Urban Water Sector Research Articles

Risks and tensions in water industry innovation: understanding adoption of decentralised water systems from a socio-technical transitions perspective

Globally, centralised urban water systems are under pressure to respond to environmental and economic pressures. In Australia, high infrastructure costs and variable rainfall have prompted governments, end-users and property developers to begin investing in more decentralised systems that use alternative water sources (rainwater, stormwater and wastewater). This trend is based on a fit-for-purpose principle and is part of a global shift toward sustainable urban water management. These developments suggest that Australia's urban water sector may be in the early stages of transition and represent a multi-decadal shift from centralisation of water supply and sanitation to partial decentralisation based on local conditions. Much of the scholarship on decentralised systems focuses on drivers and barriers to adoption, which implies a static and mechanistic process of change, and overlooks the complex interplay between exogenous pressures, innovation, multiple actors and industry reform. This paper addresses this gap by analysing temporal processes of Australia's urban water sector, using a regionally based case study comprising an historical review and interview study that analyses the multi-level, -decadal and -actor developments at the nexus between water service provision and property development. The analysis revealed emerging tensions between incumbent water utilities, property developers and end-users, and an inherent conflict between neo-liberal and environmental policy agendas. Such tensions and conflicts are missing from urban water policy and research discourse.

Insights and future directions of transdisciplinary practice in the urban water sector

Bringing together stakeholders with different backgrounds and interests to create new understandings and relationships is essential to advance the sustainable management of urban water. This is a transdisciplinary challenge, with multiple benefits but also obstacles and uncertainties in its applicability. Although transdisciplinary practice is believed to be desirable to enable sustainable urban water management, its role is not clear. Thus, the purpose of this paper is to provide insights into transdisciplinary practice in the urban water sector, highlighting advances and research gaps. This analysis draws upon a scoping process from 1970 until now. It concludes that little research explores transdisciplinary practice in the urban water sector. Future research is necessary into organizational processes, disciplinary dynamics, and strategies applied by water practitioners to bring stakeholders together and achieve transdisciplinary practice in the design and implementation of urban water projects. These future directions of research are relevant to water practitioners dealing with urban water management and could lead to the development of practical guidelines to facilitate transdisciplinary practice.

Measuring environmentally sensitive productivity growth: An application to the urban water sector

The energy use and greenhouse gas emissions in the provision of urban water and sewerage services have become an increasingly important issue in recent times. However, the impact of negative externalities such as greenhouse gas emissions on the productivity of urban water provision has received less attention in the literature. This paper applies the global Malmquist–Luenberger (GML) productivity index, which accounts for undesirable outputs in order to evaluate the productivity trends in the Australian urban water sector. Results indicate that the inclusion of greenhouse gas emissions significantly influences the productivity measurement. Findings also indicate that the conventional index, which disregards undesirable outputs, over-states the productivity growth. Despite a declining trend in greenhouse emissions over the period, the overall productivity trend of the urban water sector experienced a downward trend while accounting for bad output. This productivity decline occurs in a period of prolonged drought, water security concerns and increased reliance on desalinization and water recycling.

A study of the consumption pattern in a continuous water service demonstration zone and bulk water demand forecasting for Hubli-Dharwad, India

In the year 2008, the Karnataka Urban Water Sector (KUWS) Improvement Project brought continuous water service (CWS) to a demonstration zone in the twin cities of Hubli-Dharwad, India. Scale-up of CWS for the rest of the city has been authorized and the initial stages of construction are currently in progress. We compared the historical consumption pattern in the CWS demonstration zone of Hubli with system capacity. We found that demand in the demonstration zone has stayed within system capacity and below the national standards for adequate supply. We developed two forecast models of bulk water demand under CWS and compared forecasts with planned future system capacity. In the case of full scale-up of CWS to the rest of Hubli-Dharwad, our forecasts indicate that planned system capacity may be insufficient to meet bulk demand. These forecast models can be adopted by similar mid-sized cities in India.

How to govern the urban hydrosocial cycle: archaeo-genealogy of hydromentalities in the Swiss urban water sector between 1850 and 1950

Abstract. Switzerland appears to be a privileged place to investigate the urban political ecology of tap water because of the specificities of its political culture and organization and the relative abundance of drinking water in the country. In this paper, we refer to a Foucauldian theorization of power that is increasingly employed in the social sciences, including in human geography and political ecology. We also implement a Foucauldian methodology. In particular, we propose an archaeo-genealogical analysis of discourse to apprehend the links between urban water and the forms of governmentality in Switzerland between 1850 and 1950. Results show that two forms of governmentality, namely biopower and neoliberal governmentality, were present in the water sector in the selected period. Nonetheless, they deviate from the models proposed by Foucault, as their periodization and the classification of the technologies of power related to them prove to be much more blurred than Foucault's work, mainly based on France, might have suggested.

