource optimisation sustainability policies. One exam ple is the Sustainable Development Goals or Global Goals 2030 estab lished by the United Nations.

Another line of technology that will create areas of business devel opment is the valorisation of waste substances into valuable products. This is a field of strong investment in current R&D. I would highlight the mining of concentrate from RO desalination processes and biotechnological processes for trans forming waste substances into bioplastics. Undoubtedly, business lines are aligned with sustainable technological development.

Finally, there is the digital aspect. Digital technologies are in creasingly more mature and constantly evolving. The business of data and ensuring data quality is another fundamental line of development for the optimisation of processes and the design of intelligent digital platforms for decision support.

A whole set of emerging needs are and will generate very diverse and high-impact business development scenarios in the water sector. But without a unified development of the technological matrices that allow the objectives and needs described above to be met, it will be difficult to generate a uniform and consistent business.

We have a current scenario in the water sector with a set of driving forces that project unprecedented technological and business opportunities

MAKE THE INVISIBLE VISIBLE.

HOW TO REALIZE YOUR WATER NETWORK’S FULL POTENTIAL

Imagine if you could have a 360° view of your water network and instantly know how to optimize its performance?

With IZAR@SMART WATER – Water Loss Management Application, you’ll benefit from data-driven analytics and insights to assess, detect, reduce and monitor water loss. In addition, reports can be automatically published, which lead to a huge gain of time.

By reducing Non-Revenue Water (NRW), you’ll not only drive network performance, you’ll also preserve time and water and contribute to a more sustainable future.

JENNIVER SEHRING

SENIOR LECTURER IN WATER GOVERNANCE AND DIPLOMACY, IHE DELFT INSTITUTE FOR WATER EDUCATION

IHE Delft, based in the Netherlands, tackles water and sanitation challenges through education, research and capacity development both on a global and national level.

One of the issues that IHE Delft ad dresses is gender dynamics in the water sector. In October, Jenniver Sehring, Senior Lecturer in Water Governance and Diplomacy at IHE Delft Institute for Water Education, along with two other female colleagues, published a book called Gender Dynamics in Trans boundary Water Governance: Feminist Perspectives on Water Conflict and Co operation. An essay focused on gender dynamics in transboundary water gov ernance that questions why there are so few women that lead and work in river

basin organizations and how to solve this significant gender gap.

First of all, can you tell us briefly about your professional career and the posi tion you currently hold?

After studying Political Science and So cial Anthropology, I started my academic career as a junior researcher in an inter disciplinary project on water conflicts in Central Asia at the University of Giessen in Germany. In this project, I was the on ly woman and the only political scientist among male geographers and natural sci entists. This experience made me aware of the asymmetries at the intersection of gen der and discipline. After several years in academia, I made a transition and worked almost 10 years as a water policy advisor/ diplomat for organizations like the Coun cil of the EU, GIZ, the German Federal Foreign Office and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe.

Since 2018, I am at the IHE Delft Institute for Water Education in the Netherlands in the Water Governance Chair Group.

You have recently launched the book Gender Dynamics in Transboundary Water Governance Feminist Perspec tives on Water Conflict and Coopera tion. Where did the idea of writing the book come from?

My IHE colleague Margreet Zwarteveen, one of the co-editors of this book, has long been researching gender and water,

“Research with a gender perspective increases our understanding of why water cooperation in specific cases succeeds - or not”

"We brought together more than 100 researchers and practitioners from around the globe and the conference sparked the idea of a book"

Z Águeda García de Durango - G Jacob Baraza

Jenniver Sehring, Senior Lecturer in Water Governance and Diplomacy, IHE Delft Institute for Water Education

looking in particular at irrigation prac tices and national bureaucracies. Then, some years ago, Rozemarijn ter Horst, the other co-editor of the book, and I joined forces with colleagues of the Stockholm International Water Institute (SIWI) for a comparative analysis of women in deci sion-making processes on transboundary waters in the Rhine, Nile and Chu-Talas basins. We realized that though there is quite a bit of literature available on ques tions of women’s participation or gender aspects with respect to household water

supply and local water management, ac ademic knowledge is much scarcer when it comes to decision-making processes –be it at national or transboundary level.

This motivated us to organise an online workshop in 2020 on “(En) Gendering Transboundary Water Gov ernance”. We brought together more than 100 researchers and practitioners from around the globe. The conference sparked the idea of a book; most of the chapters are based on presentations held at the workshop.

Why is research on gender in trans boundary water governance and water diplomacy important?

Water diplomacy and transboundary wa ter governance are based at the intersec tion of engineering and diplomacy. These are two very different fields, but they have in common that they are highly masculinized. What do I mean with that?

At the more obvious level, it means that (leadership) positions are mainly held by men, thus men are dominating the field. But it is not only a question of numbers.

INTERVIEW

By having dominated both fields for so long, men have shaped the guiding prin ciples, core ideas and norms – for exam ple our idea of what a good engineer or a good diplomat should do or not do. These norms have become so ingrained that we are not aware that they are based on male experience but take them as ‘neutral’. However, they often pose (in visible) challenges for women – for ex ample when “going to the field” or being posted abroad is seen as an important professional experience but is in many cultures not accepted for unmarried women or mothers with small children.

From a more analytical perspective, research with a gender perspective in creases our understanding of why water cooperation in specific cases succeeds - or not. It helps us to situate joint water gov ernance arrangements in their context. Mainstream political analyses of trans boundary waters help us understand the context of political relations between the riparian states, economic and strategic interests, or power asymmetries. With a gender perspective, we add to that and learn to understand better the socio-cul tural setting in which the professionals practising water diplomacy have been socialised and have learnt expectations of appropriate behaviour. This affects how they approach water-related challenges.

The book has numerous contributions; how many authors have been involved in the book, and from which areas do the contributions come from?

The book contains contributions from 20 authors. Some of them are academ

"Female experts share their experiences in transboundary water policy processes or on efforts to implement gender mainstreaming policies"

ic experts. Their chapters are based on empirical research in transboundary riv er basins, or are more theoretical reflec tions, for example on the link between gender inequalities and water conflict at multiple scales, or on what feminist water diplomacy would actually mean. Besides well-established academics, it was very important for us to include a number of promising young researchers.

But the book also includes chapters that are written by practitioners; and two chapters are in the form of interviews with practitioners. In these chapters, fe male experts share their experiences as women in transboundary water policy processes or in efforts to implement gen

der mainstreaming policies. The contrib utors to the book are not only practition ers and academics, they also come from different parts of the world, and thus reflect the experience from a variety of geographical, social, political and cultur al backgrounds. The case studies include basins that are very diverse: the Danube, the Indus, the Jordan, the Chu-Talas, the Nile and the Zambesi.

The book focuses on gender dynamics in transboundary water governance. What are your main findings in this regard?

The individual chapters of the book look at different dimensions of gender dynamics in transboundary waters, and use different

Margreet Zwarteveen, Professor of Water Governance, IHE Delft Institute for Water Education

approaches for studying them. This diver sity is one of its core values. This makes it hard to summarize with a few key find ings. But one main cross-cutting themes and arguments is that transboundary wa ter governance is not gender-neutral. That might sound simple, but the chapters of the book substantiate this claim and illus trate what this means. The lack of gender equality and inclusivity bears a cost, not only for anyone who does not follow this hegemonic norm in their daily profession al practice, but also in missed opportuni ties for better water governance.

And a second main insight of the book is that, even if this gender inequality is acknowledged and there is political will

to change it, there is no easy fix. Promoting gender equality in water diplomacy cannot be reached by simply “adding women”. Gender inequalities are deeply entrenched in the norms, institutional arrangements and common practices of water cooperation and the socio-politi cal context it is embedded in. Transfor mational change that tackles structural obstacles and challenges traditional un derstandings and business-as-usual ap proaches to water diplomacy is needed.

What challenges do women face in terms of water diplomacy and trans boundary water governance?

In the joint study that we undertook with SIWI, we identified the obstacles that women perceive in the Nile, Rhine and Chu-Talas basins. Some obstacles are specific to a region or country, e.g., the absence of gender equality plans in government agencies or cultural gender norms that tell women that it is not ap propriate for them to strive for leader ship positions in which they would excel men. But there was one factor that was perceived equally strong in all three ba sins: the gender division of labour. This might not be surprising as it impacts the career prospects of women across sectors. Still, it is very relevant for water

diplomacy as the nature of this field traditionally requires frequent duty travels or meetings outside normal office hours, which often conflict with the care du ties that still are seen mainly as women’s responsibility. Having said this, we also need to keep in mind that gender is just one factor among others, and that not all women – nor men – are the same or face the same challenges.

Gender stereotyping is another stig ma that influences behaviours in, for example, water negotiations. How do you think this issue could be leveraged to your advantage in such situations?

This is a very interesting point, but also one that requires us to be cautious so as not to reinforce gender stereotypes. Let me refer again to our joint study with SI WI: In the Nile, Chu–Talas, and Rhine basins, interviewees (both men and

"One of the challenges is that gender inequalities are ingrained in practices, private and professional socialization and cultural norms"

In general women become more visible, once the water issues are not “high politics”, but rather an environmental issue – soft politics

women) stated that the presence of women in meetings and negotiations encour aged men to behave more collaboratively and politely, making them avoid rude language and harsh tones. Thus, increased participation of women seems to lead to less confrontative negotiations, but not because women would be per se more peaceful, collaborative or similar, but be cause exactly this stereotype about them makes men adapt to it. That is an interest ing twist, and it is actually also confirmed by studies in other policy fields.

Could you highlight any case studies or experiences in the book that have particularly caught your attention?

Allow me to refer to the case study that I myself have contributed to the book. It is about the Chu-Talas Commission, a bilateral commission for a small trans boundary basin shared by the Central

"There are good examples of targeted programmes for female water professionals, like SIWI’s Women in Water Diplomacy Network"

Asian countries Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan. This commission is often men tioned as a success story of water coop eration in the region, and interestingly – against the usual trend in the region – the Secretariat of the bilateral commis sion is headed by two women, one from each country. Thus, it would be easy to present this as an example of women in leadership positions, and maybe even to make claims that gender can explain this good collaboration. At closer sight, however, it became clear that the impor tance of their work is not reflected in an adequate salary or secure position. Rath er, they have worked for many years on short-term project funding. In addition, the water sector in the region has lost prestige and funding and become an un attractive field. An increased number of women might not necessarily be a sign of more gender equality, but might rather reflect the societal status of certain sec tors and positions.

I think that this is not only specific to this case, but that in general women become more visible, once the water is sues are not “high politics” anymore, but rather an environmental issue – soft pol itics. It seems that the more institution alized and less securitized transboundary water governance is, the more women

are represented in leadership positions. However, to understand this interrela tion better, we would need to do more comparative research.

Finally, in what ways can these ine qualities be addressed by administra tions and other stakeholders?

There are good examples of targeted programmes for female water profes sionals, like SIWI’s Women in Water Diplomacy Network, which empowers its members through mentoring, capac ity developing and networking. It does a great job of connecting and empower ing women working in the field of trans boundary water governance. But we al so have to keep in mind that increased

Transformational change that tackles structural obstacles and challenges traditional understandings and business-as-usual is needed

Rozemarijn ter Horst, Affiliate Researcher, IHE Delft Institute for Water Education

participation of women will not auto matically change gender stereotypes and the male-dominated business-as-usual. Just “adding women” will not do the job - it requires more transformative approaches. Dedicated gender equality policies have been launched in some river basins. However, their results are often rather modest, to say the least. If we really want a transformation towards more gender equality in water govern ance, then the more structural issues also have to be addressed. This is shown, for example, in the book chapter by Ellen Hagerman, Hellen Natu, and Christine Ochieng, who themselves were involved in an international programme to foster women’s participation and leadership

in transboundary water governance in the Nile basin. They showed that one of the challenges to truly transform gender relations is that gender inequalities are ingrained in daily practices, private and professional socialization, and cultural norms that we are often not aware of. Therefore, awareness raising – both with men and women - is a first step towards overcoming gender inequality. Gender policies and strategies have to be based on an assessment of the specific situa tion and framework conditions, and cannot be blueprints. They are likely to fail if they are only general commitment or a ‘checking-the-box’ exercise. Rather, concrete goals and actions need to be identified, budgets need to be allocated

for achieving them, and progress has to be monitored to keep the leadership ac countable. This requires both men and women to be on board: achieving gen der equality should not be the burden of women alone. And in the end, not only women will benefit from it, but the society as a whole.

institutionalized

"The more

and less securitized transboundary water governance is, the more women are represented in leadership positions"

From left to right: Saskia Ivens, Consultant - Gender Equality, Intersectionality, Women’s Rights; Roze marijn ter Horst; Margreet Zwarteveen; Medha Bisht, Associate Professor, Department of International Relations, South Asia University, India and author of one chapter in the book; Tobias von Lossow, Research Fellow, Clingendael Institute, The Netherlands and author of one chapter in the book; Jenniver Sehring.

INTERVIEW

NOAM KOMY

CEO OF MIYA

“We want to keep growing as a global leader of efficiency in the water industry”

Miya is a global water operator that specializes in water efficiency, commercial management and water treatment. Created in 2008, the company had a clear mission: to ensure water abundance through efficient water management. Present in many countries around the world, it now aims to enter the water market in the MENA region, South East Asia, LATAM and European countries like Greece.

Z Águeda García de Durango

Noam Komy, the current CEO of Mi ya, began his career in law, specializing in utilities and administrative and envi ronmental issues. He then joined Miya in 2013 and served as the firm’s VP of Strategy and Corporate Development and CGO and is now serving as its Chief Executive Officer from Abu Dhabi. Smart Water Magazine had the oppor tunity to speak with him about Miya’s most recent trajectory and the company’s future business plans.

First of all, we would like to hear more about your career path to your current position.

I joined MIYA in 2013, serving as Miya’s VP of Strategy and Corporate Develop ment and Chief Growth Officer. I was in charge of leading Miya’s M&A activities and the group’s overall strategy. Since 2022, I became partner in Miya and its new CEO. Since then, Miya has become both a market leader in the field of water efficiency and a leading water operator. In 2016 we purchased Indaqua and since then its value has grown approximately ten-fold. This growth was achieved mainly due the improvement in overall efficiency and without performing any cost cuttings that affected HR or substantial increases in tariffs that affected clients. This sum mer we decided that after such an increase in value, it is time for us to exit from that investment and seek new opportunities.

What are the main challenges you face in your position as CEO of Miya?

I became CEO of Miya in July 2022. We want to keep growing as a global leader of efficiency in the water industry. We will also seek new opportunities to do what we did in Indaqua, making a good water company a great water company that delivers superior results. I would say our biggest challenge is still convincing the water industry and decision makers on the public and private side that effi ciency is the most important challenge we face and that without getting more from our current resources we will face scarcity at unprecedented levels.

What markets is the company currently focused on?

Miya is a company ready and willing to operate anywhere around the world. Currently we are mainly focused on the Caribbean as we already know the area extremely well. We have just come back for the 31st CWWA Congress held in The Bahamas, and I have to say that it was a complete success and an honour to see how the Caribbean countries see our performance both in Jamaica and the Bahamas in recent years. So, now we aim to increase our market share in the region as well as to explore new markets such as the MENA region, South-East Asia, LA TAM and some new countries in Europe like Greece, where non-revenue water (NRW) is drawing the attention of local authorities and we are in an advanced stage in several projects.

What is Miya’s position in Spain and what are its next steps?

We know that the Spanish market is very mature. We have been developing a strategy over the last three years in Spain, achieving a very good response regarding our business model and we look forward to gaining proj ects in the near future. However, we know it will take time, but we will keep trying. We are more than capable of implementing water efficiency projects in Spain.

"This summer we decided that after such an increase in value, it is time for us to exit from that investment and seek new opportunities"

One of the markets with the most oppor tunities at the moment is Latin America and the Caribbean. What is Miya’s inter est in this area, and what kind of projects does the company focus on?

We have a strong presence in the area as reflected in our projects in Kingston, Saint Andrews and Portmore, in Jamaica, as well as in Nassau, in the Bahamas. We consid er ourselves to be the leading company in non-revenue water and efficiency projects in the Caribbean area. We have more than 10 years’ experience in the region, with ex cellent results. The firm mainly focuses on NRW and efficiency projects.

At the CWWA Congress, we were reminded of the low levels of water ef ficiency in the Caribbean and LATAM, and it is where our skills and capabilities are most needed. These are the countries which stand to gain the most from im provements in their water distribution systems. Shortly, we hope to announce new projects in the region.

Another of the markets in which the company is focusing its interest is the Middle East. What are Miya’s pros pects in this respect?

