scholarly journals Fostering Cross-Sector Collaboration to Promote Innovation in the Water Sector

2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (11) ◽  
pp. 4154 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lorenzo Compagnucci ◽  
Francesca Spigarelli
Keyword(s):  
Innovation Policy ◽  
Global Climate ◽  
Water Governance ◽  
Interdisciplinary Approach ◽  
Specific Reference ◽  
Limiting Factor ◽  
Water Sector ◽  
Economic Activities ◽  
Leading Role ◽  
Sustainable Economic Growth

Ongoing global climate change, growing population and the intensification of economic activities, increase pressure on water resources, a situation many see as a water governance crisis. Water-related issues are becoming a limiting factor for sustainable economic growth and require a collaborative and interdisciplinary approach, to foster innovative solutions. This paper provides an evidence-based contribution to understanding Triple Helix Model (THM) relations and the path to innovation policy in the water sector. The analysis focuses on the interaction between university–industry–government, with specific reference to the Murcia region in Southeast Spain. This region combines a chronic shortage of water and a leading role for agriculture. Starting from the experience of a researcher, working for the General Water Council of the Murcia Region, this paper is based on both desk research and in-depth personal interviews with representatives of THM actors. In addition, a questionnaire was forwarded to all those companies in charge of providing water services in the Murcia region. The study has found that stakeholders are not fully cooperative in seeking innovation. The main challenges are the renewal of water-related facilities and the improvement of remote control systems, denitrification and desalination technologies and achieving better energy efficiency. To this aim, THM approach is suggested as a source of local innovation policies, identifying a series of tools to foster a collaborative approach.

scholarly journals Analysing inter-relationships among water, governance, human development variables in developing countries: WatSan4Dev database coherency analysis

2012 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 485-539 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. Dondeynaz ◽  
C. Carmona Moreno ◽  
J. J. Céspedes Lorente
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
Environmental Governance ◽  
Water Governance ◽  
Research Work ◽  
Integrated Water Resources Management ◽  
Research Centre ◽  
Water Sector ◽  
Economic Activities ◽  
Joint Research ◽  
Sanitation Services

Abstract. The "Integrated Water Resources Management" principle was formally laid down at the International Conference on Water and Sustainable development in Dublin 1992. One of the main results of this conference is that improving Water and Sanitation Services (WSS), being a complex and interdisciplinary issue, passes through collaboration and coordination of different sectors (environment, health, economic activities, governance, and international cooperation). These sectors influence or are influenced by the access to WSS. The understanding of these interrelations appears as crucial for decision makers in the water sector. In this framework, the Joint Research Centre (JRC) of the European Commission (EC) has developed a new database (WatSan4Dev database) containing 45 indicators (called variables in this paper) from environmental, socio-economic, governance and financial aid flows data in developing countries. This paper describes the development of the WatSan4Dev dataset, the statistical processes needed to improve the data quality; and, finally, the analysis to verify the database coherence is presented. At the light of the first analysis, WatSan4Dev Dataset shows the coherency among the different variables that are confirmed by the direct field experience and/or the scientific literature in the domain. Preliminary analysis of the relationships indicates that the informal urbanisation development is an important factor influencing negatively the percentage of the population having access to WSS. Health, and in particular children health, benefits from the improvement of WSS. Efficient environmental governance is also an important factor for providing improved water supply services. The database would be at the base of posterior analyses to better understand the interrelationships between the different indicators associated in the water sector in developing countries. A data model using the different indicators will be realised on the next phase of this research work.

scholarly journals Water Security in Africa in the Age of Global Climate Change

Daedalus ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 150 (4) ◽  
pp. 7-26
Author(s):  
Allen Isaacman ◽  
Muchaparara Musemwa
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Global Climate ◽  
Water Governance ◽  
Water Security ◽  
Well Being ◽  
African Continent ◽  
Urban Centers ◽  
Water Shortages ◽  
Critical Dimensions ◽  
The Impact

Abstract This essay explores the multiple ways in which the nexuses between water scarcity and climate change are socially and historically grounded in ordinary people's lived experiences and are embedded in specific fields of power. Here we specifically delineate four critical dimensions in which the water crises confronting the African continent in an age of climate change are clearly expressed: the increasing scarcity, privatization, and commodification of water in urban centers; the impact of large dams on the countryside; the health consequences of water shortages and how they, in turn, affect other aspects of people's experiences, sociopolitical dynamics, and well-being, broadly conceived; and water governance and the politics of water at the local, national, and transnational levels. These overarching themes form the collective basis for the host of essays in this volume that provide rich accounts of conflicts and struggles over water use and how these tensions have been mitigated.