Public‐Service Provision in Clientelist Political Settlements: Lessons from Ghana's Urban Water Sector

The politics of public‐service delivery continues to be neglected under the supposedly more context‐sensitive post‐Washington Consensus. Using interviews and documentary evidence from Ghana, this article provides an account of the networks of political interference and informal practices in Ghana's public water utility. It argues that, in order to understand why private‐sector participation succeeds or fails and why similar arrangements have different outcomes across developing countries, we need to examine the effects of the informal institutional context, particularly the country‐specific political settlement in which public‐service provision operates.

Private Sector Participation and Performance of Urban Water Utilities in the People’s Republic of China

In the early 1990s, the People’s Republic of China opened its urban water sector to nonstate capital to help meet increasing urban water demand under severe water resource constraints. By 2007, more than 30% of urban water utilities had attracted private sector participation (PSP). To understand the factors that drive PSP in urban water supply, and to answer the key policy questions whether PSP has boosted investment and improved the efficiency in water supply, we assembled and analyzed a unique dataset consisting of more than 200 urban water utilities covering 1998-2007. Our estimations indicate that, except for the utility’s profitability and urban road infrastructure in the prior year, the characteristics of the utility or city were not strong drivers of PSP. One interpretation is that private investors participating in this newly opened sector were less concerned with short-term factors. For utility performance, we find that PSP has reduced employment, has lowered managerial expenses relative to sales revenues, and has increased profitability significantly, in both the economic and statistical sense. PSP has positively affected utilities in other ways, although the estimates are not statistically significant. Further analysis indicates that most of the changes occurred in utilities with private shareholders in the majority rather than the minority.

Private Sector Participation and Performance of Urban Water Utilities in China

AbstractIn the early 1990s, China began opening its urban water sector to nonstate capital to meet increasing urban water demand. By 2007, more than 30% of large and medium urban water utilities had attracted private sector participation (PSP), of which two thirds have a majority of nonstate shareholders. To understand the factors that drive PSP in urban water supply and to answer the key policy question of how PSP has affected water utility performance, we assemble and analyze a unique data set consisting of 208 urban water utilities servicing more than 300 million urban residents from 1998 to 2007. We find that a utility’s profitability and liability level and a host city’s road infrastructure in the prior year play important roles in driving private investors both to enter and to withdraw from the sector. It is further found that PSP utilities, and mainly those with majority nonstate shareholders, have made substantial cost savings through employment downsizing and cutting managerial expenses, which le...

Can Developing Countries Both Decentralize and Depoliticize Urban Water Services? Evaluating the Legacy of the 1990s Reform Wave

Over the past three decades, decentralization and reforms designed to insulate service providers from interference by elected officials (insulating reforms), such as corporatization and privatization, swept through the urban water and sanitation sector in developing countries. We argue that their rationales were contradictory; decentralization was intended to increase citizen participation and influence, whereas corporatization and privatization were intended to depoliticize management. We document the widespread promotion and adoption of these reforms, and conclude that decentralization made it difficult to insulate service provision in practice. We argue that studying how institutional reforms interact with one another can help explain reform consequences. © 2014 The Authors.

“Look Before You Leap”: Lessons from Urban Water Sector Reforms in Ghana

The article is primarily a case study of the use of a management contract for the reform of urban water in Ghana and addresses two main questions: (1) is contractualism suitable for the reform of urban water sector activities in developing countries; (2) under what conditions can contracting actually promote efficiency in the water sector? The findings point to answers for both questions. First, contractualism is a defective tool for reforming the politically sensitive water sector. Second, in order for contractualism to actually promote efficiency, certain fundamental conditions − context, agency task specificity and creative adaptation − must be adequately addressed.

Analytical optimization of demand management strategies across all urban water use sectors

AbstractAn effective urban water demand management program can greatly influence both peak and average demand and therefore long‐term water supply and infrastructure planning. Although a theoretical framework for evaluating residential indoor demand management has been well established, little has been done to evaluate other water use sectors such as residential irrigation in a compatible manner for integrating these results into an overall solution. This paper presents a systematic procedure to evaluate the optimal blend of single family residential irrigation demand management strategies to achieve a specified goal based on performance functions derived from parcel level tax assessor's data linked to customer level monthly water billing data. This framework is then generalized to apply to any urban water sector, as exponential functions can be fit to all resulting cumulative water savings functions. Two alternative formulations are presented: maximize net benefits, or minimize total costs subject to satisfying a target water savings. Explicit analytical solutions are presented for both formulations based on appropriate exponential best fits of performance functions. A direct result of this solution is the dual variable which represents the marginal cost of water saved at a specified target water savings goal. A case study of 16,303 single family irrigators in Gainesville Regional Utilities utilizing high quality tax assessor and monthly billing data along with parcel level GIS data provide an illustrative example of these techniques. Spatial clustering of targeted homes can be easily performed in GIS to identify priority demand management areas.