The Middle East has always been an ar ea where the company has shown great interest. Water is extremely scarce, and the cost of water production is very high. We are already holing negotiations with the main water authorities in the regions. Based on our knowledge, we consider that our business model (per formance-based and efficiency projects) can be adjusted extremely well to suit the particular needs of the region.

Moreover, I would like to announce that last summer I moved to Abu Dhabi, UAE, and I hope to bring Miya’s expertise to the region and develop and increase our company´s presence in the region.

Miya has been well known for its commitment to performance-based contracts for the reduction of non-rev enue water (NRW). How important

are these types of contracts in Miya’s current strategy?

We are the world-leading company in the execution of performance-based contracts in efficiency projects (NRW).

We have more than 15 years’ experience. We have developed more than 200 proj ect across the world. Building on the strength of our unique business model, we want to improve and carry out more projects with the aim of improving quali ty of life and to ensure all citizens around the world has access to reliable and safe water in their homes. We strongly believe that a model that obliges the private sec tor to deliver results is critical to achiev ing them.

What other niche markets is Miya in terested in in the short term?

At MIYA we will continue to focus on the water market; it is our hallmark and it is the market where we feel most comfort able. However, I would like to announce that since this summer, we have invested in an Israeli technology company, Xfloat, dedicated to providing floating PV system solutions. Xfloat’s floating panels produce more than any other alternative as they use advanced tracking and AI.

We have the exclusive right to repre sent them in Spain and Portugal. We

have started to hold different meetings with potential partners and clients. We are very excited with this new phase and we will keep you informed.

Finally, what are the company’s future plans and how would you like to see Miya in three years’ time?

We have clear plans; our intention is to grow and continue developing efficiency projects around the world. We will also be keen to partner with financial players to purchase and improve water utilities around the world as we did in Indaqua. In addition, we are going to start devel oping the floating solar panel business.

In three years’ time I would like to see Miya as a key player in the water industry, with more efficiency projects in the Caribbean and the Middle East, and we look forward to repeating our previous success stories.

"Our biggest challenge

convince

water

is to

the

industry and decision makers that efficiency is the most important challenge we face"

We will also seek new opportunities to do what we did in Indaqua, making a good water company a great water company

The term ‘Interim Project Management’ describes the core business of Agenda 21500. Thanks to our commercial activity since 2016 and the trust of our clients, in 2018 we were able to start some of our most comprehensive interim projects, providing services such as contract management, project management and commissioning of wastewater treatment plants.

From 2018 to 2020, Agenda21500 suc cessfully completed contract manage ment support services, completion and commissioning of two wastewater treat ment plants in the Balkan region, for one of its main clients. The projects in volved an extensive sanitation network and the use of bacterial bed processes and SBR systems.

Through the Interim Project Man agement format, Agenda21500 reached an agreement with its client, one of the main Spanish water sector companies, to lead until completion the construction works and subsequent commissioning of two wastewater treatment plants in different locations in the Balkan region, developed by different local authorities, with European Union funding and using FIDIC type contracts. Contract manage ment support under this standard was extended to a third facility.

The service provided by Agenda21500 included project management for the three projects, contract management, cost control, as well as monitoring and control of project planning and commis sioning. A group lead, a site manager, a contract manager, a person in charge of

economic planning and the work pro gramme, and a commissioning manager joined the teams assigned to the project sites, using two different approaches: permanent deployment on site and pe riodic visits.

The projects were at different levels of progress and faced different problems.

The experience of the team provided by Agenda21500 was key to achieve fast in tegration within the project teams, quick and complete identification of any issues, early detection of improvement needs and better communication with local project parties, clients (ministry and municipal ities) and FIDIC engineers (Slovenian

led until

region

and German companies, respectively). As usual in Agenda’s work methodology and as something crucial for international project management, we reached collab oration agreements with local profession als, which greatly enriched our services and the communication between the stakeholders involved.

Our vast experience in international project management and the application of Project Management Institute (PMI®) standards – always present in the interim services offered by Agenda21500 – en abled improved project team communi cations and performance, better interac tion with suppliers and subcontractors, and improved communications and rela tionship with both on-site management and the final client.

Agenda21500’s experience in contract management with many different types of contracts at the international level has enabled the successful completion of nu merous demands, both existing and new.

The evolution of our services over time shows the growing level of trust of our client. We started with project manage ment at one facility and contract man agement support for three projects, to then expand the scope of services to the resolution of the punch list in a second

contract in the first country, and com pleting the execution of the third waste water treatment plant in a neighbouring country. The services were successfully completed with the commissioning of the facilities.

At Agenda21500 we are very pleased to have provided the service that is the raison d’être of our company. But more than that, we are very proud to have put our experience and capabilities at the ser vice of our client and to have enabled the successful completion of their projects.

"The services by Agenda21500 included project and contract management, cost control, control of project planning and commissioning"

Agenda21500

completion the construction and commissioning of two wastewater treatment plants in the Balkan

KIRSTEN JAMES

SENIOR PROGRAM DIRECTOR, WATER AT CERES

“When it comes to financial risk, water risk and climate risk are two sides of the same coin”

Ceres is a US-based nonprofit organization working with capital market leaders to transform the economy and build a sustainable future, driving action and inspiring market-based and policy solutions.

Z Cristina Novo Pérez

Last summer investors from around the world joined Ceres in the launch of the Valuing Water Finance Initia tive, aiming to engage corporate wa ter users to value and act on water as a financial risk and drive large-scale change to protect water systems. Kirst en James, Director of the Water Pro gram at Ceres, answered our questions about this ambitious initiative to raise the profile of water and guide investor water action.

Can you tell us briefly about your cur rent role at Ceres?

I am the senior program director of wa ter at Ceres. I direct Ceres’ strategy for mobilizing leading institutional inves tors and companies to address sustain ability risks facing our freshwater and agriculture systems. Prior to this role, I led strategy development for Ceres’ California-focused policy work. Ceres is a non-profit sustainability advocacy organization.

Ceres has been building the financial case for investor action on water risk for more than a decade. We’ve worked closely with investors to increase water risk integra tion into investment decision-making via resources such as the Investor Water Toolkit. The Valuing Water Finance In itiative builds on this and other inves tor-led initiatives such as Climate Ac tion 100+ to drive large-scale corporate changes needed to safeguard our water systems and limit financial risks.

Investor interest in the Valuing Water Finance Initiative has exceeded our initial expectations. We launched the Val uing Water Finance Initiative in August with 64 investor signatories represent

ing $9.8 trillion in assets under management. These investors understand the urgency of the water crisis and are ready to begin engaging with companies

on water risk. We are in the beginning stages of these engagements and will be working closely with investors through out the process.

How did the idea of the Valuing Water Finance Initiative emerge?

Can you tell us about the feedback you have heard from investors so far?

We work with investors to increase water risk integration into decisionmaking via resources such as the Investor Water Toolkit

"We launched the Valuing Water Finance Initiative in August with 64 investor signatories representing $9.8 trillion assets"

What can be done to accelerate action by investors and companies to con sider water risks and prioritise water stewardship?

The Valuing Water Finance Initiative provides companies with a set of six Corporate Expectations for Valuing Water — clear, science-based steps necessary to mitigate water risk. The

Corporate Expectations consider the full suite of water-related issues, from water availability and quality to corpo rate board oversight and public policy engagement. They also give investors the tools they need to continue analyz ing the financial risks and opportuni ties and elevating the business case for water action.

How will progress concerning investor en gagement with companies be measured?

Ceres will periodically conduct a bench mark analysis to assess and track progress on the water risk management practices of companies that align with the Corpo rate Expectations for Valuing Water. The benchmark analysis is intended to in form investor dialogues with companies

and the overall Valuing Water Finance Initiative by assessing alignment and gaps, informing investor engagement topics, elevating best practices and track ing company progress.

What does the Valuing Water Finance Initiative hope to achieve in the next five to ten years?

We hope to see companies with high-water footprints we are engaged with make signif icant progress toward fulfilling the Corpo rate Expectations and ensuring more resil ient and sustainable water supplies globally.

How does Ceres integrate its work on water and climate issues?

When it comes to financial risk, water risk and climate risk are two sides of the same coin. It’s impossible to signifi cantly advance climate action and water

security without stronger private sector leadership. Ceres has decades of success building investor and corporate climate leadership through our powerful net works and engagement initiatives. This has set the stage for the Valuing Water Finance Initiative, which elevates water to the same level of climate risk and em phasizes water management as a critical aspect of corporate sustainability, risk management, and strategic planning.

"It’s impossible to significantly advance climate action and water security without stronger private sector leadership"

Ceres will periodically conduct a benchmark analysis to assess and track progress on the water risk management practices of companies

LINDSEY BROWN

energy and urbanisation sustainable for generations to come.

When you hear the word innovation, most often technological solutions come to mind. What is innovation for you?

Z Cristina Novo Pérez

Professional services firm GHD is committed to addressing the world’s challenges in the areas of water, energy and communities, with innovative approaches that build resilience and sustainability.

The world is changing and the water in dustry with it: there are new roles and ex pectations, where water companies do not only have to provide water and wastewa ter services, but care for the environment and the wellbeing of the communities they serve, while reducing their carbon emissions and ensuring their services are resilient to disruptions. Innovation will be key to adapt and grow; in this inter view, Lindsey Brown, Australian market Leader – Water at GHD, shares her views on innovation and how the water sector is adapting to change in Australia – the driest continent, experiencing volatile weather patterns – embracing new ways of thinking and anticipating risks.

Can you tell us briefly about your career path and your current role at GHD?

I came into the water industry from an atypical career path. Even though I stew ard an army of engineers and scientists now as GHD’s Australian Market Leader for Water, I’m not one myself. I studied

public policy, then worked in the Canadi an public service and the mining industry. After coming to Australia to do a Masters, I went into the Victorian public service with a focus on water and sustainability, then moved into a role at Melbourne Water. From there, I worked at a small consulting firm before starting my own consulting business, then moved into a role at GHD as the Victorian Market Leader – Water.

The golden thread that ties it all to gether is wanting to make a difference and knowing the power of the private sector to contribute to triple bottom line outcomes. Having worked in both the public and private sectors, I understand the roles that each play in decision mak ing and the positive impact they can have on communities.

Now as GHD’s Australian Market Leader – Water, my role is to guide our national business into the future, think ing of ways GHD can offer value to our clients for the next 90+ years and contin uing to live our purpose to make water,

After the tumult of the last few years, inno vation is no longer a ‘nice-to-have’; it’s an imperative. Innovation to me is about do ing things differently in a way that unlocks value. It is a means to a particular end; never the end in itself. Innovation is about meeting a need, doing something better or solving a problem, whether it be reducing costs, lowering emissions or finding new ways to offer customer value. Sometimes that means innovation is technological or digital, but often it isn’t. Being innovative means adopting new ways of thinking, applying existing ideas in a new way, in viting different processes or stakeholders, or combining the set of blocks we have to work with to create new things.

In my experience, one of the best path ways to innovation is to stay curious just a little bit longer. Often our desire for res olution causes us to jump to solutions or conclusions and grasp at the first or most obvious answer. If we can stay curious just that little bit longer (which sometimes requires humility), that’s where we create space for innovation to emerge.

The needs that the water industry is expected to meet have evolved and broadened to address issues like the liveability of cities or climate unpre dictability. To what extent do water sector organisations have the skills and culture to adapt to change?

In Australia, most organisations in the water industry have embraced the chal lenges of liveability and climate unpre dictability. The Australian water sector sees itself as an enormous driver of com munity value, so they’ve been quick to take on the responsibility of responding to these issues to provide value to the community and continue to enjoy the license to operate. Because the indus

"We need diversity and inclusion in the water sector because innovation happens when we have different perspectives at the table"

AUSTRALIAN MARKET LEADER, WATER AT GHD

try varies between large-scale water au thorities and much smaller entities, the ability and capacity to respond to these challenges varies too. Despite this, it is widely accepted that the water industry plays a pivotal role in these key issues.

This shared sense of purpose and commitment is what helps the water industry attract and retain people who connect with this vision, people who are committed to delivering these outcomes and inspired to make a difference. That’s something that other sectors struggle with and when we’re competing for talent, the water sector is able to dif ferentiate itself through its collective commitment to achieving positive out comes. This helps us attract people with the skills, mindset and interest to tackle these challenges head on.

Are there lessons that can be learned from other sectors in terms of creating the conditions that favour innovation?

It’s great to see the water sector take an interest in learning from each other but there is more we can learn from other sectors when it comes to agility in deci sion making and having the risk appetite to make bold moves. Those are things we as an industry could improve on.

Other sectors or organisations with dif ferent regulatory frameworks or organisa tional structures might have an edge over us but it’s critical that we don’t use that as an excuse. We need to explore ways to be more agile and bold because I expect we will be disrupted at some point. Take bank ing, for instance: 50 years ago we would never have thought an industry so estab lished and central to our economy could be disrupted, but then came cryptocurren cy and a digital revolution. To assume that the water industry won’t be similarly dis rupted leaves us in a vulnerable position, so we need to think innovatively around our future and not be complacent that we will always play the role that we play now.

The power industry is often looked to for inspiration because it’s seen as being analogous to the water industry – both highly network driven essential servic es and highly regulated. But if we want to innovate, we need to take cues from sectors that are less like us – think tech, banking and social enterprise. If we look too narrowly for inspiration, we limit our ideas. The scale and importance of the problems we’re trying to solve require us to be unlimited in our thinking.

The resilience of water and wastewater services relies on a healthy environ ment. Communicating with customers is also part of a utility’s concerns. Is there a trend towards a more holistic approach to water services provision?

In Australia, there’s a trend towards thinking more holistically about the role of water services and how they’re provided, with examples of integrated entities responsible for both waterway

health as well as water and wastewater service provision. The next evolution for the water industry is around stormwater and its value as a potential resource. Our thinking has evolved over the last few decades around wastewater as a risk to be managed rather than a resource to be captured. Similarly, our thinking around stormwater will evolve too and we may see changes with how that ties into our re sponsibilities around the water cycle rath er than being seen as something separate.

Currently, the way water is governed does not match with the natural water cycle, and we’re seeing the limitations of regulatory and governance struc tures that don’t match with the natural system. Floodwater and stormwater are managed differently to potable water and wastewater, but it’s all part of the same cycle. How we manage either of those can affect the quality of the other. We have seen a willingness to collabo rate across borders and boundaries to manage water in a more holistic way, and while that’s a key step, there’s so much more we can do to improve.

Rather than approaching water pro jects with a mentality of zero harm to the environment, we need to go further and regenerate the environments that have been impacted. In a water industry that loves concrete and pipes, we are starting to see more regenerative design and na ture-based solutions emerge. Many are leaning into an exploration of what re generative solutions might look like at scale and their potential.

Climate ambitions are on the rise. Is there enough emphasis on the links between climate and water?

Within the water industry, there is a deep understanding of the connection between climate and water, both as managers of surface water resources –which are susceptible to climate change – and as large greenhouse gas emitting energy users. Most water utilities in Australia have emissions reduction tar

gets and a majority have net zero targets. The commitment is there because we are seeing first-hand the impacts of climate change through flooding and droughts on an unprecedented scale. The next step is to help the community and pri vate sector outside the water industry understand the connection between cli mate and water, empowering people to make decisions that are more sensitive to that connection.

The recent Aquanomics report re leased by GHD quantifies the impact of climate-related events on Australia’s economy between now and 2050. It’s an important piece of work because it demonstrates the interconnection be tween climate and water in an explicit way. However, despite our best attempts to quantify the financial and economic impact, we cannot put a price on the psychological and emotional impact on communities affected by climate-related events. In the end, water utilities exist to serve their communities so it’s important that we shine a light on these issues and the impact they have on people.

What trends would you like to see in the water industry in the coming years? We’ve seen a lot of progress in the last few years around diversity and inclu

sion in the Australian water sector, with growing conversations around women in executive leadership, inclusion for people with diverse abilities or disabili ties (such as through the WaterAble net work), LGBTQIA+ inclusion (through the Pride in Water network) and bring ing Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples voices into the water sector. But we can do so much more to change the face of the water industry.

My hope is that our industry will look visibly different and be more representa tive of the diverse communities that we serve. We need diversity and inclusion in the water sector because innovation hap pens when we have different perspectives at the table. If we’re going to drive inno vation that serves our customers and our communities, we need people in organ isations who look like our community and reflect their views.

