Schleiss, Anton J.

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Article, Published VersionSchleiss, Anton J.Better water infrastructures for a better world - theimportant role of water associationsHydrolinkVerfügbar unter/Available at: https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11970/109375Vorgeschlagene Zitierweise/Suggested citation:Schleiss, Anton J. (2017): Better water infrastructures for a better world - the important roleof water associations. In: Hydrolink 2017/3. Madrid: International Association for Hydro-Environment Engineering and Research (IAHR). S. 86-87. https://iahr.oss-accelerate.aliyuncs.com/library/HydroLink/HydroLink2017_03_SDGs.pdf.Standardnutzungsbedingungen/Terms of Use:Die Dokumente in HENRY stehen unter der Creative Commons Lizenz CC BY 4.0, sofern keine abweichendenNutzungsbedingungen getroffen wurden. Damit ist sowohl die kommerzielle Nutzung als auch das Teilen, dieWeiterbearbeitung und Speicherung erlaubt. Das Verwenden und das Bearbeiten stehen unter der Bedingung derNamensnennung. Im Einzelfall kann eine restriktivere Lizenz gelten; dann gelten abweichend von den obigenNutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte.Documents in HENRY are made available under the Creative Commons License CC BY 4.0, if no other license isapplicable. Under CC BY 4.0 commercial use and sharing, remixing, transforming, and building upon the materialof the work is permitted. In some cases a different, more restrictive license may apply; if applicable the terms ofthe restrictive license will be binding.86 hydrolink number 3/2017History shows that the economic prosperity of asociety and its cultural wealth has always beenclosely related to the level of development of itswater infrastructure. In view of climate change,especially dams and reservoirs, but also otherwater infrastructure will and has to play an evenmore important role than in the past as part ofmitigation and adaptation measures that arenecessary in order to satisfy vital needs in water,renewable energy and food worldwide.International organizations and national govern-ments have shown that there is political will toimprove water, energy and food security at aglobal level through the so-called NEXUSapproach that integrates management andgovernance across sectors and scales.Nevertheless, these political intentions must betranslated into concrete actions for the urgentlyneeded enhancement of the worldwide waterinfrastructure including reservoirs and dams. Togain wide acceptance and to obtain a win-winsituation for all stakeholders, such large waterinfrastructure projects must be designed asmulti-purpose projects by multidisciplinary teamsrecognizing the complexity of these systems andadhering to the principles of sustainable devel-opment as expressed in Agenda 2030 of theUnited Nations. This calls for excellence inengineering, sciences and management. Allwater associations should contribute withconcerted actions to the worldwide vision “betterwater infrastructure for a better world”.Vital water infrastructures forreaching the sustainable development goals (SDG)For thousands of years, humankind has continu-ously developed techniques to use water and atthe same time to protect itself against water. Theterm «hydraulic schemes” or “water infras-tructure» covers all measures and human inter-ventions aiming at controlling parts of the watercycle. A vital element of our environment, wateralso has great destructive potential. Thus, thewater infrastructure projects can be divided,according to their objectives, into two groups(Figure 1) [1]:• schemes for water utilisation• schemes for protection against water.The hydraulic structures or water infrastructuredesigned for water utilisation are often multi-purpose projects providing water supply,irrigation, hydropower production andnavigation. The structures designed forprotection against water hazards include,besides flood control reservoirs, also sewagetreatment facilities (hydraulic structures toeliminate pollution), drainage, flood protectionand erosion protection measures.Today large water infrastructure projects shouldbe designed as multipurpose schemes in orderto benefit from synergies between differentobjectives of use and protection and to gainwide acceptance from all stakeholders.Dams and reservoirs as key waterinfrastructuresAccording to the ICOLD register, today morethan 58000 large dams – often called the usefulpyramids [1] –  are satisfying the worldwide vitalneeds for water, energy, food and floodprotection (Figure 2). The total storage volumeof all reservoirs registered by ICOLD is about6700 km3, of which about 4000 km3 can beused directly. To put the magnitude of usefulstorage of these reservoirs in perspective, it isnoted that all the water stored at a certain instantin all rivers worldwide, is between 1000 and2000 km3, which shows clearly that the reser-voirs can significantly influence the water cycle.This is, above all, of highest importance for foodproduction around the world, a good part ofwhich depends on irrigation. .The major problems of the world population inthis century will be without doubt the safe supplyof ecological and renewable energy, as well asthe supply of water of good quality and sufficientquantity in order to eliminate famine, poverty anddisease in the world. Still today water supply andsanitation services leave much to be desired;40% of the global population suffer from waterscarcity, which is projected to rise, and almost800 million people do not have access to cleanwater. Furthermore, an important part of theworld population is still threatened with famine.This risk could be considerably lessened byirrigation to produce food in arid areas, whichare not cultivable today. Thus, in many countries,especially in Africa, there is still an urgent needfor increased development of water and energyresources as the basis for the economicprosperity and cultural wealth of these societies.Figure 3 shows where the new large dams havebeen built since the beginning of this century [2].Thanks to these new water infrastructures, asecurity belt is formed around the world toensure water, food and energy. The zone of highdensity of new dams extends from SouthernEurope over to the Middle East, to Central andBETTER WATER INFRASTRUCTURESFOR A BETTER WORLD – THE IMPORTANT ROLE OF WATER ASSOCIATIONSBY ANTON J. SCHLEISSFigure 1. Application of water