Urban water reform in Australia: lessons from 2003–2013

Extreme rainfall variability, record droughts, floods and high temperatures have had a major impact on social wellbeing, economic productivity and environmental functionality of urban settings in Australia. Compounded by urban growth and ageing water and wastewater infrastructure, Australia's urban water arrangements have undergone major reforms to effectively manage the challenges of recent years. This paper is a synthesis of urban water reform in Australia during a decade of unforeseen natural extremes. It summarises the evolution of urban water policy, outcomes from recent government reforms and investment, and presents future challenges facing the sector. As governments at state and federal levels in Australia have moved to diversify supply options away from the traditional reliance on rainfall-dependent catchment storages, they have been confronted by issues relating to climate uncertainty, planning, regulation, pricing, institutional reforms, and community demands for sustainable supply solutions. Increases in water prices to pay for new water infrastructure are illustrative of further reform pressures in the urban water sector. In the past 10 years the Australian urban water sector has weathered new extremes in drought and flood and emerged far different to its predecessor. The provision of safe, secure, efficient and sustainable water and wastewater services remains the primary driver for urban water reform. However the challenges and opportunities to improve nationally significant social, economic and environmental outcomes from urban water have evolved considerably. The focus now is on creating the institutional, regulatory and market conditions favourable for the integration of urban water services with the objectives for productive and liveable cities.

How Frames Matter—Common Sense and Institutional Choice in Ghana’s Urban Water Sector

Ideas on what is best practice to provide more people in rapidly growing low- and middle-income cities with adequate water supplying services have changed during the 20th century. By applying a frame-theoretical approach, this article analyzes institutional choice in Ghana’s urban water sector. Special attention is paid to two major events: first, the establishment of the state water utility, Ghana Water and Sewerage Corporation, in 1965, and, second, the reform process in the 1990s and early 2000s that aimed at private sector participation in urban water management. By unraveling the arguments and the taken-for-granted assumptions underlying the two reforms, the article shows how the perceived space for policy alternatives available to decision makers at a certain point in time has been largely constrained by the dominant frames in a particular historical context. This conclusion is supportive of the argument that rationality is a highly contextual and time-dependent concept.

Fluid experiences: Comparing local adaptations to water inaccessibility in two disadvantaged neighborhoods in Niamey, Niger

Institutional and governance reforms in the urban water sector in Niger have not translated into increased water access for residents in disadvantaged neighborhoods in Niamey. These disadvantaged neighborhoods have little in common besides their inaccessibility to water, and even this experience of lack of water differs greatly between places. This paper takes a small-scale approach to understanding water (in)accessibility, and shows that knowledge of local contexts are imperative for building malleable and sustainable solutions. Approaching water from a neighborhood scale, we show that location, tenure status, and age of settlement are poor predictors of access to piped water, but they continue to guide urban water policies and developments. In the gaps of local accessibility, water vendors provide services that leave room for local geographic and household contexts in ways that normative policy models fail to accommodate.

A critical review of methods used to obtain flow patterns and volumes of individual domestic water using appliances

Determining the daily flow rates and water use patterns of specific household fixtures and appliances is important for water use monitoring, deriving effective strategies for water demand management, designing onsite water reuse systems, and efficient planning and investment in the urban water sector. Currently, there are a limited number of publications which address the need to measure flow patterns and volumes of individual household water-using appliances, or which analyze the alternatives to do so. This paper critically reviews and compares different methods of obtaining the specific flow patterns and volumes of water used by individual household water-using microcomponents (i.e. toilet, bath/shower, washbasin, washing machine, kitchen sink, dishwasher, etc.) in order to make recommendations about the appropriateness of these methodologies for various applications.

A Political Economy of Privatization Contracts: The Case of Water and Sanitation in Ghana and Argentina

In general, the process and outcomes of privatization have been studied from the point of view of efficiency. In this article, we consider issues in the course of contract design, implementation, management and enforcement in privatized public services and utilities. The study is based on two case studies, involving several water concessions in Argentina and a management contract in the urban water sector in Ghana. Three key arguments are presented on the basis of these case studies. The first is that an individualistic analytical framework is often utilized by the mainstream economic perspectives, but these are inadequate for a comparative assessment of private versus public provision in public services where there are distinct collective or group interests and hence a wider socio-economic context and representation of different interests becomes highly important. Instead, the article proposes a political economy perspective, which pays due attention to distributional issues, group interests, ideology of states and power relations for the assessment of privatization contracts. Second, the administrative capacity of states and their resources play a key role for the outcomes of privatization. Finally, while some contractual issues could be resolved through resourcing and experience over time, others are inherent to the contractual relations with little prospect of remedy.