"In Australia, most organisations in the water industry have embraced the challenges of liveability and climate unpredictability"

If we can stay curious just a little bit longer (which sometimes requires humility), that’s where we create space for innovation to emerge

EMILIO GABBRIELLI

INDEPENDENT INTERNATIONAL ADVISOR

WATER, A LIMITED RESOURCE ESSENTIAL TO LIFE: A SOCIAL CHALLENGE

As we all know, water is essential for life. This means that a suitable amount of water of the right quality needs to be available to all living creatures to ensure the well-being of all people and safeguard the environment. This has become increasingly difficult given the explosion of the world’s pop ulation and the associated water demand by agriculture and industry, coupled with a disregard for the environment that has led to contamination and depletion of water resources and progressive changes of weather patterns.

Still, at the time of the first World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) in 1992 in Rio De Janeiro, Brazil, this crucial role of water was not explicitly recognized. In fact, it hardly figured on the agenda. Luckily, it was addressed in a side event of the Summit, recognizing that it is a limited resource and so must be managed as such. At the WSSD+10, which took place in Johannesburg, South Africa, in 2002, water was finally a top agenda item, also thanks to Nelson Mandela.

Today, water is high on the po litical agenda, as the UN Devel opment Goals testify. The issue of water is pervasive in most of the 17 Goals, well beyond specific Goal 6 on Clean Water and Sanitation. However, this has not meant that the world has progressed as fast as necessary in securing adequate fresh water supplies. Projections are not promising and building consensus around workable solutions and sharing of the re sources is proving to be a significant challenge.

This cannot be surprising. When a resource is limited, the potential for conflict is high and even more difficult to man age in the case of a resource essential to life. Water is, and needs to be, a political issue at all levels, from transnational to local. At the same time, opinions about water—a highly sensitive subject—can be easily influenced by uninformed or partisan political campaigning so that the public is mobi lized against its own interests. Over the years, my observa

tion is that often we have the capacity and technology, but it is the social dimension that prevents or derails the adoption of the most effective solution. This means that the social as pect is a key element to avert a full-blown water crisis.

The public needs to be aware of the issues and well informed. This is often hard to achieve, as I frequently see in my main field of activity, desalination and reuse. For instance, there is a common assumption that the concentrate from a seawater de salination plant is toxic and that with time extensive use of de salination will lead to an overall salinity increase of the oceans. This is wrong. There is a wealth of information showing that a properly sited and engineered concentrate discharge system prevents any adverse effects on the local marine environment. Yet, this May, the construction of a large desalination plant at Huntington Beach, California, was blocked after over 20 years of devel opment as many in the community had become militant against it.

Luckily, there are examples where most citizens coalesced be hind a sound government policy. One is Singapore, where this was mainly achieved through educa tion: every year all students, from primary to university, had to visit the NEWater visitor center where they learned about the country’s bold water plan, which includes direct potable reuse of suitably treated sew age when necessary. In this way, they became ambassadors to their own family. Another example is the Programa Água Doce in Brazil, where 1000 small desalination units have been built in the semi-arid North-East and, against all odds, work satisfactorily thanks to the previous involvement and capacity building of the community to be served.

Now, more than ever, we need to be ambassadors for the solutions available. Armed with a growing suite of technologies and a willingness to work with stakeholders at all levels, we have the capacity to help address the social challenges that can affect our access to clean water, an essential resource for life.

We often have the capacity and technology, but the social dimension prevents or derails the adoption of the most effective solution

CEO OF ALMAR WATER SOLUTIONS

CARLOS COSÍN

Carlos Cosín is CEO of Almar Water Solutions and was elected President of the International Desalination Association (IDA) at the IDA 2019 World Congress held in Dubai. After three years in office, including an additional year due to the postponement of the event because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Carlos takes stock of his position as president and talks about the initiatives and projects that were carried out during this period.

During his time as President, Carlos Cosín was supported by Devesh Sharma, CEO of Aquatech International, as First Vice President, Alejandro Sturniolo, di rector of water reuse and strategic part nerships at H2O Innovation, as Second Vice President, and Shannon McCarthy as Secretary General of the association.

What is your assessment of your time as President of the International De salination Association (IDA)?

I can’t separate my time as President from the previous phase; I prefer to see it as a continuation of my support for the Association. I have been a member of IDA since 1997, but I started to take a more active role when I joined the board four terms ago. During that time,

together with the active board members, I have promoted important changes in the management and direction of the association, including the change of the secretary general. Prior to serving as Pres ident, I held the position of treasurer, so we sought a more international profile and a CV adapted to the new situation and financial management. My goal with this change was to provide IDA with a higher level of management through the new secretary general, to elevate the lev el of the board with professionals in the sector who would contribute their expe rience and decision-making power in the companies they manage for the benefit of the sector, and to provide added value and content to IDA so that it would ben efit all of its members. This is key for an

Association whose financial sustainabili ty is based on the fees paid by registered members and the sponsorships of the in itiatives that it carries out. Without that added value, the road would be a short one. We have also focused our efforts on new communication tools that give greater visibility to the tremendous work that is being done inside the Association. This is a job that is done generously, without remuneration, and the members and the market itself are the ones who should take stock, not me. I have tried to contribute with my experience, and I have worked very well with the new board and of course side by side with Shannon McCarthy, our Secretary Gen eral, who is the one who in the end is responsible for implementing the dayto-day work and the success of what has been achieved belongs to her.

One of your goals, when you were elect ed President of the IDA, was to broaden the viewpoint of the association, adapt it to the new reality and move deeper into the areas of reuse and advanced technologies. How much progress did you make toward this goal?

Well, my idea was to adapt IDA to the new times. IDA enjoys a prestigious

"I have promoted important changes in the management and direction of the association, including the change of the secretary general"

“In all areas near the coast with no alternative resource, desalination will have no competition”

G González-Cebrián

INTERVIEW

unconventional resources for the devel opment of a sustainable future.

What is your vision for the sector and the future of desalination and reuse? How does it fit in with the renewable energy revolution?

reputation in its technological profile; the technical presentations and publica tions that are presented at each and every congress always involve large technolog ical advances and a lot of hard work to maintain the level that is expected. But the sector needed to adapt to the new challenges, contractual frameworks are enormously more complex with new models such as PPP and BOOT, with much more versatile and imaginative financing, and with many more players in the sector. We realized that what we were missing in the association was the end customer, the utilities, the big in dustrial consumers, which are the ones who demand and contract the projects from the developers or EPC contractors, and also an understanding of the new regulatory frameworks in order to help many countries to develop favorable

frameworks. Lastly, non-conventional water resources (desalination and reuse) that used to be focused on municipal frameworks, now have a large presence in the industrial sector. Leading compa nies from industries such as Food and Beverage, Oil and Gas or mining now form part of our Association.

We wanted to make room for all of these professionals and give them a place to contribute their comments, problems and solutions. We created working groups called Advisory Com mittees, led by excellent leaders who are doing a very professional job. We are advancing little by little in this. We are a non-profit association, so we cannot compensate for the free contributions of these top professionals, who have limit ed time and busy calendars. I am aware that this will take time, but I think we have planted the seeds in the IDA’s new format. I would like to take this oppor tunity to thank everyone for their self less contributions.

These working groups have generated very interesting initiatives that we are working on (some have already been announced) and that will bring great added value to the IDA of the future, as a leading player in the management of

Desalination continues to grow every year, technology is already a commodity, and the scale effect has broken the molds, which means that there is no stopping its development. More and more coun tries are going to make use of this tech nology, and its challenges will lie more in the new replacement technologies or the reduction of production costs. New ideas are being developed to eliminate or mitigate brine rejection and at the same time take advantage of the extraction of minerals for commercial use. That path is wide open and holds great potential. In all areas near the coast (less than 100 km), with no alternative resource, desali nation will have no competition.

Where we still have a long way to go is in reuse, which is key to replacing the use of fresh water and natural re sources for agricultural irrigation and industrial water. These are the world’s biggest consumers and we have come a long way, but even so, in the next 10-15 years, we will certainly be seeing significant progress.

The use of renewable energies is grow ing in parallel with it, creating impor tant synergies, and not specifically in the hybridization in our plants, where wind or sunshine don’t always generate the best performance. But where I do see great opportunities is in the pro duction of hydrogen by electrolysis, be cause water is a critical resource for its production. I have no doubt as to the enormous potential that the sector will open up to us.

How do you see the role of desalina tion in the context of climate change?

Of course, since water is a scarce resource and that will remain critical in the future,

"We realized that what we were missing in the association was the end customer, the utilities and the big industrial consumers"

We have focused our efforts on new communication tools that give greater visibility to the work that is being done inside the Association

desalination and reuse are the only ways to produce new water resources. This will enable us to preserve natural reserves, lakes, and rivers, maintain their ecolog ical flows and avoid the overexploitation of aquifers to keep these reserves for fu ture generations.

The United Nations has just recog nized for the first time that the gen eration of unconventional resources (desalination and reuse) is a key tool in the fight against climate change. But I would like to go even further because reality is very stubborn. SDG 6, which guarantees the availability of water and its sustainable management

and sanitation for all, is a challenge in and of itself; if it isn’t achieved, the other sustainable development goals such as eradication of poverty (SDG 1), food security (SDG 2), health and well-being (SDG 3), reduced inequal ities (SDG 10) or development and economic growth (SDG 8) will sim ply not be possible if we fail to ensure water and sanitation for the future of humankind.

The IDA has an enormous role and responsibility in this regard. Its contri bution will be invaluable in facing this challenge. For my part, I will contin ue to serve on the board to the best of

my ability, and I am sure that the new President, Fady Juez, together with the team of professionals and the secretary general at the front, will be able to carry this forward with great enthusiasm and even greater commitment.

"Non-conventional water resources that used to be focused on municipal frameworks, now have a large presence in the industrial sector"

SMART WATER MANAGEMENT PAYS OFF

In 2017, Brønderslev Water Company faced a serious increase of its NRW volume. The Danish utility reacted and, with the help of Diehl Metering, succeeded at limiting its water loss to just 5% over the past three years.

When a series of serious and hard-to-iden tify leaks quadrupled Brønderslev Water Company’s volume of non-revenue wa ter (NRW), action needed to be taken – and fast. The company’s leadership team turned to Diehl Metering for as sistance, who helped the firm develop its LEAK365 smart meter technology. As a result, it has been able to limit its water loss to just 5% over the past three years.

Brønderslev Water Company (BWC) is wholly responsible for supplying water to the growing population of Brønderslev in Denmark. “Every year, we supply around 980,000 cubic meters of water to 16,000 consumers – all from our 365 km long wa ter network,” said Thorkil Neergaard, CEO and managing director of the company. But maintaining a water network this long – a stretch which includes 140 km

in urban areas and 224 km in rural ar eas – is no easy feat. “Non-revenue water (NRW) was becoming a growing prob lem,” said Neergaard. NRW is water that is produced by a utility firm but cannot be billed to the consumer because it is lost – usually as a result of leaks, but also because of ageing networks, poor meter ing accuracy, billing errors, manual read ings or fraud.

A series of serious and hard-to-identify leaks raised water losses to around 12% in 2017, and then one month the water loss exceeded 22%

Thorkild Neergaard, CEO and managing director of Bronderslev Water Company

For the fifteen years before 2016, BWC maintained its NRW rate at around 5 –8%, well under the 10% limit enforced by Danish regulators. “In Denmark, our legislation does not permit leakage of more than 10%,” said Neergaard. “Leak ages exceeding this limit are subject to pecuniary penalty – each cubic meter lost costs us one euro.”

However, at the beginning of 2016, BWC’s NRW volume began to rise. “A series of serious and hard-to-identify leaks raised water losses to around 12% in 2017, and then one month the wa ter loss exceeded 22%,” said Neergaard. “This was unacceptable.”

A global challenge

BWC isn’t alone in its need to address NRW – in fact, it’s a global problem. Ac cording to the IWA (International Water Association), NRW represents 346 mil lion m3/day and its financial cost exceeds 39 billion dollars a year, a number that represents nearly 50% of the average flow of the Ganges River. Across the world, water is becoming scarcer as the global population increases and climate change makes extreme weather more common. Around 1.1 billion people lack access to water and 2.7 billion experience wa ter scarcity at least one month a year. By

2025, two-thirds of the world’s population may be facing water shortages. This means the role of utilities is crucial in en suring water is delivered as efficiently as possible to populations all over the world.

“We knew we had to change our wa ter loss strategy as a matter of urgency,” Neergaard said. “That’s why we set an ambitious target – to limit NRW to just 5% a year.” To meet this target, the com pany realized it needed a better and faster way to identify new leaks in its network.

“In 2015, we installed new fixed net work smart meters – including remote automatic meter reading infrastructure –covering the complete area for the distri bution of potable water,” said Neergaard. Reliable and accurate smart meters, in stalled in every household, are the basis of an efficient water network. The in stallation of reliable and durable meters, and the ability to maintain accuracy over their entire lifetime, help set the records straight. If measures are incomplete or fluctuating, then water network evalua tion cannot be reliable.

“We’d also begun a sectioning scheme to divide the entire water distribution network into unique and well-defined District Metered Areas (DMAs). We de cided to ramp up this progress already made, and then build on it.”

Thus, in 2017, BWC began to regain full control over its infrastructure and the associated water losses. It did this with the help of Diehl Metering, a German worldwide leader in the design, man ufacture and supply of smart metering solutions and related services.

“We saw the potential of Diehl Meter ing’s water loss management application, so decided to use it and build on that to create a solution that would meet our own specific needs,” Neergaard said. “We called this solution LEAK365.”

A smarter solution to tackle NRW Combined with data from BWC’s exist ing supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) system, LEAK365 automatically compares the delivered volume of water in each DMA against what is sold.

“The delivered volume is measured at the entrance of the DMA in a bulk inlet meter connected to the SCADA system,” Neergaard said. “The sold vol ume consists of the sum of the meter readings from each household smart meter connected to the specific DMA.” Data collection is based on a reliable and high-performance communication network (AMI - Automatic Metering Infrastructure) connecting meters of the whole water network. Installed in 2015, smart meters send measurements every hour via permanently installed receivers.

This was just the start. By 2022, 22 dis tinct DMAs covering the complete supply area were created. This then allowed BWC to innovate further. “Earlier this year, with help from Diehl Metering, we installed a new integrated digitized system which is accessed via a web portal,” Neergaard said.

The solution continuously creates ‘Xrays’ of the current leakage situation. Real-time data detects and estimates the specific water losses at each DMA 24 hours a day, seven days a week. “It is an automatic process with predefined algo rithms and analytics which deliver with 100% transparency the performance of the infrastructure,” Neergaard said.

The role of utilities is crucial in ensuring water is delivered as efficiently as possible to populations all over the world

We used Diehl Metering’s water loss management application and built on it to create a solution that would meet our specific needs

The new water loss management appli cation reports the latest leakage levels through zone colour indicators in a digital map of the BWC water infrastructure. BWC defines green as a performance of 5% or less, orange between 5 – 7.5% and red for anything above 7.5% NRW. Thanks to color-coding, operators can immediately identify anomalies and make informed decisions to rapidly re solve the issue. Historical values for each DMA are easily accessible, including consumption profiles. Advanced reports can be created based on a specific period (weekly, monthly, or annually).

Several views of the analysed data are possible within the application. For ex ample, it is possible to compare two different DMA’s performance during a month in a single graph. Anomalies in infrastructures are detected easily, at a glance. As each DMA stands for the to tal sum of all households, it represents an ideal monitoring of the entire supply

Earlier this year, with help from Diehl Metering, we installed a new integrated digitized system which is accessed via a web portal

network from the single inlet to many of the hundreds of household outlet meters.

The application also facilitates threshold alerts for anomalies in a specific DMA so the team can target their leakage search ef forts. Moreover, users can achieve a granu lar level of insight, with access to informa tion on water loss history, delivered and lost volume, consumption behaviour and pressure. These features support BWC staff in tracking the progress of the gen eral network efficiency and water balance reporting. “As a result, we have achieved an average stable water loss of between 4.5%-5.9%,” Neergaard said.

Additional benefits

By reducing the complexity of its infra structure – and its NRW volume too – BWC is experiencing substantial cost savings. “We have lower OPEX and im proved asset management through rap id identification of leakages, reducing unsustainable losses in terms of water, machine time, energy, repair costs and downtime,” Neergaard said.

Staff benefit too. Because meter data is delivered automatically, team mem bers no longer need to physically drive to locations to capture meter readings via their mobile devices. This means they have more time available to fix problems as they occur – and to prevent them from becoming disastrous.

Meanwhile, end-users benefit from bet ter service. Consumers can now utilize daily smart meter readouts to monitor deviating consumption. And, because BWC is aware of a problem as soon as it happens, it can alert a consumer in stantly. “Consumers face less severe breakdowns in the distribution system and quicker repair of leaks in domestic installations,” said Neergaard.

