GLOBAL CHANGE PRESSURES

IN THE CITY OF THE FUTURE

Kala Vairavamoorthy

Slide 1

Contents
Current conditions in LDCs
Future conditions in LDCs
Issues of Climate Change
The way forward
SWITCH
Slide 2

Contents
Current conditions in LDCs
Future conditions in LDCs
Issues of Climate Change
The way forward
SWITCH
Slide 3

Percent of global total Without

Access to Drinking Water per region
4% 4%
6%

1.1 billion without

access to water
42%

19%

25%

East Asia/Pacific
Sub-Sahran Africa
South Asia
LAC Latin America and the Caribbean
MENA "Middle East and North Africa"
Others

Source: UNDP (2003)

Slide 4

Percent of global total Without

Access to Sanitation per region
5% 2%
12%

2.4 billion without

access to sanitation
42%

East Asia/Pacific
South Asia
Sub-Sahran Africa
LAC Latin America and the Caribbean
MENA "Middle East and North Africa"
Others

37%
Source: UNDP (2003)

Slide 5

Water scarcity
Particular concern in urban areas because of
migration of rural population to urban centres
Principally result from source limitation, poor
distribution, or inequality between rich/poor
Increase the health burden on the urban poor

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24-Hour Water Availability (2001)

Source: McIntosh (2003)

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Coverage with Piped Water

Source: McIntosh (2003)

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Non-Revenue Water (2001)

Source: McIntosh (2003)

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Most wastewater is not treated!

Effluent
discharge

Sewer
Network
Centralised
WWTP

Distribution network

Water
Treatment
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While 85% of all wastewater is not treated!

.and the consequences are clear..
95%

World-wide

100%

EU

90%
80%
70%
60%

<40%

50%
40%
30%

<15%

20%

<2%

10%
0%
Primary/ secondary treatment

Tertiary treatment

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Is this the future of our

water resources?

Slide 13

Slide 14

Contents
Current conditions in LDCs
Future conditions in LDCs
Issues of Climate Change
The way forward
SWITCH
Slide 15

World population prospects 1950 - 2030

Source: UN (2004)
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Slide 17

Growth of urban agglomerations

(population in millions)

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Water-stress facts
Africa
12 countries in a Water Stress situation.
Further 10 countries will be stressed by 2025
(1.1 billion people or 2/3s of population).

India
Largest number of water-deprived persons in
the world in next 25 years.
By 2050, half of population will be living in
urban areas and face acute water problems.

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Water availability

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Relationship between population and

flood events (Belo Horizonte, Brasil)

Source: Tucci (200$)

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Deteriorating Infrastructure
Buried urban infrastructure networks have
declined rapidly over the last 20 years
aging, poor construction practices, lack of quality
control, little or no maintenance, and operation at
capacities higher than design intended

For example in Canada upgrading systems to

appropriate standards over the next 15 years
could cost around $75 billion.

Slide 22

Main Breaks since 1965 (USA)

American Water Works Service Co., Inc. (2002)

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Contents
Current conditions in LDCs
Future conditions in LDCs
Issues of Climate Change
The way forward
SWITCH
Slide 24

Changes in Runoff due to CC - 2080

IS92a scenario

Source: Hadley Centre (2003)

Slide 25

Water stress due to CC - 2080

IS92a scenario

Source: Hadley Centre (2003)

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CC developing countries
60% of the additional people at risk of
flooding are expected to be in Southern Asia
and 20% in South East Asia (2080)
Additional 3 billion people could suffer
increased water stress by 2080. (Northern
Africa, Middle East and India)
Africa, Middle East and India expected to
experience significant reductions in yields
Additional 290 million people exposed to
malaria by the 2080. (China and Central Asia)

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CC and developing countries

Poor people will be hardest hit as they are
most vulnerable (lower capacity to adapt).

lack of financial, institutional and technological

capacity and access to knowledge

While climate change is important in the long

run, there are more immediate development
priorities that affect human welfare.
Is it responsible to argue for adaptive
measures when predictions are so uncertain ?

