Water Corporations Research Articles

The influence of regulation on preference for utility infrastructure investment to generate income for Australian water corporations

ABSTRACT Effects of price regulation and preference for utility supply infrastructure on Australian urban water utilities and urban water markets are examinated using historical data, models of the future and a case study of Greater Sydney. Australian regulators utilise the building block method based on operating and capital costs, and a Regulatory Asset Base to set nominal revenue requirements and ultimately prices for water utility services. Regulation of water utilities that is dependent on a Regulatory Asset Base drives preference for utility infrastructure and is remote from market mechanisms of consumer demands for water and sewage services. These regulatory processes are not linked to the operation of the urban water market of government owned utility and distributed solutions, and act to crowd out viable complementary solutions including water efficiency, distributed water sources and alternative pricing models. Government regulation, ownership and operation of utilities may produce strong performance from the perspective of urban water corporations but decrease economic efficiency, resilience and social welfare in urban water markets. The role of major water corporations needs to be redefined in a market recognising multiple complementary water sources and services. Regulation of utility services should have regard to the entire market, market demand, environmental health and consumer welfare.

Designing An Information Security Framework For The Indonesia Water Industry Sector

The majority of Indonesia's water industry sectors have implemented smart water management systems as part of their business development, which has an indirect impact on enterprise information security. However, in general, water sector enterprises continue to place a low priority on information security, and the development of information system frameworks is based on generic norms employed by financial firms. There has been no research on information security frameworks especially built for water firms in Indonesia that use information security standards in the utilities sector. This article proposes a solution in the form of a new framework for Indonesian water firms that combines international information security requirements in the utilities sector with Indonesian government rules. This approach of development combines worldwide standards with national rules. The Cybersecurity Capability Maturity Model (C2M2) and ISO 27019 are two international standards commonly used by utility businesses globally. Government Regulation or Peraturan Pemerintah (PP) Number 71 of 2019 on the Implementation of Electronic Systems and Transactions is the relevant national regulation. The framework addresses information technology, telecommunications, and operational technology, with four approach categories: governance and ecosystem, protection, defense, and resilience. According to the research findings, the newly integrated framework can be applied and is worthy of recommendation. This framework also meets the standards for information security and can be used by Indonesian water corporations.

Comprehensive Indicator Bank for Resilience of Water Supply Systems

Appropriate indicators are required to measure the resilience of water supply systems (WSSs). However, it is challenging to identify appropriate indicators since there is no comprehensive database of indicators to measure its resiliency. This study will establish a comprehensive bank of indicators to assist water corporations and decision-makers in selecting appropriate indicators for their particular system. The suggested indicator bank is comprised of three layers such as dimension, attributes, and the number of indicators resulting from 12 different indicator codes that the study has analysed. In addition, this paper presents instructions on how the indicator bank can be used and integrated with water enterprises, enabling decision-makers to pick the relevant indicators. The proposed indicator bank is an exploratory approach that should be validated in a real work setting since resilience is a challenging concept, and WSSs are complex due to their dependencies to other lifelines such as power networks with too many variables that may affect the actual outcomes.

Optimized behavior of long-term rainfall for the red sea semi-arid region

Precipitation is one of the most significant variables with an impact on the environment, agriculture, as well as the design of any hydraulic infrastructures. The rainfall analysis predicts the highest, average, and minimal values of rainfall that are expected in certain catchments for return periods. The long-term variability of rainfall over the Arbaat watershed was studied at the various stations in a duration (day, month, and year) from 1942 to 2010 rainfall runoff using the Isohyetal Map of the area besides using different plotting position formulae of rainfall ratios. This statistical analysis will offer valuable data for water resource planners for Port Sudan, farmers, and Red Sea Water Corporations engineers (RSSWC) to evaluate the availability of water and create the storage accordingly. From the rainfall-depth analysis outcomes, the rainfall pattern was found to be irregular. Although the historical data was used, the meteorological observation of Suakin, Sinkat, and Arbaat stations was stopped from work. However, Port Sudan station gave reliable results without resorting to precipitation data measured by the satellites. Besides, the outcomes of this study can provide rational guidelines and policy concerning water resources to preserve the health of several ecosystems in the regions of under study.