Because water losses within households are identified and stopped immediately, flooding is prevented, which means there is less chance of damage and a reduction in insurance claims. “In addition, the household saves money on both its water and the sewage bill,” said Neergaard. “All of this contributes to improved customer satisfaction.”

In fact, the entire population of Brønderslev is seeing advantages. “New leaks are rapidly identified, leading to diminished complications in terms of infrastructure,” said Neergaard. “There’s less need to repair streets, boardwalks or pipes, so there’s less disruption to traffic – and fewer delays as a result.”

Last but not least, the team at BWC feel better equipped to meet their en vironmental objectives and be more sustainable in the long term. “We have linked our strategic goal of a maximum water loss of 5% to the UN’s Sustainable Development Goal No. 6 – Clean Water and Sanitation – to demonstrate, among other things, how our daily operations are related to, and support, the sustain able development process and the green transition of the society,” said Neergaard. “Reducing water losses means we can protect our natural resource and empow er a far more sustainable future.”

If other water companies followed suit, enormous progress could be made. Ac cording to the IWA, if the total amount of NRW were reduced by just one-third, the savings would be sufficient to sup ply 800 million people. That’s why gov ernments and enforcement agencies are tightening regulations, and setting tar

gets that require increasing intervention. Digital solutions, which can pinpoint problems before they become too expen sive and disruptive to fix, are obviously key solutions to protect water resources.

An innovative future lies ahead

While his success with this project has been impressive, Neergaard isn’t resting on his laurels. In the not-too-distant fu ture, he hopes to investigate what’s pos sible when combining different data sets into even smarter and more integrated digital solutions.

“ To ensure we maintain – and even improve on – the low levels of water loss we have achieved so far, while, at the same time, securing and improving the

efficiency and effectiveness of our opera tions, we look to the new smart possibil ities that are continuously being investi gated and evaluated,” Neergaard said.

One way Neergaard and his team hope to achieve this is by monitoring night flow. “Data from the SCADA system continuously records the water flow in to each DMA, and so for each DMA we hope to define a limit for minimum night flow, helping us to identify new leaks,” Neergaard said.

Smart temperatures are another ave nue that Neergaard is keen to explore.

“An example is the use of temperature data from the smart meters to set up a machine learning algorithm to identify and localize new leaks within the DMAs

even quicker based on unexpected vari ances in the water temperature in the distribution network.” “We aim to use semantic modelling for the precise pre diction of water consumption,” he said Finally, Neergaard believes that the smart use of data can help BWC improve water quality. “For many years, we have been running a water quality monitor ing program called ‘Bactiquant’, which measures the total bacteria present in the distribution network,” he said. “This knowledge helps us to track and delin eate pollution events caused by, among other things, leaks. By integrating this data in LEAK365, we believe we can do even more to improve water quality for generations to come.”

JO BURGESS

MANAGING DIRECTOR SOUTH AFRICA & HEAD OF TRIAL RESERVOIR AT ISLE UTILITIES

Mining operations affect natural water systems during the entire mine life cycle, from exploration, to operations, to closure. The potential impacts of mining call for water management strategies that consider not only the mine site but the catchment where it operates.

Mining operations face water-related challenges that already exist today and are likely to intensify in the future: on one hand, there are water supply concerns in water-stressed areas; on the other, prevent ing the release of polluted water into the environment is a major issue. In this inter view with Jo Burgess, Managing Director South Africa & Head of Trial Reservoir at Isle Utilities, she answers our questions on management strategies to minimise the impact of mining operations.

Can you tell us briefly about your career path and your current role at Isle Utilities?

My current role at Isle is Managing Direc tor of the South African Business and Head of the Trial Reservoir. My current priority is to grow the Trial Reservoir whilst deliver ing projects in a range of areas where we see there is a big impact to be made, including that of mining impacted water.

Like many people looking backwards, things make sense: My career path looks like a neat line from leaving the education system to now, but in reality, I didn’t plan

it this way. I finished my PhD at Cran field University and that’s where I had my first job, as a postdoc Research Officer.

Then I decided to make the move to South Africa and I got a postdoctoral re search fellowship at Rhodes University, in the Eastern Cape province. That began my career in academia: first as a post doc, then as a lecturer and then as Head of Biotechnology. And that’s where I started doing my first work on mining-impacted water. The mining industry is a corner stone of the South African economy and it’s almost impossible to work on envi ronmental biotechnology and not be in volved with the mining industry.

Now - as well as my day job - I’m an honorary professor at the University of Cape Town’s Centre for Bioprocess En gineering Research, still doing research work on industrial wastewater, including mining-impacted water.

What are some of the most pressing challenges of water management in the mining sector?

Almost all of the water challenges in the mining industry can be distilled down to one of two things: too much water or not enough. This means that the require ments for water related innovations in the mining industry fall into two major camps and their application is very much a local issue. There is either treatment of excess water, or recovery and re-use where there is insufficient water.

That’s clearly a bit of oversimplifica tion; there are all sorts of issues around values recovery for example: residual metals and reagents that are added in the metal mining and refining processes. This is in addition to tailings management and water desalination which is not just sodium chloride but any dissolved sol ids in mining impacted water, primarily sulphur salts. And then of course there’s passive acid mine drainage / acid rock drainage technologies or techniques that are required for mines which have closed already or which are about to close.

A truly passive system that doesn’t cost very much to run and requires almost no maintenance is like the Holy Grail of the mine water sector. It doesn’t exist yet.

Water connects a mining operation to the local landscape and communities. To what extent are water supply and discharge issues a priority for mining companies?

If water supply and discharge issues af fect the core business of a mining com pany, then they are a very, very high pri ority. Typically, however, if they don’t affect the core business of extracting a resource and refining it, then expendi ture on water supply and discharge is

“There’s a rise in the use of digital technologies, for mining processes and for site and environmental monitoring”

Z Cristina Novo Pérez

INTERVIEW

sues become a grudge purchase and a very low priority.

Obviously it’s not possible to paint the whole mining industry with the same brush. There are some companies with ambitious corporate environmental stew ardship goals that really genuinely work towards good environmental and water stewardship practices. However, there are others that only pay lip service to these kinds of matters, and in those cases they just do enough to keep themselves out of court. And in a small number of cases, they just do enough to keep themselves out of court only if the fine is higher than the cost of taking mitigating action.

I think in general it’s possible to say that the outlying exception is the segment of the mining industry involved in the extraction of rare earth elements for energy storage in the renewable energy industry. Those kinds of companies see themselves very differently from the other mining houses. They see themselves as part of the green energy revolution and they act accordingly. They’re very serious about their water and environmental protection activities.

Competing water demands and the unpredictability of water supplies due to climate variability can affect the re liability of water sources for mining. Are these risks driving innovation in the mining sector? Could you high light a recent success story?

The risks of running out of water - actu al physical water shortages - and the risk of running out of a continuous supply of the correct quality water to sustain the ac tivity of the business are the greatest risks

driving innovation in the mining sector at the moment. Both of these risks are the drivers for on-site and between site water re-use and they are the drivers for water efficiency and for closer control of mining processes. By far the fastest growing area of innovation in the mining sector, as it relates to water anyway, is that of digital technologies and remote monitoring and control of water volumes, of water quality and of reagent utilisation.

I’d like to highlight the eMalahleni Water Reclamation Plant (EWRP). It’s a great example of what can be done if companies are willing to collaborate. It actually uses fairly standard technology, or what has become standard technology in large part because the EWRP was the first private sector organisation to im plement it in South Africa. The EWRP is a collaboration between Anglo Amer

ican, Eskom what was BHP Billiton at the time. It’s a joint venture that takes mining impacted water which is in excess to the mine’s requirements and would require treatment to be discharged the environment. And it treats it to pota ble standards to be provided to the local municipality. The pathway through the regulatory system to enable the EWRP to become a water service provider was tortuous, to say the least. But the EWRP blazed the trail and showed that mining impacted water can be used for produc tive, consumptive use and the private sector and the public sector can indeed work together to provide a system that treats water, protects the environment, provides water to people, and using the gypsum by-products from water treat ment, built hundreds of houses for those who need them.

"Almost all of the water challenges in the mining industry can be distilled down to one of two things: too much water or not enough"

Wastewater treatment by the mining sector has sometimes been in the pub lic eye due to incidents with tailings ponds. Do you think there is room for improving the reputation and trans parency of the mining sector in terms of its water stewardship?

Oh, absolutely. Yes. There’s lots of room for lots of improvement. There are some very good reasons why communities dis trust the mining industry. The mining industry itself needs to be much more open and willing to communicate bad news as well as good news, because soon er or later the truth comes out anyway.

A significant portion of the world’s mines are expected to close in the not-so-distant future. Are there specific considerations for water monitoring and management during the mine reclamation stage?

There are specific considerations on mine sites which are closing or have closedthey should be put back to the pre-min ing state as far as that’s possible to do, although that is really an impossible task. However, where the industry has gone wrong in the past is that mine closure and mitigating the water risks associated with closure need to be brought in at the very beginning, before the ground is even bro ken, at the exploration stage of starting a mine site. Leaving closure and site recla mation planning until the closure stage is the reason why we have so many legacy issues with mine sites that contaminate the environment in perpetuity. It’s estimated, for example, that almost all of the dissolved tin and silver in rivers in the United Kingdom comes from Roman-era mining. Legacy mine sites that have closed continue to leak metals into the wider en vironment for centuries, if not millennia after closure. Now we know that this hap pens, we can plan at the mine exploration stage for responsible material storage and mine closure and reclamation, but we can’t leave it until the reclamation stage.

What do you see in the future of water in mining?

I think the future of mining will include a lot more automation. There’s a rapid rise

in the use of digital technologies, both for the mining processes themselves but also for site and environmental monitoring and risk mitigation activities. The other big trend I foresee emerging in the next few years is the emergence of mining companies which don’t actually excavate. There are mega dumps and smaller dumps around the world originating from histor ical mines that were started 80 to 150 years ago, and back then the metallurgical extraction processes were not as efficient as they are today. So a lot of those waste dumps contain a richer source of ore than the low quality virgin resources that we’re now left with underground. I think we’re going to see a lot more “mining” of above ground dumps, which will have the bene fit of providing us with the kind of metals that we need for the renewable energy in dustry like lithium and nickel but without making more mines to do it and simul taneously dealing with the environmental legacy of the older mining practices.

“Water Innovations Market Demand Analysis in the Mining Sector” Report to the Water Research Commission, South Africa by Jo Burgess and Caroline Wadsworth, is available for download at www.wrc.org.za. Copies are available from Jo Burgess.

Typically, if they don’t affect the core business, expenditure on water supply and discharge issues become a very low priority

DR KATRIN SCHUHEN

CEO AT WASSER 3.0 GGMBH

WASSER 3.0: UNIMAGINED POTENTIAL FOR WATER WITHOUT MICROPLASTICS AND MICROPOLLUTANTS

The concept of sustainability is vague and used too often as inflationary. We deal with supposed sustainability - for marketing and image reasons. The fact that we are still only discussing limit values for microplastics and many micropollutants without implementing them is extremely short-sighted and negligent. Nonetheless, there is light at the end of the tunnel. Microplastics are becoming a circular economy issue and are therefore also of economic interest.

Microplastics are ubiquitous in the environment and firmly anchored in the public consciousness as a global environmental problem. Wastewater treatment plants have been shown to be a major entry point of microplastics into the environment; estimates from studies show that each wastewater treatment plant in the Global North transports between 93 million and 8.2 bil lion plastic particles into rivers and oceans every year. This is because these particles, like oth er micro- and nanoscale pollut ants, are inadequately retained despite three stages of treat ment. Detecting and removing microplastics poses enormous challenges to science and indus try. At Wasser 3.0, we have developed efficient, cost-effec tive, and circular solutions for the detection, removal, and reuse of microplastics from (waste)water with an ecologi cally and economically undreamt-of potential.

Wasser 3.0 PE-X® is a novel approach based on a com bination of physical agglomeration and water-induced chemical fixation according to the Clump & Skim prin ciple. Hybrid silica gels are added to the water in a sim ple process. Through stirring, they clump together with the microplastics and/or micropollutants to form pop corn-like agglomerates. These float to the water surface where they are then removed without the use of filters. The composition of the waste products makes them emi nently suitable for recycling. The detection and evaluation

of contamination scenarios and adaptability of the hy brid silica gels are the key to success. In this way, tailored solutions are developed for different types of contamina tion, water compositions and process environments. The non-toxic high-tech materials and sophisticated low-tech technologies are flexible, adaptable, and scalable. They can be integrated into existing processes either as a stand-alone solution or as an add-on. The overall process is designed to be climate-friendly and energy-efficient. Low operating costs make the modular concept future-proof. It can be used both as part of the 4th purification stage and in other pollution scenarios involving industrial wastewater, sur face water or seawater.

Thus, the process provides far-reaching and holistic opportunities for industry and municipal wastewater treatment plants to conserve resources and save costs. Companies that pro duce, process, and recycle plas tics are among the first users. In addition to microplastic removal, process chemicals and process waters are recovered at a desired pH and temperature, or mi croplastic-free and COD-reduced effluents are discharged. Further, the recovered agglomerates are suitable substitutes for insulation and construction materials.

In addition to further development and scaling of its technology, Wasser 3.0 focuses on responsible research and education around microplastics. Wasser 3.0 is not a classic tech start-up. As a non-profit GmbH, its mission is water without microplastics and micro-pollutants through responsible research and eco-friendly innovation, in line with the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Profits from commercial business operations are reinvested directly and 100% in research and education projects. Collaboration and sponsorships make research and innovation in this business surrounding possible and impact driven.

Microplastics are ubiquitous in the environment and firmly anchored in the public consciousness as a global environmental problem

ZIJIE “BERYL” XIA

SCIENTIST AT CLAROS TECHNOLOGIES

ROBUST PFAS REMEDIATION CAN PROTECT WATER RESOURCES, PUBLIC HEALTH

Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are widely used synthetic chemicals that do not break down naturally and are found in water, soil and air globally. These persistent organ ic pollutants are of significant concern because of their wide spread environmental distribution, bioaccumulative potential, and links to health risks such as various cancers, hormone disruption, weakened immunity, and reproductive problems.

Water is a sink for these highly mobile, persistent chemicals, leading to the contamination of drinking water. A 2022 anal ysis of drinking water from 41 cities in 15 countries detected PFAS in every sample.

tion generates small-chain PFAS that are spread widely by ash and smoke and accumulate in soils. The U.S. Department of Defense recently banned the incineration of PFAS materials, and there are efforts worldwide to do the same.

Technology offers safer solutions

Scientific technology may have led to the PFAS contamination problem, but it’s also leading to solutions. Technologies developed at the University of Minnesota and being offered by Claros Technologies detect and destroy PFAS in wastewater, leaving only detoxified water and naturally occurring elements.

PFAS

Common PFAS management falls short Most commercially available PFAS testing is compound-specif ic, detecting fewer than 100 com pounds and focusing on regulated ones. However, there are more than 12,000 PFAS compounds and regulations of them differ by location and are subject to change.

Testing has been playing catchup with the continuously growing list of known PFAS compounds. Calls for a class-based approach to PFAS management have led to new testing such as the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s recently published draft method for adsorbable organic fluorine (AOF). However, AOF is less sensitive, does not provide compound-specific informa tion, and is biased toward longer-chain PFAS compounds.

Current PFAS management is also problematic. The most common practices for PFAS removal in wastewater are reverse osmosis, foam fractionation, ion resins, and granulated activat ed carbon. Effective capture and removal of short- and ultra short-chain PFAS is especially challenging in water with high concentrations of other organic compounds and ions.

Filters are often sent to landfills or incinerated, which breaks PFAS into smaller compounds that are transferred to another environmental matrix. For example, industrial-scale incinera

The first step in remediation is comprehensive testing that utilizes compound-specific methods and those that address PFAS as a class, such as AOF and total organic fluorine (TOF). The second step is the capture of short- and long-chain PFAS and other pollutants. An inno vative sorbent is more efficient than granulated activated carbon in captur ing PFAS, allowing for a faster empty bed contact time and a higher loading capacity. It also has a much smaller footprint that can be easily retrofitted into existing capture systems, making wide-scale adoption feasible.

The final steps are concentrating and permanently destroying PFAS. Reducing millions of gallons of wastewater into a few gallons of PFAS concentrate makes destruction more manage able. Defluorination is accomplished through a photochemical process that breaks the powerful C-F bond at room tempera ture and atmospheric pressure.

