Integrated Water Management in the Sydney Region
Abstract
The limited water resources supplying Sydney are currently under significant stress due to increasing demand for potable water, extended drought, environmental concerns and a possible long-term climate change. Conventional management of discrete systems for water supply, wastewater and stormwater treatment/disposal is no longer appropriate to service the growing population and to simultaneously provide adequate environmental protection. Hence there is an emerging need for an integrated approach in managing our water resources. The goal of integrated water management is to ensure that there is sufficient water available to meet all of the competing demands and to provide adequate environmental protection. This can be accomplished by the implementation of a number of strategies and programs in an integrated fashion that address water supply, water demand as well as the environment.
This paper presents the concept of integrated water management and a number of the building blocks currently being formulated for Sydney, Australia, including the Building Sustainability Index (BASIX) program, Demand Management, Water Sensitive Urban Design (WSUD), Integrated Effluent Management and Environmental Flows.
Authors
Tony Church, Dennis Cho, Philip von Huben & David Barnes