infrastructures [1] Water-related SDGs87hydrolink number 3/2017promote the following goals in their activitieswhich are strongly related to the worldwidedevelopment of water infrastructure:• Goal 2. End hunger, achieve food securityand improved nutrition and promotesustainable agriculture• Goal 7. Ensure access to affordable, reliable,sustainable and modern energy for all• Goal 8. Promote sustained, inclusive andsustainable economic growth, full andproductive employment and decent work forall• Goal 9. Build resilient infrastructure, promoteinclusive and sustainable industrialization andfoster innovation• Goal 13. Take urgent action to combatclimate change and its impacts• Goal 14. Conserve and sustainably use theoceans, seas and marine resources forsustainable developmentHow can this be achieved? First the members ofthe water associations have to be aware of theimportance of the SDGs and of how they cancontribute through their research and devel-opment activities to achieve them. One possiblesuggestion could be to require that any papersubmitted to an IAHR Congress include a shortparagraph, if applicable, explaining in two tothree sentences how it contributes to the SDGs.Furthermore, a new best SDG paper awardcould be set-up. This could be used as a vehicleto publicize to a broader audience outside IAHRthe most relevant three papers contributingsignificantly to the SDGs. A next step could beto extend this initiative to papers published inIAHR journals. This would greatly increase theawareness of the SDGs among the authors andreaders of Congress and journal papers. Mostof the water associations are fighting todayalone to promote and communicate theirviewpoint on social-political issues related to oraffected by water. To be heard really, they wouldhave to unite their voices in such communica-East Asia.  It covers the area of high water stressin arid and semi-arid regions, as well as theMonsoon- exposed regions with extremely highpopulation density. The belt of new dams shownin Figure 3 is less apparent across NorthAmerica over the World’s most productive cropgrowing region, where only a few dams havebeen built this century. This is due to the fact thatsignificant dam development took place in thisregion in the last century. It must also be notedthat the regions along this belt are alreadyaffected perceptibly today by climate change,whose effects are expected to become evenmore dramatic in the future, according modelsimulation predictions. The existing dams andreservoirs, as well as future projects will play akey-role in the mitigation of the effects of climatechange [3]. The belt of dams and reservoirswhich covers these threatened and veryvulnerable regions around the world will helpprovide food security, water and energy.Therefore, it can be called a security belt.Figure 3 illustrates another worldwide problemaddressed through the construction of newdams, which is the huge economic gradientfrom the global North to the global South, i.e.from the developed countries to the emergingand developing countries The trend for morenew dam construction in the South comparedwith the North can be seen clearly in SouthAmerica, as indicated by the arrow attached tothe security belt mentioned earlier. The samecannot be said for Africa. In this part of theworld, the security belt has to be fixed withextensions to the South in order not only tosecure food, water and energy but alsoequitable worldwide wealth for all countries.Dams and reservoirs are a major part of thewater infrastructure, which strengthens thesecurity belt and its extensions. Important role of water associations Among the 16 sustainable development goals(SDGs), water associations should at leastProf. Dr. Anton J. Schleissobtained his PhD at ETHZurich in 1986 and workedthen for 11 years forElectrowatt EngineeringLtd. in Zurich (now Pöyry)and was involved in the design of manyhydropower projects around the world as anexpert. In 1997 he was nominated fullprofessor and became Director of theLaboratory of Hydraulic Constructions (LCH)of the Swiss Federal Institute of TechnologyLausanne (EPFL). In 2015 he was electedpresident of the International Commissionon Large Dams (ICOLD). For his outstandingcontributions to advance the art and scienceof hydraulic structures engineering heobtained in 2015 the ASCE-EWRI HydraulicStructures Medal.IAHRFigure 2. Location of the 58’000 large dams according to the ICOLD registerranging from medium size dams (up to 50 m high, shown in yellow) to veryhigh dams (above 150 m, shown in red)Figure 3. New dams and reservoirs commissioned since 2000 creating asecurity belt around the world to ensure water, food and energy [2], [3]tions. A significant platform is the World WaterCouncil (WWC) with its globally known commu-nication and promotion vehicle the World WaterForum (WWF). In order to have an influence onthe water themes to be treated and discussedduring the WWF it is important to be elected onWWC’s Board as a Governor. For single waterassociations, such as IAHR or ICOLD, it is verydifficult to be elected alone in WWC’s Board as aGovernor. Thus, all water associations havingseveral votes should unite their forces to get oneof the associations elected to represent anddefend the common interests of all water associ-ations. In addition, the water associations couldalso prepare together a declaration to publicizeissues of common interest and/or concern. nReferences[1] Schleiss A. J. (2000). The importance of hydraulic schemes forsustainable development in the 21st century. In: Hydropower &Dams (2000), Volume 7, Issue 1, pp. 19 – 24.[2] Schleiss A.J. (2016). Dams and reservoirs as security belt aroundthe world to ensure water, food and energy. In: World Atlas &Industry Guide 2016, Aqua Media Int., pp. 12-13.   [3] Schleiss A.J. (2017). Ensuring worldwide long-term prosperitythanks to dams and reservoirs as vital water infrastructures - Theimportant role of ICOLD.  Proceedings of the 4th InternationalConference on Long-Term Behaviour and Environmentally FriendlyRehabilitation Technologies of Dams (LTBD 2017), 17 to 19October, 2017, Tehran, IRAN.

Better water infrastructures for a better world - the important role of water associations

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Better water infrastructures for a better world - the important role of water associations

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