The future of PFAS remediation

PFAS were developed to solve problems, not create them. Designed to be strong and durable, those very qualities have become a liability. It’s important to mind that lesson when it comes to PFAS remediation. Every new solution brought to market should be thoroughly vetted to ensure it doesn’t create new problems downstream.

were designed to be strong and durable, and those very qualities have become a liability: an important lesson for remediation

LEAD

GROUP MANAGER, AQUATIC SCIENCE

KATE WATERS-HART & DAMIAN WHELAN

GENERAL MANAGER FOR UK & EUROPE PHOSLOCK ENVIRONMENTAL TECHNOLOGIES

Based in Australia, Phoslock Environmental Technologies (PET) offers water treatment and remediation solutions to address excess nutrients in water bodies. Their Phoslock® solution reduces in-lake phosphorous concentrations while ensuring the safety of humans and aquatic biota.

Nutrient pollution affects water bodies worldwide. While it is a natural phe nomenon, human activity accelerates the rate at which nutrients like phosphorus enter freshwater. In this interview, we speak with Kate Waters-Hart, Group Manager, Aquatic Science and Damian Whelan, General Manager for UK & Europe, both at Phoslock Environmental Technologies (PET), to learn how Phos lock® can improve water quality condi tions. We also hear about PET’s largest project in Europe to date, involving the application of Phoslock to the Kralingse Plas lake in the Netherlands, directly from Anne Molema, Project Manager at the City of Rotterdam.

Can you tell us about the research be hind the development of Phoslock®? How has its safety been assessed?

KW-H Phoslock® has been extensive ly and independently assessed within

the research community over the last 25 years. Over this time over 100 peer reviewed publications have been pro duced. Research projects have focused across different scales, from laboratory, mesocosms and whole lake trials and on a range of topics from assessing Phos lock’s efficacy, it’s impact on freshwater biota and human health. From the vast amount of scientific evidence available, these studies have conclusively shown that Phoslock poses negligible risk to both aquatic biota and to human health.

What does the treatment with Phos lock® involve, and how does it work?

KW-H To understand if Phoslock® is a suitable solution to improve water qual ity in any water resource, we undertake an assessment of its chemistry and sed iments. If suitable, a Phoslock dose is calculated and applied as a slurry, by mixing Phoslock granules and lake water

together. The slurry is typically sprayed over the water surface, where it will travel down through the water column, bind ing phosphate as it goes. As it reaches the bed sediments it forms a fine fluid layer where it will continue to bind any phos phate released from sediment complexes.

“Phoslock® can be used to manage the effects of current and historical nutrient pollution caused by both diffuse and point sources”

Z Cristina Novo Pérez

Here it will remain and will continue to bind phosphate until all lanthanum binding sites are full. Phoslock and its precipitates will form part of the sedi ment profile and can help consolidate fine and fluid sediments. The Phoslock slurry is applied during autumn – early

spring to target the majority of the phos phate pool which is in the sediments during this period.

Phoslock is 95% bentonite and 5% lan thanum, and it works by using the ability of lanthanum to bind available phospho rus. Lanthanum bound within Phoslock

binds very strongly to phosphate to form the insoluble, non-toxic, inert, natural mineral Rhabdophane. Rhabdophane is a very stable mineral that will not release the phosphorus under the natural con ditions found within lakes. The reaction rates between lanthanum and phosphate

INTERVIEW

are rapid and quickly controls excess phosphorus which helps to improve wa ter quality conditions.

How does Phoslock® compare to other methods to remediate excess phospho rous in water bodies?

KW-H Phoslock® is a versatile product to use for the control of phosphorus pollu tion as it has several advantages over other commercial phosphorus binders. Once applied, Phoslock does not alter the pH or conductivity of the receiving waters unlike alum or iron salts. This eliminates the need to add buffers to control the pH and prevents any stress induced to aquatic biota through chang es in pH. Phoslock can bind phosphate over a wide pH range, in anoxic con ditions, in the presence of humic sub stances and in brackish and saline wa ters. This is a big advantage over other commercial products. Phoslock is also favourable due to the fact that the bond between lanthanum and phosphate is strong and will not be released under anoxia or through pH changes unlike iron and alum salts, respectively. Unlike alum salts, Phoslock does not crystalise and will not lose its binding capacity

with age. Phosphate bound to lantha num will not be released as a result of sediment resuspension events caused by wind or waves and it has the ability to increase sediment stability.

How is water quality preserved in the long term, after treatment with Pho slock®?

KW-H Phoslock® is an excellent solu tion to help control the phosphorus released from sediments that have en tered the system through years/decades of uncontrolled sources of nutrient pollution in the catchment. Phoslock is very effective and can last a long time if catchment phosphorus is significantly reduced. A single application of Pho slock has been effective in controlling phosphorus concentrations in lakes for more than 10 years where catchment phosphorus loads have been reduced. Phoslock should be applied alongside catchment management measures to help speed-up recovery from phospho rus pollution. The development of a monitoring plan, if not already in place is vital in understanding the health of a waterbody and to assess how effective restoration measures can be.

How long has it been around, and where has it been used?

DW PET’s flagship product, Phos lock®, was originally developed by the Australian national science agency (CSIRO) more than 20 years ago. This unique water treatment product is used globally, with over 300 successful ap plications to date and clients supported by our various entities, subsidiaries and management teams in Europe, UK, Can ada, US, China and ANZ.

How big is the problem with nutrient pollution in Europe and what are the largest contributors?

DW Nutrient pollution is a global prob lem with many factors contributing to its impact on freshwater biota and human health. It is a natural phenomenon which usually occurs over centuries, as water bodies fill with sediments, but human activity accelerates the rate at which nu trients like phosphorus enter freshwater. Climate change and increased catch ment loading from population growth and land-use are the main external stressors that can increase the rate of external phospho rus loading to lakes. Recent publications have described the impacts of phosphorus

Kralingse Plas lake post application November 2022

in waterbodies as the reason for many wa terbodies failing current Water Framework Directive ecological quality targets.

Phoslock® is an excellent and effective technology that can be used to manage the effects of current and historical nu trient pollution caused by both diffuse and point sources such as agriculture, livestock, wastewater, industry, surface water, aquaculture, and the natural sur rounding environment, to return a wa terbody back to its natural state.

Where in Europe are you active? Can you tell us a bit more about these projects?

DW We are active across The Nether lands, Finland, Germany and with interest growing across the UK, Sweden, France, Italy… We have just completed a Phoslock application in The Netherlands where we revisited the Kralingse Plas Lake, applying 19 tonnes of Phoslock to the Wolvenvallei and Heemtuin that connect into the Kralingse Plas.

In early November 2022, Phoslock Environmental Technologies Limited announced a partnership arrangement with SSI Services (UK) Limited aimed at driving improved customer engagement, seamless application support and technical reach nationally via their Operational and technical services business Onsite. I am confident that this won’t be the last partnership we announce across UK, Eu rope and globally.

What is the largest project so far and what did it involve?

DW Our largest European Project to date was the treatment of Kralingse Plas lake located in The City of Rotterdam, Neth erlands. The Kralingse Plas lake is PET’s largest remediation project undertaken in Europe. We successfully applied 1,064 tonnes of Phoslock® to the 100-ha lake in less than four weeks with excellent sup port and cooperation from the City of Rotterdam and Hoogheemraadschap van en de Krimpenerwaard.

CASE STUDY

PHOSLOCK APPLICATION IN THE KRALINGSE PLAS LAKE IN THE NETHERLANDS

Molema, Project Manager at the City of Rotterdam, explains the water quality issues in the lake and their experience with Phoslock®.

Can you tell us about the water quality issues the Kralingse Plas Lake was facing?

Kralingse Plas is a popular recreational lake visited by millions of visitors a year. Unfortunately, we had a persistent water quality problem related to too much phosphate in the water, which eventually leads to poor water quality. We realized the ’legacy’ phosphorus built up in the lakebed over many years was the primary cause of the high level of nutrients in the lake.

How was the city addressing those issues, and how did you decide to try Phoslock®? We started to investigate the issue, contacted engineering companies and universities and, of course, we utilised our own knowledge and expertise as the City of Rotterdam. After researching different options for solving the phosphate issue, thanks to different water boards and universities, we discov ered Phoslock®. We then did extensive research of 96 recent peer-reviewed scientific research articles about the effects and side-effects of Phoslock, both being tested in the laboratory and in real-world settings, in the lakes that have been treated with Phoslock, and discovered there were no negative effects. We invited a team of science experts, waterboards and water quality professionals who confirmed that Phoslock is a safe and environmentally friendly solution to treat the lake.

What have been the results of applying the treatment, and what is being done to protect water quality nowadays?

Phoslock® is an excellent method to catch the phosphate that is released from the bottom of the lake. With only a layer of about 3 mm of Phoslock on the lake bottom the problem was solved. Every month we analysed how effective the measures were. The results were looking positive, but it was yet to be seen what would happen in the summer, when temperatures rise.

This November, we marked the 1-year anniversary of the first treatment with Phoslock are we are pleased to say the lake is in great health, even after we had one of the warmest summers on record.

Anne

HOW SEKO HELPED A LEISURE GROUP PROTECT VISITORS AND ATTAIN LEGIONELLA COMPLIANCE

In this case study, SEKO provided a safe, reliable, cost-effective solution to meet a customer’s needs concerning Legionella compliance. The project was a success and SEKO has since added the purpose-built system to its product range, in order to help operators in multiple sectors to prevent Legionella, protect equipment and control costs.

When a European leisure group want ed to safeguard customers across its clubs from Legionnaire’s disease and comply with local legislation relating to the control of Legionella bacteria in water systems, it chose SEKO for a dedicated solution.

What is Legionnaire’s disease and how can it be prevented?

Legionnaire’s disease is a potential ly-fatal lung infection caused by the inhalation of water vapour contami nated with Legionella bacteria. Legio nella can occur in natural water sys tems but is more commonly found in purpose-built systems such as cooling towers, hot and cold water systems, spas and pools.

The primary control method for Legionella is water temperature man agement. Operators should always run water services at high temperatures to cause pasteurisation and destroy any bacteria living in the system, thus pre venting Legionella growth. Water can then be distributed to showers or mix er taps and blended with cold water to moderate temperatures.

Guidance for Legionella control states that water should be above 50°C at a hot water tap after 1 minute and 60°C at the calorifier. If the water is heated

The primary control method for Legionella is water temperature management: pasteurisation destroys any bacteria living in the system

by a boiler system, this will usually be between 70 and 80°C to make up for losses through the hot water system.

Addressing a common challenge

This presented a dilemma to the lei sure group operator, who was looking to reduce their rising water heating costs as well as prevent the threat of Legionella . Thankfully, however, local legislation allowed the use of biocides such as chlorine dioxide (ClO 2) in stead of thermal disinfection, meaning the opportunity presented itself to si multaneously reduce both water tem perature and costs.

The decision was taken to use chlorine dioxide, a powerful oxidant that disin fects water and prevents biofilm build up. This would mean that as well as achieving significant energy savings, the operator could cease using water softeners for further cost reduction.

The operator was looking to reduce their rising water heating costs as well as prevent the threat of Legionella

Enter

SEKO, with a bespoke solution

Once chlorine dioxide had been chosen as the preferred Legionella control method, the operator approached wa ter-treatment expert SEKO for a solu tion that could safely dose the chemi cal into its water system.

After a complete assessment of the application, SEKO’s product team de veloped a range of bespoke chlorine dioxide generation systems. These devices, named Chlorox, would offer proportional control with a mixing chamber manifold to allow convenient ClO 2 dosing into cold water storage tanks or directly into the water line.

Comprising three panel-mounted en closures, the installer-friendly Chlorox system isolates the pumps within the two outer sections with the main wiring housed in the central compartment.

The pump model selected was SE KO’s own Tekna Evo TPG50 sole noid-driven dosing unit, with its front-mounted pump head making it perfect for use in a vertical enclosure.

Meanwhile, the combination of Tek na Evo’s small stroke capacity – which delivers a constant low-level chemical stream – and its renowned precision and reliability would ensure quality performance for the long term.

In addition, for some of the group’s sites with an additional security re

quirement, SEKO supplied lockable bunded chemical storage cabinets to provide added peace of mind.

Safety first

The Chlorox unit is proportionally con trolled by a pulse from a water meter, offering an exceptional degree of safety. This is because when water isn’t pulsing through the system there’s no risk of chemical dosing. And by interlinking flow sensors with the Tekna Evo pumps, all pumps shut down automatically in the event of a system failure.

Meanwhile, the chemicals are dosed into a maturation chamber within a water-filled outer case so, in the un likely event of a chamber leak, chlo rine dioxide is released into the water and rendered harmless.

The Tekna Evo TPG500 also offers precise calibration to ensure accurate dosing which, when combined with

After a complete assessment of the application, SEKO’s product team developed a range of bespoke chlorine dioxide generation systems

The Tekna Evo TPG500 also offers precise calibration to ensure accurate dosing which makes it both safe and easy to use

multifunctional valves and an external alarm lamp, makes it both safe and easy to use.

A positive result

Since using the Chlorox system across multiple sites, the leisure group reports significant cost reductions from low er heating costs and the elimination of costly water softeners. Additionally, minimised biofilm build-up helps the operator avoid costly and inconvenient unplanned pipework maintenance.

As an added bonus, the unit’s com pactness, when combined with the re moval of the original water softeners, has created valuable extra space in the group’s tight plant rooms.

Along with the delivery of measurable cost and operational benefits, SEKO met the customer’s primary ob jective of Legionella compliance. This means the client can now rest assured that they’re proactively preventing the spread of Legionella bacteria in their hot water systems and in turn protect ing the many thousands that use their facilities each week.

By fulfilling and exceeding the op erator’s remit, this customised package provided the safe, reliable, cost-effec tive solution that was so important to the customer and their clientele.

The success of the purpose-built Chlorox unit has seen SEKO since add the system to its standard product range, helping operators in multiple sectors to prevent Legionella , protect equipment and control costs.

The client can now rest assured that they’re proactively preventing the spread of Legionella bacteria in their hot water systems

MARIA ELENA RODRÍGUEZ HERNÁNDEZ

WATER ENGINEERING DIRECTOR, R&D - ENGINEERING AT INGETEAM

NEW PUMPING SCENARIOS ASSOCIATED TO CLIMATE CHANGE: SUBMERSIBLE PUMPS

Climate change is disrupting weather patterns, leading to extreme weather events, unpredictable water availability, ex acerbating water scarcity, contaminating water supplies and flooding areas that were never affected by these events in the past. Water in its various forms is always on the move, in a complex process known as the water cycle. Global warming is already having a measurable effect on this cycle, altering the amount, distribution, timing, and quality of available water. Water users – from communities, to industries, to ecosystems – are in turn affected: their activities and functions depend, either directly or indirectly, on water.

The rapid growth of cities, and consequently population re quirements in terms of water supply, and at the same time, global warming ravages have changed any known water sup ply pumping scenario: different, reliable pumping solutions are definitively needed to answer the actual pumping challenges.

As we all know, a submersi ble pump is a type of centrifugal pump that can be fully submerged in water during operation. The fact of being submersible allows reducing the size of the pumping station and at the same time eliminates concerns about dam age to the motors in the event of flooding.

Facing the worst drought on record in the Colorado Riv er Basin, as lake levels continue to fall, the Southern Nevada Water Authority (SNWA) has built a low lake level pumping station to ensure access to its primary water supplies in Lake Mead. The use of submersible pumps in the new intake en hances the SNWA’s existing intake system, enabling contin ued access to its water resources in Lake Mead, even if lake levels drop too low. This is going to be a trend in our lives: due to the combination of drought and increased water demand, water reservoir levels are not going to reach their original ca pacity. The depletion of aquifers will make it necessary to drill exiting wells down in order to reach deep-water reservoirs,

making most traditional pump solutions non-viable; they are not suitable to reach these new depths.

A growing number of communities are finding themselves underwater. Extreme weather, sea level rise, and other climate change impacts are increasingly to blame. Connecting climate change to floods can be a tricky endeavor. With regard to floods, what is clear is that, whether common in the area or not, flood events require reliable pumping solutions.

In 2018, the World Bank estimated that three regions (Latin America, sub-Saharan Africa, and Southeast Asia) will generate 143 million more climate migrants by 2050. While it is difficult to estimate, approximately one-third of the people forced to move around the world do so due to “sudden onset” weather events — flooding, forest fires after droughts, and intensified storms. This fact, together with more common urban migration for economic rea sons, have driven water system plan ners to new pumping challenges.