Urban agriculture and related water supply: Explorations and discussion

This article provides a review of the opportunities and challenges of urban agriculture. Secondly, it is explored whether it may be feasible for the urban water sector to facilitate greater uptake of urban agriculture and this is done by exploring a hypothetical case. Urban agriculture is an opportunity for many cities, with some cities sourcing more than half of the fresh produce from within the city boundaries. The literature describes numerous benefits of urban agriculture; some which are difficult to measure such as women's empowerment, increasing social cohesion, and others that can be more easily measured such as job creation, or reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. However, the potential for this depends on the local context, and local restrictions. It may be possible that the urban water sector can help facilitate greater uptake of urban agriculture in synergistic relationships. The case for this statement however hinges on a number of assumptions, and estimates that are laid out in this article. Further research is suggested to explore the validity of such assumptions and estimates in various contexts.

Impacts of variable energy prices on the financial sustainability of water facilities: case from Ghana

Water is conveyed to consumers through systems that generally rely heavily on energy. The dependence on energy is a major challenge to utility providers because of frequent variation in energy prices. This paper assesses the effect of energy price changes on the financial sustainability of water facilities. It further investigates the proportion of energy cost to total costs of water supply. The study is based on a field survey that targeted five small town water systems and 15 water systems existing under the urban water sector in the Greater Accra and Ashanti regions of Ghana. The results show that energy (diesel and electricity) expenditure forms substantial component of water supply cost. The proportions of energy to total supply costs for small town and urban water systems are 31% and 29%, respectively. The total operational costs per water supply stand at 1.19 US$/m3 and 0.44 US$/m3 for small town and urban water systems respectively. The energy costs per water supply for small town and urban water systems are 0.40 US$/m3 and 0.13 US$/m3, respectively. Results further show that diesel-driven water systems are more sensitive to energy price changes than those of electricity-driven systems; therefore making financial profit from diesel-driven systems is highly elastic to diesel price changes. The results thus indicate that urban water systems are more efficient than small town water systems in terms of both energy and operational costs.

Circulations and transformations of energy and water in Abu Dhabi’s hydrosocial cycle

Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates is a rapidly developing state reliant on modern water production and distribution systems to support its economic growth and urban development. Whilst often conceptualized as a rentier state, its urban water sector has undergone major economic restructuring over the last decade, resulting in an increasingly important role for the private sector in developing new supplies. These supplies primarily comprise desalination and recycled wastewater, which require substantial capital investment, complex technology and energy supplies. This paper examines the production of water in Abu Dhabi, showing how the transformation and circulation of water have created new landscapes that bear little resemblance to the arid physical environment of the Arabian peninsula, and new patterns of water consumption that are increasingly divergent from traditional careful management. It demonstrates the central role of the energy sector in driving the production and circulation of water – for instance, by powering desalination plants, providing the investment capital for these complex facilities, subsidizing operations and consumer tariffs, and by negotiating access with neighbouring states. The paper argues that Abu Dhabi’s hydrosocial cycle cannot be understood in isolation of a consideration of energy, and, consequently, that the infeasibility of isolating water from wider physical, economic and social influences in complex contexts challenges previous approaches to the relationship between water and state power.

The research-policy nexus in climate change adaptation: experience from the urban water sector in South East Queensland, Australia

Despite an exponential growth in the volume of adaptation research over the last decade, there is still a research gap in regard to the provision of suitable information to adequately inform climate change adaptation policy makers. Contributing to this gap is a paucity of research reporting on the effectiveness of implemented adaptation strategies. This paper reports on the success, failures and future risks of the responses taken by the South East Queensland (SEQ) water sector during the Millennium Drought. The adaptation strategy employed a portfolio approach mixing ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ adaptations. Strategies included the following: large-scale water manufacturing facilities and distribution networks; the exploitation of local water resources; regulatory instruments; institutional reforms; support for research and training and a range of demand management programmes. The strategies employed were innovative and in many cases required rigorous scientific evidence for their development, implementation and follow-up assessments. However, we show that there has been considerable disparity between anticipated and actual policy outcomes, which points to maladaptive consequences. By revisiting the effectiveness of implemented adaptation strategies in the SEQ water sector, our paper provides evidence for the need for integrative studies with genuine policy integration.