Water Miles

Water under the sustainability microscope

fra99le — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 01:22:30 +0000

An article I wrote for the Clean and Green section of the Plumbers’ Journal (Dec 09/Jan 10):

Water under the sustainability microscope

The Carbon Footprint of Water

fra99le — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 01:08:21 +0000

This is a terrific report, full of great data and ways to visualise the issues. It comes from the River Network, a national US organisation.

The Carbon Footprint of Water (download pdf).

The Water-Energy Nexus | River Network

fra99le — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 23:28:32 +0000

Just found this site, and this post in particular, which has a lot to do with the Water Miles message:

The Water-Energy Nexus | River Network

Links to articles on the cost of desalination plants in Australia

fra99le — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 22:38:57 +0000

Greens MP Mark Parnell says South Australian households are paying heavily for a doubling in the size of Adelaide’s planned desalination plant (ABC News) “The Greens believe that desalination is an important technology but it’s a last resort, not a first resort. There is cheaper water to be had if only the Government would invest in recycling and that water is available year-after-year. Every litre of desalinated water costs money because of the huge amounts of energy involved.”

Victoria’s Desal plant figures don’t hold water (SMH) “Public or private, the 150-gigalitre desal plant is not needed. The additional water could be produced at a sixth to a quarter of the cost by a judicious mixture of conservation, recycling and diversion dams.”

Coomera Cross-Connection (residents drink recycled water)

fra99le — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 22:30:57 +0000

Click here for yet another example of the now clearly evident difficulty in avoiding cross-connections in third pipe supplies. Gold Coast residents were supplied recycled water to their drinking water taps.

The system was no doubt subject to some very rigourous proceedures and thorough checking but it appears to be very hard to avoid cross-connections at this scale of development.

See also my paper on risk and scale in water recycling.

‘Footprint’ for water

fra99le — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 22:40:42 +0000

Consumers will be able to gauge the water “footprint” of products under a labelling move experts believe will benefit New Zealand, reports The Press and the Otago Daily Times. The NZ Herald covers it too.

More on water footprinting:

http://watermiles.org/2008/12/23/water-footprint-network-launches/
http://watermiles.org/2009/06/30/water-footprint-of-bioenergy/
http://watermiles.org/2008/12/04/plumbers-journal-article/

IWA Water Reuse SIG – Newsletter

fra99le — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 22:30:26 +0000

You can download copies of the International Water Association’s Newletters for the Water Reuse specialist group from here.

The September 2009 newsletter carries a copy of my NZLTC conference paper, on water reuse and system scale.

Water-Energy linkages

fra99le — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 02:37:42 +0000

Here’s a new report from Beacon Pathway that covers the key Water Miles message: that water and wastewater supply cost energy. It quantifies this for four councils in New Zealand.

http://beaconpathway.co.nz/images/uploads/Final_Report_WA7090(2)_Energy_water_relationships.pdf

Integrated Water Management Design Criteria Report

fra99le — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 01:52:11 +0000

A NZ manufactured greywater system (the ECOplus) obtained the highest number of sustainability points for a single product in an assessment of the efficacy and efficiency of water saving products. It also featured as part of the best overall system (a combination of greywater recycling, rainwater tank, low flow showerhead and water efficient washing machine). This is a reflection of the fact that it works well in combination with other water saving devices. Products and systems were assessed against the following criteria:

Water quantity
Water quality
Nutrient cycle
Material cycle
Cultural issues
Resilience
Technical issues
Social
Life cycle energy
Economic

Full report:

http://beaconpathway.co.nz/images/uploads/Final_Report_WA7090(3)_Integrated_Water_Management_Design_Criteria.pdf

Public Lecture by Stan Abbott

fra99le — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 23:53:53 +0000

Stan Abbott, director of the Roof Water Research Centre at Massey University, is giving a public lecture on ‘Roofwater Harvesting in Urban Environments – An Environmentally Sound Solution to Diminishing Water Sources’.

The lecture is at Massey in Wellington on Thursday 20 August at 6pm.

See this poster for more details.