scholarly journals Assessing determinants of PPP project performance

2018 ◽  
Vol 36 (1) ◽  
pp. 67-85 ◽  
Author(s):  
Raghu Rama D.T.V. Swamy ◽  
Piyush Tiwari ◽  
Anil Sawhney
Keyword(s):  
Drinking Water ◽  
Project Performance ◽  
Specific Reference ◽  
Water Sector ◽  
Content Type ◽  
The Public ◽  
Baseline Information ◽  
Implementation Models ◽  
Urban Drinking Water ◽  
Project Structure

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to understand the factors that affect the performance of projects being implemented on the public-private partnership (PPP) framework, with specific reference to urban drinking water sector in India. Design/methodology/approach A listing of factors that have a bearing on project performance have been developed based on a review of the literature. Through a survey, seven factors that are relevant to the Indian context were determined. Interviews were then conducted across a cross-section of government agencies, financial institutions, development agencies, private sector entities and consultants to understand the relative importance of these attributes. The analytical hierarchy process was used to develop relative weights of these factors. Findings Ranking and relative weights of the factors in descending order are stakeholder consent and support for water PPP projects (22.1 percent), appropriate project structure (17.4 percent), availability of realistic baseline information (16.2 percent), reasonable water tariffs (13.9 percent), public sector capacity (13.0 percent), well-developed market (9.5 percent) and water sector regulator (7.9 percent). Differences in perceptions amongst various stakeholder groups were also found. Research limitations/implications Water sector has not matured, and with the advent of newer formats of implementation models, there could be significant changes in the sector. As the number of projects available for study is limited, this exercise can be undertaken periodically and updated in relation to experiences in other infrastructure sectors. Practical implications This analysis provides inputs to policymakers and project proponents for structuring more sustainable urban drinking water PPP projects. Originality/value Indian infrastructure PPP market is attracting increased attention from researchers, though not much emphasis is being given to urban drinking water sector. This paper aims to contribute toward filling this research gap.

Anticipating the computational performance of Earth System Models for pre-exascale systems

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xavier Yepes-Arbós ◽  
Miguel Castrillo ◽  
Mario C. Acosta ◽  
Kim Serradell
Keyword(s):  
Computational Efficiency ◽  
Climate Model ◽  
Global Climate ◽  
Horizontal Resolution ◽  
Limiting Factor ◽  
Earth System ◽  
Computational Point ◽  
System Models ◽  
Computational Performance ◽  
Earth System Models

<p>The increase in the capability of Earth System Models (ESMs) is strongly linked to the amount of computing power, given that the spatial resolution used for global climate experimentation is a limiting factor to correctly reproduce climate mean state and variability. However, higher spatial resolutions require new High Performance Computing (HPC) platforms, where the improvement of the computational efficiency of ESMs will be mandatory. In this context, porting a new ultra-high resolution configuration into a new and more powerful HPC cluster is a challenging task, involving technical expertise to deploy and improve the computational performance of such a novel configuration.</p><p>To take advantage of this foreseeable landscape, the new EC-Earth 4 climate model is being developed by coupling OpenIFS 43R3 and NEMO 4 as atmosphere and ocean components respectively. An important effort has been made to improve the computational efficiency of this new EC-Earth version, such as extending the asynchronous I/O capabilities of the XIOS server to OpenIFS. </p><p>In order to anticipate the computational behaviour of EC-Earth 4 for new pre-exascale machines such as the upcoming MareNostrum 5 of the Barcelona Supercomputing Center (BSC), OpenIFS and NEMO models are therefore benchmarked on a petascale machine (MareNostrum 4) to find potential computational bottlenecks introduced by new developments or to investigate if previous known performance limitations are solved. The outcome of this work can also be used to efficiently set up new ultra-high resolutions from a computational point of view, not only for EC-Earth, but also for other ESMs.</p><p>Our benchmarking consists of large strong scaling tests (tens of thousands of cores) by running different output configurations, such as changing multiple XIOS parameters and number of 2D and 3D fields. These very large tests need a huge amount of computational resources (up to 2,595 nodes, 75 % of the supercomputer), so they require a special allocation that can be applied once a year.</p><p>OpenIFS is evaluated with a 9 km global horizontal resolution (Tco1279) and using three different output data sets: no output, CMIP6-based fields and huge output volume (8.8 TB) to stress the I/O part. In addition, different XIOS parameters, XIOS resources, affinity, MPI-OpenMP hybridisation and MPI library are tested. Results suggest new features introduced in 43R3 do not represent a bottleneck in terms of performance as the model scales. The I/O scheme is also improved when outputting data through XIOS according to the scalability curve.</p><p>NEMO is scaled using a 3 km global horizontal resolution (ORCA36) with and without the sea-ice module. As in OpenIFS, different I/O configurations are benchmarked, such as disabling model output, only enabling 2D fields, or either producing 3D variables on an hourly basis. XIOS is also scaled and tested with different parameters. While NEMO has good scalability during the most part of the exercise, a severe degradation is observed before the model uses 70% of the machine resources (2,546 nodes). The I/O overhead is moderate for the best XIOS configuration, but it demands many resources.</p>