The rapid growth of cities has modified the actual relative location of many pumping plants: while be ing in the middle of nowhere in the past, with city growth and the new neighborhoods’ layout, they rest in the middle of many settled areas at present time. Many old pumping stations were projected in the past with pumps with surface motors. Having the motor on the surface, the noise from these pumps can disturb neighbors, disrupt their sleep and inter fere with normal daily activities. If loud enough, it can also affect their health. Noise pollution needs to be controlled to make life comfortable. With this acoustic pollution issue, the replacement with submersibles could be the right response to eliminate the noise: The motor pumps are located underwater, out of earshot, making the submersible solution the best one in these scenarios.

In summary, submersible pumping solutions will help to face the problems that climate change, with its consequences, brings to our cities and communities: access to water resourc es, floods, seawater level rise and population movements.

A submersible pump allows reducing the size of the pumping station and eliminates concerns about damage to the motors during flooding

DIGITAL

The strategy of Hidroconta – a Spanish company specialised in water management and control, manufacturers of water meters, hydraulic valves and intelligent remote control and remote reading equipment – focuses on quality and innovation in the digital water space, promoting a culture of cooperation and developing partnerships.

The company is involved in the re search, design and manufacture of the best hydraulic technology for water re sources control, with the guarantee of being “Made in Spain / Made in Eu rope”. Hidroconta has one of the larg est certified water meter test benches in Europe and has a department dedicated exclusively to the development of smart metering systems.

Internationalisation is one of Hidro conta’s objectives for the 2030 horizon. Currently, 70% of its turnover and 50% of its projects come from international markets. France is one of the countries where the company’s efforts are showing optimum results.

As an example, we collaborate with Hydralians, one of Hidroconta’s French partners.

Hydralians is a large company with 71 points of sale in France and more than 12,000 references in its catalogue; it also offers full support services for projects, from assistance in drafting them, to support during the final in stallation in the field.

Arnaud Leblanc is the commercial director of IoT for Hydralians; we talk ed with him about the digitalisation of

the water sector and the collaboration with Hidroconta: “working with a Eu ropean partner facilitates communica tion and interaction between the differ ent actors, manufacturers, distributors and customers”. On the other hand, from his experience working with Hi droconta, he highlights the knowledge of water management in Spain, taking into account the water situation in the country, and stresses how essential wa ter management is to preserve crops and ensure suitable yields.

France is going through a difficult drought situation and is aware, as Leblanc says, that such episodes will happen again in the future: “the infor mation, knowledge and products man ufactured by Hidroconta offer us the solution for our customers to preserve water resources”.

The digitalisation of the water sector is key in the fight against climate change. The brand is tackling digital transforma tion in France by offering IoT assets to its customers. Hydralians has been offer ing connected solutions to its customers, farmers, landscapers, pool specialists and local authorities for years.

According to Arnaud Leblanc, on av erage, “we obtain 20 to 30% water sav ings with connected water meter installa tions. This level of savings is mainly due to the fact that the water meter is easily within reach, from our smartphone or our computer. Moreover, it can be easily doubled if we use the advanced functions

Hidroconta researches, designs and manufactures hydraulic technology with the guarantee of being “Made in Spain / Made in Europe”

Hidroconta testing laboratory

water consumption” – Arnaud Leblanc, Hydralians

of the platforms, setting up rules or automated alerts.”

“We have deployed the equipment in a landscaped park where we have achieved 60% water savings by controlling flow rates and adapting irrigation to weather conditions. The connectivity between the equipment and a web platform has enabled these savings.”

To implement digitalisation projects and choose the different communication technologies, they take into account the products’ reliability and usability. They mainly work with LoRa, Wifi, 3G and Sigfox protocols. The cost of communi cations and the type of installation where the project is going to be carried out, residential areas or large areas, are other aspects to take into account.

Hidroconta works with Hydralians supplying IRIS equipment with Sigfox communications because of its wide coverage in the French market, which Hidroconta has one of the largest certified water meter test benches in Europe and a department devoted to smart meter development

manages to cover all the needs of its cus tomers. “IRIS is economical and easy to implement,” adds Leblanc.

As Leblanc says, Hidroconta’s IRIS device is a communications module that is simple to install and connect to the cloud. An APP has been special ly developed to facilitate the installer’s task. Through NFC technology, the de vice is linked in seconds with the data management and visualisation plat form. This NFC connectivity allows us to interact at any time with the device locally, being able to access all recorded data easily.

Another benefit of the digitalisation of water networks is it enables studying

“With the digitalisation of assets, you can achieve up to 60% savings in

consumption, which is essential to save water. Data visualisation platforms al lows us to quickly see consumption at a site. It is clearly a tool that allows quick response, taking action to address overor under-consumption.

Hydralians is currently digitalising CACG’s raw water network. CACG is a key player in water management in southwest France; its mission is to secure water resources, reconcile economic and environmental issues, innovate, optimise water use and respond to new challenges: droughts, floods, and water stress.

One of the actions to improve the network entails the installation of Hi droconta’s IRIS communications mod

ules; with them, it is possible to monitor water consumption recorded by the in stalled water meters.

The versatility of IRIS in terms of da ta transmission technologies is key. The installation of the IRIS module involves testing the signal quality at the site where the water meters will be located and selecting the best communication technology: LoRaWan, Sigfox, NB-IoT, LTE, GRPS.

Once the communications validation work is done, end users can install and activate the IRIS module on their own through the Hidroconta Installer APP and immediately obtain monitoring data on their Smartphone or web platform.

Hidroconta works with Hydralians supplying IRIS equipment with Sigfox communications because of its wide coverage in the French market

The information, knowledge and products manufactured by Hidroconta offer the solution for customers to preserve water resources

Hidroconta laboratory

Assembly and testing of IRIS equipment

JORGE HELMBRECHT

BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT MANAGER, IDRICA

“The pillar we need to facilitate the digital transformation involves change management”

Idrica has become a catalyst of the digital transformation thanks to a holistic approach born of its experience and a technology based on an architecture that optimises operational efficiency while committing to economic, social and environmental sustainability.

Jorge Helmbrecht, Business Develop ment Manager at Idrica, addresses the keys to the digital transformation, out lining the main issues, advantages and steps to carry it out with guarantees of success. A change where people and processes are fundamental because it is not only about technological change, it is also about changes in the culture of the company, in the way we communicate, in the agility of organisations and even in the different strategies to implement.

What is the path to a company’s digital transformation?

The digital transformation path of a com pany comprises three key aspects that must be considered together to achieve success: the processes to be transformed, the people involved and the technology to be used. It is not just a matter of digi tising and integrating isolated data and systems, but of transforming and stream lining work processes, bringing about a

real evolution in the organisation that re quires a holistic and cross-cutting vision. This global approach must necessarily involve personnel at all levels of decision making, in order to overcome resistance to change and make the most of the new technologies, thus allowing the digital transformation to focus on obtaining better outcomes in a sustainable manner.

We can therefore say that a pillar we need to facilitate the digital transfor mation involves “change management”, helping people and companies to rede fine their activities, processes and struc tures, to face the new challenges that will come and get the maximum benefit from digitalisation. However, we should not forget that the primary objective will continue to be data and information management, and using them to gener ate more knowledge and improve deci sion making.

Data, as well as the information they provide, have long since ceased to be

fungible material and have become a tan gible asset within companies and must be treated as such, using tools that guar antee their correct extraction, process ing, secure storage, dissemination and use. On the other hand, the technologies to be implemented must necessarily be modular and scalable, to adapt easily to changes and the company’s growth, as well as cybersecure and agnostic in terms of the relationship with other hardware and/or software with which they must connect.

What are, therefore, the benefits of correct change management?

The benefits of change management, and therefore of a digital transformation correctly carried out, are many: improved productivity, increased efficiency and cost reduction, greater resilience and rapid response to change, risk reduction and generation of new opportunities, en couraging teamwork as well as internal and external communication, and ma ny others, as we have seen over the last 20 years of digital transformation of the Global Omnium group of companies. The success of this digitalisation journey is the basis for Idrica to offer its experi ence and technological solutions for the water cycle to the rest of the world.

How is digitalisation approached in the water sector?

The water sector cannot afford to remain oblivious to current digital transforma tion processes and the concrete benefits they entail: from greater efficiency in wa ter and energy management at all levels

"The digital transformation of a company comprises three key aspects: the processes to be transformed, the people, and the technology used"

INTERVIEW

of being guided and endorsed by man agement and having the participation of all areas, but it is more complex and re quires more effort and time to complete the execution of a comprehensive trans formation plan.

The other approach, bottom-up, oc curs when digitalisation arises from the need to solve a specific problem or im prove results in a particular area of work, such as minimising network losses, fa cilitating asset management, controlling subcontractors’ field work, detecting anomalies automatically or making the operation and maintenance of a treat ment plant more efficient, among many

(both in drinking water and sanitation systems and concerning a basin’s water resources with their multiple uses), to improved service quality and consumer satisfaction, the reduction of the carbon footprint, and the sustainability of pro cesses, to name just a few. To these spe cific benefits in the field of management, operation and maintenance, we must add the benefits linked to the structur al and functional change that affects the entire organisation.

Therefore, and from my point of view, there are two approaches to address this digital transformation process: top-down and bottom-up. The first one, the topdown approach, would be to start in a global and planned way in all areas of the company and following long-term objec tives and goals. Along the way, digital isation and process transformation will take place with the implementation of technology. This vision has the advantage

The success of this digitalisation journey is the basis for Idrica to offer its experience and technological solutions for the water cycle

"The digitalisation strategy in countries with different technological maturity must ask what the smartest way is to leverage existing resources"

other possible challenges to be solved. This bottom-up methodology has the great advantage of being much more ag ile in its implementation and of being oriented toward clear objectives, achiev ing tangible results quickly. However, it can happen that the goals are not aligned with those of other departments or that there are interoperability problems that cause the survival of isolated silos of in formation (even if they are digitised).

What role does Idrica play in this process?

At Idrica we can provide a comprehen sive approach by combining the best of

both methodologies to optimally dig italise a company with our technolo gy based on a flexible architecture: we solve specific challenges in each area of the water cycle (supply, sanitation, wa ter resources, agriculture and irrigation) with dedicated modules that can oper ate independently; and we also integrate and normalise all the cross-cutting in formation from different data sources (sensors, dataloggers, GIS, SCADA, CMMS, etc. ) in a single layer called Smart Water Engine to which all the said modules or other proprietary ap plications can be connected, ensuring global interoperability. Finally, an up per business intelligence layer allows to strategically visualise the indicators and dashboards of the whole company, thus completing the merging of both topdown and bottom-up approaches.

I believe that the success of the pro cess lies in the company being able to overcome its specific challenges in an agile way with short-term results – this encourages staff commitment and in volvement – but always maintaining cross-cutting connections of data and systems and, above all, the global ap proach towards a common objective in the medium and long term.

How is the digital transformation you are talking about taking place in countries with different level of digi tal maturity?

The digital transformation path can start from different points and states of tech nological maturity, but in all cases there must be a correct assessment or audit of the initial state and a final picture of the goal to be achieved, in order to follow the appropriate roadmap.

The first step is usually to integrate information from existing infrastructure and assets and the data they generate, whether it is static or time series data, and for this it is essential to propose a master data model that allows interoperability with multiple systems. In this sense, and

regardless of the number of existing sen sors and instrumentation, or the degree of digitalisation of a water company, the important thing will be how to structure and implement a flexible architecture fo cused on data and agnostic as to its ori gin, which can grow gradually and adapt to its technological evolution.

The digitalisation strategy in coun tries with different technological matu rity must ask what is the smartest way to leverage existing resources and data in their current state, but above all, ensur ing that the decisions taken follow the roadmap towards the set goal, even if it is a long term goal.

The approach that many water util ities have taken in the past has been to focus on measuring and increasing the number of sensors, in order to in crease the amount of data available for more objective decision making. This has often not been done in coordina tion with the potential end users of the data, but rather as an initiative of the department that generates it. This way, silos of isolated information - and their corresponding IT systems - have been created in various repositories without a prior planning strategy. This flawed process must be prevented from hap pening again in companies that are be ginning their transformation journey, taking advantage of the experience and lessons learned. I believe that this is one of the most differentiating added val ues that Idrica brings to the sector: the experience and knowledge of someone who has already walked the entire digi talisation path.

"Data, as well as the information they provide, have ceased to be fungible material and have become a tangible asset within companies"

MAGNE EIDE

CHIEF COMMERCIAL OFFICER, INFOTILES

INFLUX MONITORING ENABLES INFORMED FINANCIAL AND DATA-DRIVEN OPERATIONAL DECISIONS FOR THE WASTEWATER GRID

If a water utility has leaking wastewater pipes, it can result in rainfall infiltrating the wastewater grid. This can overload the wastewater system during periods of heavy rain or storm events, leading to the release of untreated wastewater into the environment. It also increases the risk of cross-contami nation of drinking water – though this is rare.

Rainfall penetrates the wastewater grid from wet soil or when drains are directly connected to the wastewater sys tem, making the wastewater system sensitive to rainfall dur ing periods of heavy rain or storm events. Climate change also amplifies the problem, resulting in more frequent and extreme rainfall events. When these events occur, up to 10 times more rainwater than normal can be pushed through the wastewater system. This puts extra strain on the wastewa ter pumps, requiring extra capac ity, investment, and energy need ed to deal with the extra influx. The pumps then push the extra rainfall forward to the wastewa ter treatment plants, which also need extra capacity to handle the increased influx.

With a lack of detailed evi dence of where and when the in flux is occurring, many utilities opt to increase the capacity of wastewater evacuation and treatment to avoid the waste water systems becoming completely overrun. This, however, does not solve the underlying problem. To avoid environ mental hazards and misguided investments in treatment ca pacity, the challenge is to determine when and where the influx is occurring and to decide the right measures to fix leakages, decrease rainfall penetration, and mitigate against periods of heavy rain and storm events.

InfoTiles applies control system (SCADA) data to analyse the dry and wet weather behaviour of wastewater treatment systems. The amount of influx in every pump station is cal culated in real-time, allowing water managers to see trends, resulting costs, and where to focus maintenance. Once the

key problem areas have been identified, Internet of Things (IoT) devices can be placed in critical points in collected data to be included in the live dashboards and obtain more de tailed measurements.

For one of InfoTiles’ customers, a water utility in Norway, it discovered that the pumps were pushing five million cubic meters (m3) of wastewater per year, of which, 20% was influx surface water (more than one million m3).

The cost of treatment of this extra influx service water in to the wastewater system was around 1.5 million euros, not including the energy costs of transporting the water for treat ment in the first place.

About 50% of the influx water was handled by three pump stations of about thirty the utility had in total. This enabled the maintenance team to rapidly identify focal points for further measurements, and eventually, identify the critical points to rem edy in order to reduce the influx.

Furthermore, the analysis made through InfoTiles discovered that some pumps were being constantly overloaded with influx occurring even in dry weather conditions. Up stream pipes were situated close to the banks of the nearby river, in soil that was constantly saturated by water from the river.

In essence, the wastewater system was being used to absorb and pump river water, treat it, and release the water back into the river once it was treated. The three pumps in question had already been chosen for upgrade due to the strain but, with the extra insights gained through using InfoTiles, this deci sion could be challenged, as an alternative and better placed investment would be to improve the integrity of upstream wastewater pipes instead.

In summary, through real-time monitoring of wastewater influx, the actual costs became clearer to the utility, and in formed financial and operational decisions could be made to improve the most vulnerable parts of the wastewater grid.

The influx in every pump station is calculated in realtime, allowing water managers to see trends, costs, and where to focus maintenance

WE DO THINGS DIFFERENTLY.

Innovation

collaboration on a global scale

There are very few challenges today that haven’t been tackled in some way, by somebody, somewhere in the world. It is with this knowledge that Isle identified the need for utilities to work together globally. Together we are changing the way emerging technologies and solutions are brought to market. If you want to join us please contact piers.clark@isleutilities.com

www.isleutilities.com

OPINION

ANDREW HOLLISTER

CISO AT LOGRHYTHM

CYBERSECURITY PRIORITIES FOR WATER UTILITIES: PROVIDING A SECURE FOUNDATION FOR TRANSFORMATION AND AUTOMATION

Water utilities are an essential sector that we rely on every day. Like many businesses and critical industries, the water sector is explor ing automation to boost efficiencies and reduce operational costs.

According to ResearchandMarkets, the water automation and instrumentation market is projected to reach $14.4 billion by 2027. The introduction of Internet of Things (IoT) and Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) solutions are transforming the way that water utilities operate, allowing integration of remote sensing, supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) and analytical capabilities.