Assessing the uk's geostrategic water footprint

The water footprint idea was recently proposed as a key indication for human-induced water use. The entire amount of water consumed during the production and consumption of products and services, as well as direct water consumption by people, is referred to as the water footprint. Water is used both directly and indirectly in manufacturing processes. As a result, estimating the water is necessary. We may use footprint to calculate the overall amount of water used throughout the whole global supply chain. In this article, we will discuss To assess the impact, build a regional input-output (IO) model that includes water consumption coefficients. For the South-East and North-East, respectively, residential water footprints for various usage categories Water used directly and indirectly throughout the regional supply chain in England and the United Kingdom. In we also compute overall water footprints, which include both residential and industrial water usage. Water used in other nations to make products and services that are imported and consumed in the area multi-regional input-output (MRIO) model was used to investigate the situation. In addition, both footprints contain the amount of water used directly by homes. In terms of the two areas, we can see a significant regional difference in regional (domestic) income. Water footprints between the water-scarce South-East and the water-rich North-East of the country England. We discovered that the South-East has a 22 percent larger household water footprint per capita than the rest of the country The North-East has the highest household water footprint per capita. Agriculture, food, and other major water users Hotel and catering, as well as products and electricity and gas production. Total water footprints per capita in the United States1257 m3 in the south-east/year) are almost double those in the north-east (597 m3)./year).Only the supply chain impacts and related water usage are included in the household water footprint. Inside regional borders, which are often more important to policymakers and water corporations Watersheds or borders are two terms for the same thing. The entire water footprint enables global impacts to be assessed and promotes global supply. In terms of resource use; it is also bringing concepts ofjustice and equality.

Construction of Roller Compacted Concrete Dams in Hot Arid Regions.

Roller compacted concrete (RCC) dams are attractive to many water and energy corporations around the world due to their ease in construction and low construction cost. The hydration of cement and the climatic changes on the convective boundaries are the two main heat sources for the temperature rise in the roller compacted concrete dams. Thus, changing the RCC placement schedule according to climate conditions might eliminate the problem of thermal cracks. In this research, the RCC dam method was applied in an arid region; the Bisha state in Saudi Arabia was chosen as a case study. We found that RCC dam technology can be applied safely with an alternative solution, like selecting a suitable placement schedule and reducing the placing temperature of facing at upstream and downstream sides to overcome the risk of thermal cracks.

Bottled water in Mexico: The rise of a new access to water paradigm

Providing a case of bottled water as the main source of drinking water for a nation, this article looks at the unfolding of this development in Mexico and locates it into the mainstream debate about how to achieve sustainable development goals (SDGs) Target 6.1: universal and equitable access to safe and affordable drinking water for all. This is timely and relevant due to the 2017 amplification of the indicators defining access to improved sources of water to include the use of bottled water, under the broader category of “packaged water.” This signifies that populations that rely on bottled water as a complement to tap water, independent of the frequency and quality of this service, will be considered to have achieved the target. In only two decades, the phenomenon of bottled water has grown from a high‐end, niche consumer good to a global industry valued at $170 billion and climbing. The industry now stands poised to show how the private sector can be involved in achieving global targets, such as SDG 6.1, while earning large profits. In Mexico, 2017 estimates show 73% of the national population relies on bottled water as their unique source of drinking water, up from 61% in 2010. The article will trace the industry's history in Mexico rising out of an earthquake, a cholera epidemic, a financial crisis and the actions of the bottled water corporations. The profitability of this particular model of water delivery has attracted large‐scale investment by multinational food and beverage corporations and banks as well a recent explosion of small‐scale neighborhood water shops selling relatively small quantities of water. Today, this Mexican model is actively being replicated in other regions. Using a literature review and interviews with key informants from CONAGUA, Mexico's national water commission, the article traces four “lines of flight” of the origin and development of the bottled water industry in Mexico. The article reviews the current expansion of market actors and the published strategies of the dominant multinational corporations, to show the various configurations of the bottled water industry that are competing for the future of water delivery. The paper concludes by suggesting that the consequences of this trend deserve renewed examination by the water research community.This article is categorized under: Engineering Water > Planning Water Human Water > Water Governance

Public values as essential criteria for public entrepreneurship: Water management in France

Historically, major private companies were the dominant players in urban water supply in France. However, a new era of water supply restructuring is underway, whereby formally private water corporations are being made public. Given that many such public water corporations adopt practices associated with private entities, it is essential to identify what is expected of “public” entities by virtue of the fact that they are public. In this article, we examine the foundational ideas behind the raison d'être of public entities, which engender priorities that differ from their private sector counterparts. Using a research-action methodology, water utility management, staff and consumers of Greater Nantes were asked to specify the meaning of “public” and how it should be operationalized in the case of publicly owned utilities. The research shows that the attainment of public values is what lends legitimacy to a public utility charged with the provision of essential services. In this case, even in a context of neoliberal governance, where private values of an economic nature conflict with public goals; public values take precedence in the management and the regulation of the service.