Slide 28

Uncertainties in predictions
Emissions

Uncertainty due to emissions

GCM/Downscaling

Science uncertainty
Hydrological

Uncertainty due to
natural variability

WR

Decision
Making
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Science uncertainty

Source: Hadley Centre (2003)

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Science uncertainty

Source: Hadley Centre (2003)

Slide 31

Relative frequency of predicted

changes in daily rainfall

seasonal average (blue bars)

extreme 99th percentile (red bars)

ensemble of climate model

Slide 32

Contents
Current conditions in LDCs
Future conditions in LDCs
Issues of Climate Change
The way forward
SWITCH
Slide 33

Current practise of urban water management,

use and abuse is not sustainable
But is this surprising if we realize that.
the current system was designed when the
world population was below 1 Billion..
.and the term Sustainability
was not invented yet

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.while present days syndromes of Global

Change were still unknown

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Challenge
There is a need for win-win actions that
address directly the more immediate water
management problems while preparing for the
consequences of longer term climate changes.
Wise to make decisions on "no-regrets"
adaptive measures, or decisions which prevent
future options being closed.

Slide 36

Focus on vulnerability
Vulnerability management - holistic and
integrated activities
Proactive or anticipatory adaptation aims to build
resilience and reduce vulnerability by minimizing
risk and maximizing adaptive capacity.
Study urban environment as complete system,
to observe and analyze the interconnections and
interdependencies among urban infrastructures
and identify points of vulnerability

Slide 37

Contents
Current conditions in LDCs
Future conditions in LDCs
Issues of Climate Change
The way forward
SWITCH
Slide 38

SWITCH

Slide 39

EU 6th Community Research

Framework Programme
Theme: Global Change and Eco-systems
Specific theme: Integrated Urban Water Mgt
SWITCH: Sustainable Urban Water Management
Improves Tomorrows Citys Health
Implementation: 2006 2010
Coordinator: UNESCO-IHE

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SWITCH Consortium

32 Partners
17 from EU
12 from Developing countries
3 from other countries
9 Demo-cities
10 Study sites
Some 40 PhD studies
17 different countries

Project Duration: 5 years (2006 2010)

Budget:
23 Million Euro
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SWITCH
Overall Goal and Mission
The SWITCH Integrated Project aims to contribute to the
achievement of sustainable and effective urban water
management (UWM) schemes in The City of the
future (projection 30-50 years from now).
The approach will be to develop efficient urban water
systems and services (city level) in the context of the
citys geographical and ecological setting (river basin
level), which are robust and adjustable to a range of
global change pressures (global level).

Slide 42

SWITCH calls for a Paradigm Shift

System must be robust, flexible and adaptable to
global change pressures.
Must consider interventions over the entire urban
water cycle interrelations (e.g. water use =
wastewater production = water resource
deterioration = increased costs of drinking water
production).
Reconsider water use - make water more
productive (DM, reuse.)
Source separation and treatment for reuse manage individual waste flows (converting waste
components into products)
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SWITCH approach and methodology

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Activities
1

Urban water paradigm shift

Urban water supply & use

Storm Water Management

Water use in sanitation and waste

management

Urban water environments and planning

Governance and institutional change

Slide 45

Examples of activities
Bank filtration and soil-aquifer treatment:

Demonstrations:
Tel-Aviv (WWT-reuse)
Berlin (bank filtration)

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Examples of activities
Rational Water Use:
Demand Management
Water saving technologies

Demonstrations:
Zaragoza
(World Expo 2008)

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Eco-sanitation

Dry sanitation
Urine separation
Nutrient recovery
Reuse

Demonstrations:
Beijing
Alexandria

Slide 48

Beijing
Sustainable building area
will serve as a demonstration
site during the Green
Olympics of 2008.
Innovative water management concepts:
separate treatment of concentrated and diluted
wastewater flows
use of treated effluents and storm water infiltration
for landscaping and groundwater recharge
potential use of eco-san products in urban
agriculture.
Slide 49

Water in the City of

the Future

Slide 50

Picture the City of the Future

We
We
We
We
We

learned to live with water by building flexible cities

do no longer use water to transport wastes
have effective water and waste recovery schemes
use a fraction of the water use of 30-50 years ago
apply integrated urban water cycle management

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0.3 m3/m2

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0.3 m3/m2

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0.3 m3/m2

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0.3 m3/m2

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Towards Sustainable
Water in the City of the
Future

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