The challenge the water industry is now facing is to ensure investment in automated technologies is matched with appro priate investments in cybersecurity.

The adoption of automated technologies has led to an increased attack surface for water utilities as systems become increasingly de pendent on internet connectivity. This has widened the threat land scape, giving bad actors the opportu nity to cause widespread disruption, the impact of which may be felt by individuals as much as organisations.

Security vs automation

Across Europe, cyberattacks are increasing in both frequency and severity, and the water sector is no exception. With more attacks hitting national headlines, utilities that introduce automated technologies and processes need to strengthen their cybersecuri ty posture to protect against a wide variety of threats.

As in every sector, acquiring an appropriate budget to de fend against cyber attacks is a significant challenge to security teams in the water industry. With a massive amount of infra structure to maintain, combined with unpredictable condi tions, investments in cybersecurity may be overlooked as a top priority for the water sector.

As water utilities look to introduce more remote functions to re duce costs and free up resources, they need to ensure that their au tomation efforts are supported by an appropriate level of cyberse

curity. This may require deploying additional cybersecurity tooling, supported by the expertise of well-informed cybersecurity teams. Utilities can proactively address cybersecurity risks with a riskbased approach that goes beyond simply checking the box for regulatory compliance. This process starts with considering exact ly what needs to be protected, and what tactics attackers are likely to employ. They can then prioritise their cybersecurity budgets on the appropriate tools and training to effectively protect their digital transformation efforts.

Investing in Tools – A combined strategy of both preventative and detection technologies is needed to protect against threat ac tors in the broad threat landscape that organisations face today. By leveraging a comprehensive security platform, analysts can harness intelligent security dashboards and alerts for greater visibility into threat activity. A centralised security platform can empower overwhelmed security teams with contextual analyt ics, providing insights into threats so that they can reduce noise and quickly secure their environment. It can also simplify analysts’ workflows by estab lishing a sequential timeline of events.

Investing in Teams - Water utili ties can further protect their automa tion efforts by providing team members with regular cybersecurity training. Cybersecurity is everyone’s responsibility, and empower ing employees with the insights to stop an attack will help them to make smarter cyber decisions and improve the overall security posture within the water industry.

Fighting Future Attack Waves

Critical infrastructure more broadly has come into focus as at tacks have impacted sectors from pipelines to healthcare and the financial sector. The water industry is no exception and the re cent targeting of a UK water utility underlines this point. With the right combination of security tools and staff training, water utilities can create a resilient cybersecurity environment that is equipped to support and protect future innovation efforts.

Utilities can address cybersecurity risks with a risk-based approach that goes beyond simply checking the box for regulatory compliance

ALESSIO GIARDINO

SENIOR WATER AND CLIMATE CHANGE SPECIALIST AT THE ASIAN DEVELOPMENT BANK

CONNECT, COLLABORATE AND CAPACITATE THROUGH THE NEW ADB “ASIA AND THE PACIFIC WATER RESILIENCE HUB”

Asia and the Pacific is one of the most water-scarce regions in the world. It has 60% of the world’s population but only 36% of its water resources. The region is also the most vul nerable to natural hazards, accounting for 57% of fatalities and 88% of people affected as a result of these events since 1970. This vulnerability is compounded by climate change — with growing impacts on local economies, communities, and the environment — as well as by the continued effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and sustained pressures on water security and access throughout the region.

Building holistic resilience is the best way to combat and re duce these threats. Resilience means "to bounce back". When applied to water, it refers to water systems and services that can weather and recover from shocks while remaining adapt able to — and prepared for — an uncertain future. Water resilience goes beyond climate uncertain ty, extreme weather events, and even pandemics. Water resilience means water entities and partners are prepared to thrive amid all challenges, including social and inequality issues, instability, and financing constraints.

A major untapped opportunity to build resilience is through digitalization. The adoption of technology has been frustratingly slow in the water sector, despite evidence of the success of digital solutions across a wide range of ap plications. Water ranks one of the lowest in digitalization uptake among development sectors.

The Asia and the Pacific Water Resilience Hub, developed and managed by the Water Sector Group of the Asian De velopment Bank is an open platform dedicated to strength ening water security in the region by establishing partner ships; providing training opportunities; and developing and sharing knowledge products, innovative methods, tools, data, and digital technologies. This is summarized by the motto of the Hub: “Connect, Collaborate and Capacitate”.

The Asia and the Pacific Water Resilience Hub provides spe cific entryways for water entities and partners to build to wards sustainable and inclusive water resilience and security for the region. It brings together water experts, policy mak ers, resource managers, and water implementers to collec tively address water resilience to enable countries and water entities better weather and prepare for natural hazards, climate change, water insecurity, and social and economic cri ses. Through the Hub tools, trainings and knowledge pro duced by multiple partners across the world are made readily available to others partners who may be facing similar issues. Why develop a new Hub when so many Hubs already exist? First, the primary target audience of this Hub is different when compared to most existing Hubs. The Asia and the Pacific Water Resilience Hub has, as primary audience, the water agencies working at the ground level, where climate change effects are primarily felt, and where resilience is needed. Also, the Hub aims to not only create awareness, but also assist water entities in finding curated solutions to start developing resil ient systems or embark towards resilient pathways. Training programmes are developed following specific demands from the agencies in the region. An example is the programme re cently launched called “AID” (Accelerating Innovation and Digitalization) which aims to make water innovation more accessible in Asia and the Pacific by building the knowledge and capacity of ADB’s developing member countries and ADB staff to engage, localize and adopt innovative solutions for a water-secure region.

If you want to find out how you and your organization can connect, collaborate, and help build capacities of water entities toward a more resilient, more sustainable, more inclusive, and a more water-secure Asia and the Pacific, please do not hesitate to contact us via the following address: hub4r@adb.org.

The Hub aims to assist water entities finding curated solutions to develop resilient systems or embark on resilient pathways

DR ALESIA OFORI

RESEARCH FELLOW IN WATER AND SANITATION GOVERNANCE - SCHOOL OF POLITICS AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES, UNIVERSITY OF

WHAT ARE THE PRIORITIES FOR GLOBAL WATER RESEARCH?

Global water security presents a complex problem for human societies and will become more acute as the impacts of climate change escalate. The hot and dry summer of 2022 has, for in stance, brought complex water challenges into public debate in the UK. Should we build more reservoirs? Use desalination plants to increase water supply or should households just reduce their consumption? Are private water companies even doing enough to reduce leaks or prevent wastewater discharges into our rivers? The debates persist but these are ‘wicked’ prob lems which defy simple answers. In 2019 a team of interdisci plinary researchers from water@leeds set out to scope the most important global water research questions for the coming dec ades. The outcome was about 4000 proposed questions from research participants from more than 80 countries, which were systematised and revised using the NVivo software. We further inter viewed academics and practitioners from a wide range of disciplines from hydrology, civil engineering, environmental science, economics and anthropology. We employed this approach to refine and identi fy a list of 100 indicative questions organised under six big questions. In the published paper in the One Earth Journal, titled, “The top 100 global water questions”, we thus intend to start a con versation with the global water sector on priorities for future research: research that could contribute to tackling the scale and nature of human-water interactions in the context of climate change. These six big questions are: (i) What are the character istics of water supply and sanitation systems that provide sus tainable access to clean water and sanitation for all? (ii) What are the pathways to improve water and sanitation safety and risk management in human settlements? (iii) How can the compet ing demands of different water users be reconciled? (iv) What are the dynamics and interrelationships between hydrology, ecosystems and human-induced changes on land, water, biota, and climate? (v) What are the critical challenges for the govern

ance of human interactions with water? (vi) How can water and sanitation research from multiple disciplines collectively work with governance systems to inform policy and human actions? These questions capture the scale and complexity of human-wa ter interactions. Questions 1 and 2 confront the technical, eco nomic, political and social nature of providing the recognised (but unmet) human right to adequate water and sanitation for all, whilst preventing and addressing contamination of wider ecosys tems. Question 3 reminds us that competition for water between human needs, populations and the wider ecosystem is an inher ent and critical challenge and that competing demands must be reconciled to avoid conflict, damage and exploitation. Question 4 draws attention to the planetary interactions of water, climate and ecosystems and the impact that human activities are having on them. These four questions tak en together link each human being to planetary hydrological dynamics.

Questions 5 and 6 cut across all these scales to ask where and how human collective action can address the challenges set out in questions 1-4. Current governance arrange ments for water and sanitation are failing everywhere. They are failing to ensure that all human beings have access to adequate wa ter and sanitation. They are failing to resolve competing de mands which means the most powerful grab and pollute water resources with little fear of punishment. In pretending that the management and governance of water is a technical question of the right infrastructure, economics, and institutions (see SDG 6.5.1), they are failing to recognise that resolving wicked prob lems has a fundamentally political dimension.

Perhaps by combining the collective and interdisciplinary ca pacity of the global water sector can we bring our knowledge and research power together to work with powerful actors to untangle these wicked problems. These 6 big questions grant us a language to do this. But we must combine the power of all disciplines and not ignore difficult political choices.

LEEDS

In 2019 a team of researchers from water@leeds set out to scope the most important global water research questions for the coming decades

INTERVIEW

WILLIAM C. LANDRETH FELLOW, STANFORD UNIVERSITY WATER IN THE WEST PROGRAM, FOUNDING MEMBER, WATER POLICY GROUP

FELICIA MARCUS

“Water is at the center of climate adaptation and where so many solutions lie”

The United States is facing various pressing water challenges, including drought, rising sea levels, ageing water infrastructure and polluted waterways. We speak to Felicia Marcus, William C. Landreth Fellow, Stanford University Water in the West Program, Founding Member, Water Policy Group, about some of these questions. Z Olivia TempesT

Founding member of the Water Policy Group and the William C. Landreth Visiting Fellow at Stanford’s Universi ty’s Water in the West Program, Felicia Marcus has worked in most areas of the water sector, having turned her volun teer work into a successful and buzzing career. Serving in positions in govern ment, the non-profit and private sector, she shares with SWM her vast experience and views on various pressing water is sues, including the 50th anniversary of the U.S. Clean Water Act, climate miti gation, and the provision of clean water to disadvantaged communities, a topic particularly close to her heart.

Can you tell us briefly about your career path and your current role at Stanford University and the Water Policy Group?

I have a crazy accidental career path that came from following my heart and my volunteer work turned into my career path. I started as a public interest law

yer in LA and ended up becoming the volunteer lawyer and VP for a group called Heal the Bay which was fighting to upgrade the City of LA’s wastewater facilities to protect Santa Monica Bay. Long story, but we were successful in part because we won some regulatory and legal battles, and in part because we also got the city leadership to agree with us in the political/policy arena. I ended up heading the public works department several years into it due to some amazing vision of Mayor Bradley and his Deputy Mayor Mike Gage, which led to me be ing able to put myself where my mouth was, get even more done on more issues, and also learn the joy and the challenge of actually being in an operational role. It was a revelation and a great privilege. I then became regional administrator of US EPA in the Clinton Admin (in part because I knew what it felt like to be reg ulated in addition to my environmental and legal background as an advocate).

There I worked on issues across the board in water — drinking water, water supply, conflicts over ecosystem flows, source water protection, water quality standards, etc. across four states and 143 federally recognized Indian tribes and many of the Pacific Islands. I al so spent a lot of time at the US-Mexico Border on a host of issues. After a ten year period working in national non profits (NRDC and TPL) I went back into government in the Jerry Brown Ad ministration as Chair of the State Water Resources Control Board. Currently, I am a half-time visiting fellow at Stan ford’s Water in the West program and the other half is a mix of an energy cor porate board, some water consulting, and a lot of pro bono work on recycled water and climate adaptation both do mestic and international. I just finished a project looking at synergies between state climate policy and nature-based solutions that yield multiple benefits, especially for water.

This year marks the 50th anniversa ry of the Clean Water Act in the U.S. What are its main achievements and what are the main threats to water safe ty that still exist?

There are many remarkable achieve ments accomplished because of the Clean Water Act, which is possibly the most successful of our environmental statutes. In particular, if you look at the issues at the time the act was passed, it’s been estimated that at the time 80-85% of the water pollution problem was from unregulated, or under-regulated, “point

"There are many achievements accomplished because of the Clean Water Act, which is possibly the most successful environmental statute"

INTERVIEW

with aging infrastructure, the chemi cals of emerging concern, and to deal with non-point sources. And we need more integrated solutions that include nature-based systems that can provide multiple benefits (like stormwater cap ture and quality through greening urban spaces while providing flood control and water quality) and large scale water re cycling. This is where the Clean Water Act meets the Safe Drinking Water Act.

sources” or pipes that went directly from a facility to a water body for pollutant disposal. It’s done a pretty awesome job, albeit later than 1985 (the original goal for “fishable, swimmable” waters), but significant nonetheless. Sewage and in dustrial discharges are reduced to a small fraction of what they were, rivers aren’t catching on fire, and waterbodies are not choked by sewage discharge that ab sorbed so much oxygen that fish asphyx iated). On the other hand, “non-point source” pollution from urban runoff and agriculture and other land disturbance has not been vanquished and we are see ing algae blooms and “dead zones” from that runoff in lakes and waterways, in cluding big-time in the Gulf of Mexico (and increasingly in the Bay-Delta and last month in San Francisco Bay). We also have new generations of pollutants

that are emerging through better sci ence, including more ubiquitous chem icals like the PFAS and PFOA families of “forever chemicals” and microplastics that slough off everything and are now even found in what we all excrete. Dit to with endocrine disruptors (hormone mimickers) from the hormones and drugs we take, or even caffeine. We’ve also not achieved healthy water for eco systems (the fishable part and beyond), so despite the great progress compared to where we were 50 years ago, we still have a long way to go and we’d better not take 50 more years to get there. The federal tools for dealing with non-point pollu tion are much more constrained than for point sources (e.g., the exemption for much of agriculture), so this is a big lift. Another remarkable accomplish ment of the Clean Water Act that most people don’t realize stems from its em phasis on capacity building in states and tribes to implement federal programs. Similarly, people don’t acknowledge the billions of dollars in grants and loans that have gone to much of the public sector clean-up of things like sewage treatment plants. Grants shifted to low-cost loans along the way, but those are helpful too. We need far more to retool to deal

You have been named “California’s Water Czar” by the New York Times for your leadership during California’s historic drought. How is California dealing with drought? How can it serve as an example for other states? Didn’t feel like much of a “czar” at the time, but the State Water Resources Control Board that I chaired was on point for many of the key issues in cluding historic mandatory urban wa ter conservation regulations, helping get drinking water to underserved small communities that were running out of water (and frequently being served pol luted water even if they had it), handling water rights conflicts between water rights holders and between water rights holders and the ecosystem, etc. so I was pretty on point on some tough choices. I do think we moved the needle signifi cantly in that last drought in helping to get the human right to water issue front and center and prioritizing underserved communities, in helping folks see that they were hemorrhaging valuable highly treated drinking water on keeping their lawns a particular shade of green in a drought (the public saved 24% and has held 2/3rds of that), in getting historic groundwater management reform legis lation passed, in getting better data on water use in agriculture (although still a long way to go), and in trying to pro tect the ecosystem (although we have a long long way to go), and other things. We put over $1.5 billion in grants and loans into water recycling projects to

"We need far more to retool to deal with aging infrastructure, the chemicals of emerging concern, and to deal with non-point sources"

get them off the drawing board and in to construction and we streamlined our recycled water rules to make them clear, more usable, and more predictable. Di rect potable reuse standards will be out in 2023 and just the promise of that has unleashed huge projects -- particularly in the greater LA area that will make the region significantly more resilient to dis ruption of imported water sources which is inevitable with climate change but also possible any time for other reasons.

In 2020, you joined the Program on Water in the West at Stanford University. What projects and research have you been working on regarding water management?

It’s been an eclectic mix of projects. I am there as a practitioner in residence of sorts, so I spend a lot of time lecturing in other people’s classes, advising students and professors about how policymaking actually works in practice, and how to get things done. I’ve team taught some courses including a cool one that inte grated the Human Right to Water with the Sustainable Groundwater Manage ment Act and an energy seminar dealing with the western governance infrastruc ture for managing electricity. I finished a big project on the intersection of state climate policy and nature-based solutions that yield multiple benefits, especially for water, in the Colorado Basin states that was really fun, and am currently working on a “policy lab” project with Professor Buzz Thompson and five students to up date the state of state policies across the west that integrate water and land use — an obvious overlap that is rarely pushed or implemented at the state level. I’m al so working on a project on underutilized tools to protect instream flows across the west. We have all kinds of policies and tools, but they are not implemented extensively or effectively. Part of that is political will, or lack thereof, to be sure, but part of it may be that the tools are just too hard to use and perhaps there

are easier to implement reforms or barri er removal that can see them used more frequently and effectively. I’ve also been spending a lot of time specifically in the climate adaptation and water space in the west and internationally.