Governance structures and their impact on tariff levels of Brazilian water and sanitation corporations

This study analyzes the effect of governance structure on the tariff levels applied by Brazilian corporations of water supply and sanitation. It aims to contribute to the traditional debate of public versus private management, and to determine the effect of regulatory structure on tariff levels. The results first show that, when jointly considered, the water supply and sanitation tariff levels are higher for privately managed corporations. Second, we have found that a corporation regulated by a local agency or a regional agency does not exhibit significantly lower tariff levels than unregulated corporations. Finally, the results indicate that the use of the rate of return and price cap/revenue cap regimes do not provide tariff levels lower than those set via negotiation with the municipality.

Water and the entrepreneurial city: The territorial expansion of public utility companies from Colombia and the Netherlands

Since the mid-1980s, liberalization has motivated numerous water supply reforms. Among these, privatization has received the most attention. Yet, its actual scope has been limited. Beyond privatization, the territorial expansion of municipally owned water corporations into new service areas can be witnessed in countries as diverse as Italy, South Africa, Canada, Colombia and the Netherlands. Generally, the activities of public water corporations are analyzed through the lens of commercialization. This framework is central to understanding recent shifts in water supply. Yet, while it addresses the effects of commercialization on service quality and access, it rarely integrates the influence of shifts in social reproduction and collective consumption in structuring reform. Drawing on theories of urban entrepreneurialism, I attempt to advance a broader analytical framework that is more amenable to integrating the diversity of processes involved, including but not limited to commercialization. At the same time, the territorial expansion of municipally owned water corporations suggests ways to rethink urban entrepreneurialism: it is not only commercial, it is also social, and it is Schumpeterian. To make these points, this article examines the efforts of two public water corporations to go international: EPM of Medellín, Colombia and WMD of Drenthe, the Netherlands.

Book Review: Schorr, The Colorado Doctrine: Water Rights, Corporations, and Distributive Justice on the American Frontier, by Charles W. McCurdy

Book Review: Schorr, The Colorado Doctrine: Water Rights, Corporations, and Distributive Justice on the American Frontier, by Charles W. McCurdy

DAVID SCHORR. The Colorado Doctrine: Water Rights, Corporations, and Distributive Justice on the American Frontier.

Almost all economic and legal histories of the American West discuss the evolution of water rights from the common law riparian doctrine to the prior appropriation doctrine, a new form of property rights in water. Riparian rights give landowners the right to the “reasonable use” of water that flows through their land. The system worked well in the high rainfall areas of the United States east of the Mississippi River, but in the arid West there quickly developed an alternative legal system: prior appropriation. This water doctrine allowed usufructuary rights in diverted water and used the date of the original appropriation to allocate water among competing claims. The doctrine also required that water be put to beneficial use. The emergence of this novel form of legal governance of water is usually treated as the result of miners and farmers wanting to capture substantial efficiency gains by diverting water from streams for sluicing in mining and raising crops in agriculture.

The Colorado Doctrine: Water Rights, Corporations, and Distributive Justice on the American Frontier

More words have been diverted to the “Colorado doctrine” of prior appropriation and the 1880 case Coffin v. Left Hand Ditch Co. than necessary for a beneficial look at the development of western water law and its role in U.S. history. Historians and lawyers like to gaze in this stream and see their favorite theory about American history or law reflected, be it environmental determinism, economic efficiency, interest-group manipulation of the law to favor wealth and power, instrumental judicial decision making, environmental degradation in the service of economic growth, or, as in David Schorr's new book, distributive justice. Schorr seems to have the details correct, and that makes his book important and useful. He goes beyond the usual story of how courts in Colorado washed out of the law every iota of riparian rights, establishing the purest version of the appropriation system of water rights gained only by diversion and beneficial use. Through analyses of how lawmakers limited the meaning of priority, the role of ditch companies and water corporations, market transfers, and even the measure of beneficial use, Schorr shows how at every possible fork lawmakers limited water rights to those actively using water (mostly for irrigation) and only for the amounts actually used. They prevented results that could directly or indirectly allow someone to hold rights to water but not use them, to hold water for speculation or for sale, or to use as leverage to control other resources. And they did so often in opposition to the interests of powerful business and political leaders. When the waters settled, what lawmakers had fashioned were private property rights spread widely among the citizenry that served individual users well (the intent and design) and that were otherwise so constrained that they prevented not just speculation but also efficient transfers and the markets we normally associate with private property: an anticommons.

