National Conference on Urban Water Management - Organised by the Centre for Sustainable Development, Bangalore
Background
The challenge of urban water management is multi-faceted, ranging from access to fresh water sources to managing increasing and competing demand. Increasing urban density and intensity of economic use also plays a critical role in sourcing for water. With increasing variability and low dependability on surface water sources, dependence on groundwater sources has increased exponentially.
The result today is that the urban water and sanitation sectors suffers from inadequate service delivery, increasing demand-supply gap, quality deterioration, poor environmental sanitation, deteriorating technical and financial performance. Coupled with systemic inadequacies, increasing climatic variability and resource availability will render towns unable to provide fundamental requirements for human well being and dignity – safe water and sanitation facility. The conference was scheduled in order to understand options available to manage the multi-faceted urban water challenge.
The Event
An integrated approach to planning and policy was the thematic focus of the conference. The various topics covered were water supply, wastewater treatment and reuse, conservation and ground water management, water utilities management, public health and governance.
The conference was scheduled over 3 days (the 13th to the 15th of December, 2009) which included technical sessions (for 2 days), and site visits to water and wastewater treatment plants in and around Bangalore (1 day). Separate sessions for poster presentations were also held parallely.