scholarly journals Local Participation in Forest Watershed Management: Design and Analysis of Experiences in Water Supply Micro-Basins with Forest Plantations in South Central Chile

Forests ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (7) ◽  
pp. 580 ◽  
Author(s):  
Victor Vargas ◽  
Noelia Carrasco ◽  
Camila Vargas
Keyword(s):  
Watershed Management ◽  
Local Knowledge ◽  
Global Climate ◽  
Water Governance ◽  
Local Participation ◽  
South Central ◽  
Forest Watershed ◽  
First Case ◽  
Main Challenge ◽  
Collective Creation

The joint “International Forests and Water Conference 2018” highlighted among its main conclusions the need to involve the viewpoint and participation of local communities in the management and monitoring of forest watersheds. This topic constitutes a strategic and transverse challenge for the sciences and public policies in the current context of global climate change. As a contribution to this challenge, the aim of this research was to qualitatively describe and analyze a territorial intervention model based on two case studies. Both involve stakeholders from the public sector, forest companies, and rural communities within the framework of implementing a participatory process at a local scale. The first case study was based on the collective creation of a set of indicators for local water monitoring. The second case, through the incorporation of the social and local dimension, culminated in the collective creation of a forest watershed management guide. The research hypothesis was that the inclusion of stakeholders and local knowledge in forest watershed management is essential to create and/or strengthen local abilities that ensure the involvement of communities in water governance, surpassing the current informative and consultative approaches. The research methodology was qualitative, and the data collection strategies were focused on the compilation of the process, the participatory work, and gathering diverse local knowledge. The data analysis included content tabulation, including both local indicators and ones extracted from the guide. In both cases, the systematization process and the main empirical findings were included. Among the findings, it was observed that both the pilot of local indicators and the design of the forest watershed management guide confirmed that the main challenge of local participation is the effective inclusion of local knowledge in water governance. This ethical and methodological challenge must be approached more rigorously and with more commitment.

Digital International Governance

2011 ◽  
pp. 365-370 ◽  
Author(s):  
F. Amoretti
Keyword(s):  
Information And Communication Technologies ◽  
World Bank ◽  
World Market ◽  
The State ◽  
International Governance ◽  
Economic Activities ◽  
Leading Role ◽  
Role Of The State ◽  
The World ◽  
The One

Up to 1980, development, which had been defined as nationally managed economic growth, was redefined as “successful participation in the world market” (World Bank, 1980, quoted in McMichael, 2004, p.116). On an economic scale, specialization in the world economy as opposed to replication of economic activities within a national framework emerged as a criterion of “development.” On a political level, redesigning the state on competence and quality of performance in the discharge of functions was upheld, while on an ideological plane, a neo-liberal and globalization project was to the fore. The quite evident failure of development policies in peripheral countries, on the one hand, has contributed to the debate on the need for reform of governing institutions in the world (de Senarcless, 2004); and, on the other, has pushed them, de-legitimized as they are, in the direction of finding new strategies and solutions. In the 1990s, considering their leading role in government reform, international organizations such as the United Nations Organization (UN), the World Bank, the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the World Trade Organization (WTO) classified e-government as a core issue on their agenda. Innovation through information and communication technologies (ICTs) (social and economic advancement among the peoples of the world has become increasingly tied to technology creation, dissemination and utilization) is at the core of the renewed focus on the role of the state and the institutions in this process. Redefining the state—functions, responsibility, powers—as regards world-market priorities and logics, has become a strategic ground for international organization intervention, and ICTs are a strategic tool to achieve these aims.