The Colorado Doctrine: Water Rights, Corporations, and Distributive Justice on the American Frontier. By David Schorr. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2012. xiv + 235 pp. Illustrations, notes, and index. Cloth $65.00.

<i>The Colorado Doctrine: Water Rights, Corporations, and Distributive Justice on the American Frontier</i>. By David Schorr. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2012. xiv + 235 pp. Illustrations, notes, and index. Cloth $65.00.

Anti-Monopoly and the Radical Lockean Origins of Western Water Law

This review of David Schorr's book, The Colorado Doctrine: Water Rights, Corporations, and Distributive Justice on the American Frontier, maintains that the book is a therapeutic corrective to the standard history of the origins of western water law as celebration of economic efficiency and wealth maximization. Schorr's account convincingly contends that the roots of prior appropriation water law -- the "Colorado Doctrine" -- lie in distributional justice concerns, not in the supposed efficiency advantages of private property over common property. The goals of the founders of the Colorado doctrine, according to Schorr, were to advance Radical Lockean principles such as widespread distibution of water to current settlers and avoiding monopolization of the resource by large landowners and corporate speculators. The book explains how western water law doctrines like the abolition of riparian rights, beneficial use as the basis and measure of water rights, the sufficiency principle, the no-injury rule limiting the transferability of rights, and public ownership of water all served these Radical Lockean goals. Schorr generally downplays the significance of temporal priority, thought by many to be the hallmark of western water law, and he explains the early Colorado courts surprising and consistent favoring of small-scale farmers over large-scale corporations like ditch companies. Schorr also attempts to draw lessons from his careful and detailed history of the rise of prior appropriation law for contemporary concerns like allocating the burdens of climate-change pollution control. Although he overlooks a few matters -- like the motive underlying the rejection of riparian rights as an anti-federal government doctrine and the failure of the founders of the Colorado doctrine to grant limited terms instead of perpetual rights in water -- and his assumption that public property will inevitably be distributed to the wealthy and the well-organized might be questioned -- this book is law and history at its finest and should be read by all serious natural resources and property law teachers and scholars.

David Schorr: The Colorado doctrine—water rights, corporations, and distributive justice on the American frontier. Yale library series in legal history and reference, 2012

David Schorr: The Colorado doctrine—water rights, corporations, and distributive justice on the American frontier. Yale library series in legal history and reference, 2012

Private Water Corporations Dealing with Public Interest

Multinational corporations (MNCs) in the water sector have taken up the task of supply and sanitation of water, a responsibility that used to belong to the government and in many countries still does. Also, the MNCs are taking part in governmental policy making related to water supply and sanitation. Especially in developing nations water is often regarded as a free commodity, but when corporations enter the arena this may ultimately change. Water becomes an economic good, co-governed by a profit-seeking company. A development which may lead to conflicting interests. This thesis analyses the water sector and provides a study into the changing roles and responsibilities of the key players in this sector. The main focus is on the challenges faced by MNCs performing activities that were and are considered to be part of the governmental responsibilities. The research question is: How do corporations deal with the public interest in the WSS sector?In the thesis, firstly a theoretic background on the MNC and international politics is offered by introducing corporate citizenship and regime theory. Secondly, the structure and key developments in the water sector are analysed. Thirdly, the thesis focuses on the activities of Veolia Environment in Morocco.

Ambition That Overleaps Itself? A Response to Stephen Tully's Critique of the General Comment on the Right to Water

In the March 2005 issue of this journal, Stephen Tully set out to critique General Comment No. 15 on the Right to Water, issued in 2002 by the Committee overseeing the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. Tully argues that the right to water cannot be implied from the Covenant, that its practical value is limited and, quite paradoxically, that the Committee was not bold enough in imposing direct obligations on multinational water corporations. This article contends that the general comment was neither radical nor conservative but a reasonable interpretation of the Covenant that was grounded in international law and practice. Further, the general comment has demonstrated a practical utility and this article provides examples of where the recognition of the human right to water has had an impact and also offers some thoughts on how the influence of general comments should be evaluated. Tully's proposals for reform of the Committee's approach to ‘General Comment-making’ are then considered in the context of international law and the historical practice of the Committee.