You are a founding member of the Water Policy Group, counseling gov ernment officials on water policy strategies. Why was the Water Policy Group created and how does it help governments and international bodies improve their water policy strategies?

The Water Policy Group was founded by current and former senior national and international water policy officials who recognized the importance of being able to bring together years of experience and expertise as practitioners familiar with the challenges of being such an official.

The value of having others who have experience in that unique situation of working with elected officials, the media, stakeholders, and one’s administration colleagues gives one practical experience and ability to help ask questions, coun sel, and help each other think through challenging water issues. I relied on the Australian members of the group during our big California drought as sounding

boards who could ask good questions, which is why they invited me to join them when they formed the group. As Yogi Berra said, “in theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice, there is.” Members of the group have also worked extensively with international organizations of all kinds and can bring a sense of the practical and pragmatic to conversations and ef forts that can otherwise sometimes be abstract. Last year we undertook the first survey of what national water min isters at the political level thought about pressing water challenges and were able to do so in part because of our various connections to water ministers through our collective work. It gave a candid look at what they were thinking in an anon ymous survey (key takeaways included that climate change was the number one

We put over $1.5 billion in grants and loans into water recycling projects to get them off the drawing board and into construction

"I finished a big project on the intersection of state climate policy and nature-based solutions that yield multiple benefits, especially for water"

threat to water security across the board, and that fragmentation of institutions was the greatest barrier of many). We are about to undertake another survey which we hope will help to shape future international meetings and discourse on

the issues that the ministers most need help on. Individuals in the group have done a variety of speaking or assistance work with a wide variety of countries or multi-country efforts and we hope some day to do more as a group.

As the former State Water Board chair, you worked to prepare the state for a more challenging water future under climate change. What do you think is water’s role in climate adaptation? Water is at the center of climate adapta tion. It is the bleeding edge. It is where the effects are first felt, whether through droughts, flooding, or sea level rise. It is also where so many solutions lie — better water management in cities and agriculture will blunt the worst effects of climate change, and smarter water shed management from mountaintops to sea or sink can do even more to help mitigate climate change’s worst impacts through wildfire prevention, mitigating snowpack loss, and mitigating floods and sea level rise. It can also yield mul tiple benefits for biodiversity, water qual ity, and other social goods. Water has a role in multiple kinds of clean power

Water has a role in clean power production and better operation of water and wastewater treatment plants can also mitigate climate change

production, and better operation of wa ter and wastewater treatment plants can also mitigate climate change in many ways. Efficiency first and foremost is the cleanest, cheapest, and smartest thing we can do, followed by water recycling and stormwater capture — all of which have multiple benefits while making our communities more resilient in the face of a pretty darn terrifying future. Na ture-based solutions like ecological forest management, meadow restoration, and enhanced agricultural practices are at the heart of building resilience. In SF Bay, they are working on using wetland resto ration and elevation to buffer the force of sea level rise while providing greenspace and ecological value. In LA County, they are planning $300 m a year in greenspaces and stormwater capture to deal with flood control, recharging groundwater basins, and cleaning up stormdrain pol lution. Massive recycling projects are be ing designed or expanded. All of those are water efforts that will help us adapt to that scary future. Our systems and practices, unfortunately, tend to be back wards-looking and siloed, though there are signs of hope on all of the things I’ve mentioned. We just need to expand them across far more regions and com munities and do it all much, much faster.

You also worked towards solving water challenges in disadvantaged commu nities. Has there been any progress in this regard? What remains to be done? This is the challenge that is at the top of all our lists. We publicized reports in 2012 and 2013 to expose more broadly what a big problem this was and worked hard to get some tools to deal with it as we had neither the resources nor the au thority to act at the scale needed. Oddly enough, the drought which followed and found people out of water created far more impetus to fix the problem than the fact that so many small communi ties that had water had horrible water. There has been a lot of progress in the

ten years since the Human Right to Wa ter (HRTW) statute made the HRTW state policy. We still have a long way to go but making good on the promise of HRTW is within sight. Due to the phe nomenal organizing and strategy work of advocates like the Community Water Center, the Leadership Counsel for Jus tice and Accountability, and Clean Water Action plus the leadership of the Brown and Newsom Administrations, Califor nia did several things to consolidate the drinking water program into the state water board to help create a one-stop shop for small communities for funding and technical assistance, numerous legis lative efforts to give the water board pow er to consolidate small water agencies with larger ones to create an economy of scale, over a billion dollars for capital and operational needs and a variety of other measures. Communities are now being helped every day with a robust plan to keep marching through the list of failing and at-risk communities. Each commu nity is uniquely situated, so it takes a cus tomized approach for each, but progress is being made. We all want it to be faster, but there are good people in and out of government making this their top prior ity every day. There are still more tools that the water board needs to move even faster and I’m sure the advocates will keep going back for more, which is great.

Working closely with students at Stanford University, what advice would you give the younger gener ations entering the water industry?

It is a fascinating and important field of endeavor — people will always need wa ter so this field is no passing fancy. While it will evolve, and needs to evolve, it will always be important. The beauty of it to day is that there are so many fields from which to engage — engineering, policy, law, communications, and science of all types. Drinking water and water quality in the environment are enormous and growing ever more important and chal

lenging as science evolves. Water rights and water supply management is an entirely different field. Natural systems and nature-based solutions are coming to the fore in a way they have not for the past 100+ years (during which we seem to have forgotten what everyone everywhere has known forever about the connectedness of things). Ecosystem management is something we need to rise to the occasion on or we will have lost something incalculable (which we already have in many instances but the worst losses yet to come can be avoid ed). We need scientists, advocates, en gineers, managers, communicators, and any expertise you can imagine to meet the challenges ahead. The private sector is waking up to water insecurity as well as the need to be better water stewards in the communities they work in and due to employee and customer expectations so that is a growing field as well. I advise students to see what grabs their hearts and where their skills and the things they like to do come together. I also always encourage students to experiment with internships and externships and volun teer work to see beyond the idea of a job and get a feel for different parts of the water field. I’m biased, but a career spent in sewage, water rights, urban and rural, tribal and community, and lots of cor ners of the water industry has been ed ucational and rewarding from every an gle. Each experience has made me more effective in the next and we need more people with a broad view of the field to be able to come up with and implement complex, cross-sector solutions.

"Drinking water and water quality in the environment are enormous and growing ever more important and challenging as science evolves"

Manage freshwater phosphate issues safely with Phoslock®

Eco-friendly and effective, Phoslock ® removes excess phosphate from waterbodies safely and permanently. Phoslock’s proprietary technology is the sustainable way to remediate fresh waterways and manage eutrophication issues. Approved for drinking water supplies in the US and with hundreds of successful treatments around the world, it is the environmentally safe way to return waterways to their natural state by removing excess nutrients. Visit our website to learn more or contact us at enquiries@phoslock.com.au

World leaders in water remediation. petwatersolutions.com

SDGs

VALENTIN POST

FINISH MONDIAL

FINISH (Financial Inclusion Improves Sanitation & Health) Mondial’s goal is to make sure that people in low-income communities have access to a safe toilet. Via a partnership between WASTE, AMREF Flying Doctors & Aqua for All, it scales safe sanitation through strengthening local sanitation markets.

Z CrisTina nOvO pérez

Globally 2.5 billion people still don’t have access to a safe toilet, with negative consequences for public health and the economy. The FINISH Mondial pro gramme is implemented in 6 countries – India, Bangladesh, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, and Ethiopia – improving liv ing standards in communities. In this interview, Valentin Post, co-founder and CEO of FINISH Mondial, tells us about their approach to address the sanitation challenge, and how their programme contributes to the circular economy by encouraging safe disposal and reuse of human waste.

Can you tell us briefly about your ca reer path and your current role at FIN ISH Mondial?

I have worked in the sanitation and waste sector for over 25 years. I started my ca reer in industrial waste management and entered the toilet sector a little bit by co incidence. My first work experiences were with leather tanneries and the pollution they cause. You might think that working with human and municipal waste would be easy in comparison. But reality has taught me that the waste sector is never easy and highly contextual. As FINISH Mondial’s co-founder and CEO, my job is to safeguard the FINISH Mondial mis sion and vision, as well as to motivate and support the country teams, working groups, partners and supporting staff. To increase our footprint, I also actively seek to engage partners and innovations that may help us reduce costs or increase scale.

FINISH (Financial Inclusion Im proves Sanitation & Health) Mondi al’s goal is to make sure that people in low-income communities have ac cess to a safe toilet. To achieve that goal, you follow a holistic approach described as the “Diamond model”. Can you explain your approach in more detail?

Yes indeed, our approach to the sanita tion challenge is very comprehensive. We involve all the stakeholders in the sani tation ecosystem – communities, busi nesses, financial institutions and govern ments – with the aim of providing toilets for those who need them most. We visit communities and households to raise awareness of the health benefits of hav ing a safe toilet, and we keep engaging with them to create demand for toilets. We train local masons to build quality low-cost toilets and safe sanitation sys tems, and train sanitation entrepreneurs to safely collect, transform and reuse human waste. We partner with banks and other financial institutions to develop sanitation loan products, build the ca pacity of their staff to market these prod ucts, and link them to interested house holds and sanitation businesses. Finally, we encourage governments to create an enabling environment and to join pub lic-private partnerships.

So, in a sense, you make sure that all the pieces of the puzzle fit together… Yes, exactly, because there is no point in training masons to build toilets if they

"We involve all the stakeholders in the sanitation ecosystem with the aim of providing toilets for those who need them most"

CEO,

“People are more than willing to invest in a safe toilet or sanitation system once they see its benefits”

can’t find customers (because people are not aware of the benefits of a safe toilet or prioritise other needs with the little money they have). Or you could get people inter ested in a safe toilet, but they can’t afford it. Or you could train sanitation entrepre neurs, but they have no capital to start or expand their business. You really have to make sure that all aspects are covered.

You apply a market approach to the sanitation challenge – people pay for their toilets – yet FINISH Mondial is an NGO. Why did you choose to work with a market-based approach?

The sanitation sector still relies heavily on government subsidies, which is un sustainable in the long run. 2.5 billion people still don’t have access to a safe toi

let! People also tend to be more negligent with products or services they have not paid for. We wanted to find a more sus tainable approach and therefore, people pay for the toilets, but we make sure they can afford to pay. As a rule, people with out toilets are poor and can’t afford the out-of-pocket expense of a toilet. This is where microfinance and the financial

institutions we work with come in. Paying the needed amount in small instalments matched to the expected income of the household makes safely managed san itation affordable for many more people. We find that people are more than will ing to invest in a safe toilet or sanitation system once they see its benefits. And by creating a sanitation market, we create lo cal employment for masons, pit emptiers, and so on. We also, of course, make sure that sanitation businesses sell good prod ucts. We give a lot of training to entrepre neurs to ensure quality and affordability. Typically, our toilets and sanitation sys tems are both high quality and also a third cheaper than prevailing systems.

You operate in six countries – Bangla desh, Ethiopia, India, Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda. Can you tell us about your plans to scale up and about some of the barriers you face in this regard?

The biggest challenge is that scaling up sanitation is highly contextual: each country has its specific challenge. In Ethiopia, for instance, there are some financial liquidity problems. Even if households are interested in sanitation loans, the availability of funds is limit ed. In Bangladesh and eastern India, we need to construct floodproof infrastruc tures, which is a technical challenge. We have identified several possible solutions, some of which we have tested and oth ers still need to be tested. We will also need to get the governments to accept and adopt these new floodproof toilets in their standards.

The FINISH programme contributes to a circular economy: how so?

Our goal is to “recycle” the human waste from the toilets we build. Recy cling can be autonomous, carried out by the household itself using double pits. These systems are used mainly in rural and peri-urban areas; the human waste is treated on site, and households learn how to empty and safely reuse their own faecal matter. Alternatively, in urban settings, we work with and develop the capacities of sanitation entrepreneurs to collect and transform the human waste, usually into co-compost that can be safe ly applied in agriculture. Co-compost

from human waste, mixed with other organic waste materials, is very nitrogen rich and makes a great fertiliser.

Greenhouse gas emissions from sani tation are often underestimated. How can safely managed sanitation help lower emissions?

Few people know this, but unsafe storage and dumping of human waste is a ma jor contributor to greenhouse gas emis sions. When human waste is not stored properly it releases methane into the air. In Kampala, Uganda, for instance, a recent study estimated that sanitation

"In urban settings, we work with and develop the capacities of sanitation entrepreneurs to collect and transform the human waste"

The sanitation sector relies heavily on government subsidies, which is unsustainable: 2.5 bn people don’t have access to a safe toilet!

Valentine Post visiting both completed and ongoing sanitation systems under the FINISH Mondial program in Uganda

represents more than half the city’s to tal emissions. So, building nice toilets is not enough; you must make sure you also keep an eye below the ground where the waste is stored. By processing human waste into products like co-compost and applying these in agriculture, you can also partially replace high-carbon-foot print fertilisers and further reduce overall CO2 emissions.

I imagine that some people need con vincing about the idea of recycling hu man waste and using it in agriculture. What challenges does your team face

and how do you create social accept ance for circular sanitation?

Indeed, this is not easy. Asking farmers to work with products made from human waste or asking consumers to buy food grown in human waste is not without its challenges. Yet, we forget that using human waste as fertiliser was common practice in ancient times. Today, thanks to scientific research and rigorous testing, we can make sure that the products we use are 100 per cent safe. We found that what works best to change perceptions is to start with a small group of farmers and foster peer-to-peer exchange. Farmers

are generally very positive about using products from human waste. They see how their yields improve and how strong plants grown with co-compost are. This is backed by scientific studies as well.

What is the future of circular sanita tion? What vision do you have for the sector?

People, in general, very much like the idea and concept of circularity and the circular economy. But when you try to implement these concepts, you encoun ter many human-made obstacles that prevent circular sanitation from becom ing standardised. Since we are dealing with faecal matter and potential path ogens, the public might express some concerns. So, we need to take a step-bystep approach. The promising potential of reusing human waste is still largely untapped. Globally, it is estimated that human waste could provide 50 million tonnes of fertiliser, which would account for a quarter of the current global de mand. Imagine, that’s quite amazing! We are talking about changing the narrative about a waste product that creates a lot of problems in today’s world, changing it from a problem to valuable input. And this isn’t only about improvements in food security and environmental benefits (carbon sequestration, nutrient capture, restoration of soils and their water-hold ing capacities, and flood resilience): the economic opportunities are huge as well. New markets, businesses and public-pri vate partnerships will be created around the safe disposal and reuse of human waste. These are exciting prospects.

"Human waste is a major contributor to greenhouse gas emissions; when human waste is not stored properly it releases methane into the air"

MEDIA LIBRARY

SOMETHING TO READ...

WATER TO THE ANGELS

Written by Les Standiford, author of Last Train to Paradise, this book is a biography of William Mulholland, the City of Los Angeles’ chief engineer. It traces Mulholland’s career and life from its beginnings to its end and tells the story of the largest public water project ever created, the William Mulholland’s Los Angeles aqueduct.

BY: SWM TEAM

Available on Netflix, this documentary starring David Attenborough highlights the most pressing water challenges facing society today. In 2019, the series won two Emmy awards for Outstanding Documentary Series and Outstanding Narrator. It aims to inspire people around the world to understand the natural world as never before.

SOMETHING TO ENJOY...

WATERFALLS

TLC’s smash hit

TLC wrote “Waterfalls” for their second album CrazySexyCool in 1994. It is often considered the hiphop group’s most famous song and topped the charts around the world. The song also earned two Grammy nominations. Despite its name, Waterfalls actually addresses the illegal drug trade and HIV/AIDS.

William Mulholland and his monumental aqueduct

SOMETHING TO WATCH... OUR PLANET: FRESH WATER Emmy Award-winning documentary

Theproofthat we’redoingwell isthat youdon’teven realize weexist.

Wearecolourless,transparent,almost invisibletoyoursight.Wegounnoticedona day-to-daybasis.And…Whynotrecognizeit? ...discreetinthisnoisyworld.

ButbehindAqualiatherearemany professionals,expertsandcommitted, dedicatedeverydaytoensurethatthe watercontinuestoreachmillionsofhomes... withoutyouevenknowingaboutit.

Wearepeopleworkingforpeople providinganessentialpublicservice.