scholarly journals Preliminary recognition of state of incorporating climate change impacts and adaptation considerations in SEA and EIA procedures for renewable energy projects

2020 ◽  
Vol 154 ◽  
pp. 07004
Author(s):  
Magdalena Tyszer ◽  
Slávka Gałaś
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Renewable Energy ◽  
Power Plants ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Global Climate ◽  
Specific Reference ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Implementation Climate ◽  
Adaptation To Climate Change ◽  
Energy Projects

In the last years, the European Union has developed and set a several environmental policies whose imposes an obligation on Member States to implement specific actions, including incorporating climate change considerations into SEA and EIA processes. One of major environmental challenges facing most developing countries is that of global climate change. The aim of the research was to obtain a comprehensive review of existing SEA and EIA practical approaches for renewable energy installations in the aspect of adaptation to climate change with specific reference to Polish projects. Both SEA and EIA procedures implemented in Poland and other countries was introduced with the intent of factoring in potential risk to the environment by future large-scale project developments such as the construction of power plants, roads, or dams. The paper consist the initial recognition of available data of the current experience and level of implementation climate change impact and adaptions into local procedures. Preliminary results suggest that the additional funding should be given for climate change adaptation in the energy sector, especially in renewable energy projects, as well as specific interventions for climate-adapted energy systems should be targeted in order to fill the gap in RES sector and spur sustainable energy development.

“Something Has to Yield”

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joakim Öjendal ◽  
Gustav Aldén Rudd
Keyword(s):  
Global Climate ◽  
Water Governance ◽  
Transboundary Water ◽  
Multiple Stakeholders ◽  
Institutional Cooperation ◽  
The Status ◽  
Transboundary Water Management ◽  
Transboundary Institutions ◽  
Huge Challenge ◽  
Transboundary Basins

As estimations and predictability of water supply in basins around the globe become difficult under a changing global climate, the need for new transboundary water management arises. To avoid international tensions related to water, traditional water agreements between states need to be transformed into more sophisticated and flexible arrangements of water governance. Designing and implementing such arrangements is a huge challenge since they must involve multiple stakeholders, must take into consideration the accelerating global water scarcity, and are dependent on the risks and unknowns of global climate change. Following an exploration of the core literature on the topic and the theoretical underpinnings of how to govern future risks, this chapter takes a closer look at the status of three important transboundary basins: the Meuse, the Mekong, and the Teesta basin. These basins all experience water stress with riparian states at different stages of agreeing on transboundary institutions and institutional cooperation.

Good water governance and IWRM in Zambia: challenges and chances

Water Policy ◽  
2011 ◽  
Vol 13 (6) ◽  
pp. 845-862 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Uhlendahl ◽  
Pritam Salian ◽  
Claudia Casarotto ◽  
Jakob Doetsch
Keyword(s):  
Water Resources ◽  
Water Resources Management ◽  
Water Policy ◽  
Agricultural Land ◽  
Water Governance ◽  
Local Level ◽  
Integrated Water Resources Management ◽  
Water Sector ◽  
Resources Management ◽  
Hydropower Production

The implementation of principles for water governance is widely accepted but challenging for the whole water sector of a developing country like Zambia, because of the legal and administrative changes and organizational requirements involved. In February 2010, a revised water policy for Zambia was approved by the Cabinet. The revised National Water Policy 2010 aims to improve water resources management by establishing institutional coordination and by defining roles as well as responsibilities for various ministries. Taking into account the previous political and administration changes, this paper points out the problems and challenges of the implementation of good water governance mechanisms in Zambia. Focusing on the Kafue River Basin, from which water is abstracted for a variety of conflicting purposes (like municipal supplies, industrial use, mining, irrigation of agricultural land, fishery activities, wetland reserves and hydropower production), the gaps in implementing good water governance and Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) in Zambia are identified, as well as the factors causing these gaps in the Zambian water sector. The paper finishes with a overview of the opportunities given by the new water policy through Water User Associations (WUAs) at a local level.

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