Optimise et al - a technology podcast powered by Naviate
Listen in to Bettool Jabur, Naviate Technology Manager, Architecture, as she invites guests from different industries to talk about design, technology and everything in between. Subscribe to get notifications on new episodes.
Optimise et al - a technology podcast powered by Naviate
Documentary: Wastewater Management
We're very proud to publish this a fascinating documentary on the world of wastewater with industry experts by our host Bettool Jabur.
This documentary explores the complexities of wastewater: what it is, the pressing environmental challenges we face, and the crucial steps we can take towards a more sustainable future.
We hear from:
✅ Rafid Alkhaddar, Pro Vice Chancellor/Provost at Amity University, who shares the alarming reality of "a litre of fuel being more expensive than a litre of water" in some Gulf countries, highlighting the critical importance of water conservation.
✅ Caryn Novak from Autodesk, emphasizing that the technology to tackle wastewater challenges already exists; it's simply a matter of effectively applying it.
✅ Simon Renfrey from Symetri Europe, emphasizing that while software and solutions are powerful enablers, the ingenuity of engineers remains crucial in driving impactful and sustainable solutions.
Enjoy!
Timestamps:
00:01 Science, Technology, and the Future of Water Management
03:25 Integrated Urban Wastewater Management and it's implications in Europe
08:12 The Impact of Climate Change on Water Management and Infrastructure
14:07 Water Managemenr and Technology: A Conversation from an Water Engineering Perspective
17:23 The Role of Technology in Water Conservation and Pollution Prevention
20:57 Water Conversation and Sustainable Practices
#sustainability #waterconservation #environmentalengineering
Optimise et al - a technology podcast powered by Naviate.
Listen in to Bettool Jabur, Naviate Technology Manager, Architecture, as she invites guests from different industries to talk about design, technology and everything in between. Subscribe to get notifications on new episodes.
Find all episodes on YouTube here
Connect with our host, Bettool Jabur on LinkedIn here
0:14
Water, the essence of life From the streams that carve our landscapes to the rivers that power entire cities, water sustains our world.
0:26
But behind its life giving flow lies a critical challenge.
0:31
Managing this vital resource responsibly.
0:35
The amount of water is finite in the world doesn't change.
0:38
In the UK, the best water we can find is Manchester, Liverpool, and the best one is Glasgow actually.
0:44
In this documentary, we'll explore how the intricate systems of water and wastewater management are maintained, improved and reimaged by leading professionals in the field.
0:57
The water industry is heavily regulated.
0:59
It has three regulators.
1:01
You have the Environment Agency, and then you have the Drinking Water Inspectorate, and then you have Othwat, which is the economic regulator.
1:11
Together we'll explore the science, the technology and the feature of water waste management, from the software innovations driving efficiency to the global efforts in ensuring water sustains life fed generations to come.
1:28
I think technology is enabling engineers and modellers to do far more now than what they were able to do before.
1:36
I think what's really, really important is to remember that the software and the solutions are enablers.
1:42
We still need that engineering knowledge to be able to drive these solutions.
1:47
Together, we'll explore the science, the technology, and the future of wastewater management, from the software innovations driving efficiency to the global efforts in ensuring water sustains life for generations to come.
2:12
First question I asked students when I used to go out into class, when I used to do it, you said when you wash your hands, water goes into a hole.
2:21
Do you know what does it go?
2:22
It goes to the ground.
2:23
It goes in pipes.
2:24
But very few people, they'll say well behind that.
2:28
So the amount of water is finite in the world doesn't change.
2:34
What a great comet.
2:36
It never changes.
2:36
It never changes at all at all.
2:39
We change it from one fold to another.
2:41
OK, so it can be in the form of ice, can be the form of water vapour, it can to form of liquid and the ground.
2:49
And what we have actually is about 2% of the available water is something we can utilise in the world.
3:00
A lot of it is on fishable or it's in ice bonds and the and the north of the Earth and the but that 2% is what we can utilise.
3:12
Now this 2%, how much overt is available for us to use?
3:17
And that's a question that very few people can answer is actually not a lot.
3:25
I was a president of an institution here in the UK called Sailor, just an institution of whatever environmental management, and part of my job was to go around to promote the institution at its activities.
3:38
So I was giving a lecture on this very subject, and one of the audience objected.
3:44
He said, well, you're giving us things about treatment, about conservation, about care, but if there is no water, what can we do?
3:53
I said, well, that is not right.
3:55
Actually water is there, but polluted water is not good because the damage that polluted water can deal is more than nonexistence because it's carry diseases, it's carry viruses, it carry a lot of things.
4:11
So the clever bit is how can we utilise this water?
4:15
How can we use this water and treat it?
4:18
Not many people accept that you can treat sewage water so they can't drink it.
4:24
But in fact, it can.
4:26
Yeah, there are ways, even the treatment process where the water can become very pure and very drinkable.
4:40
Well, there is legislation.
4:42
The legislation dates back to 1993, and it's you legislation.
4:48
Yeah.
4:48
It's the Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive.
4:52
And it's gone through the first round of review in over 30 years.
4:58
But it doesn't necessarily apply to the UK anymore.
5:02
Back when it was enacted in 1993, it created a step change in water quality.
5:06
So things, things have actually improved right from where they were in the 90s, right?
5:13
Because that that meant that everyone everywhere in Europe at the time had to have a certain level of water quality coming out of the back of the treatment works.
5:22
It set the baseline standards, right?
5:25
So what's happened in Europe is like they went back and they reviewed everything through the water framework directive to have a look at what the health indicators on rivers were and they found that things have just sort of levelled off.
5:41
So the reason why they went back and reviewed it was to figure out how do we get that next level of step change to occur.
5:49
So the legislation that's going through right now, and I think it's going to be written into law at the end of the year for Europe and the EU, is the new revision that's going to include work, stringent requirements for final effort and off the back of web water treatment works.
6:07
But also something called integrated urban wastewater management plans.
6:14
And that's something where they want cities and towns to have a look at how they treat surface water or wastewater in general, which is surface water, which is the runoff, urban runoff, and also your sewage effluent.
6:29
And the idea there is to have a look at the entire catchment and see what you can do to sort of improve the water quality of that river.
6:37
And this is something that's going to come into effect probably in the next three to five years in Europe where in any city with over 100,000 people.
6:48
And then it's going to be in based rollout.
6:50
But that's what they're doing to try to kind of raise awareness around river health here.
6:57
I think it's given all of the media attention and the high profile finds that have come out.
7:06
I mean, we're talking 126,000,000% of water, 90 million for Thames.
7:12
It's different.
7:13
It's a different approach.
7:14
We have regulated regime here where a lot of data is being put into the public domain.
7:21
So you have citizen science now you can go and look at your local area and you can see what's what, what's happening in terms of sewage out one, sewage spills.
7:31
It's actually publicly listed, but it's a little bit after the fact.
7:36
You know, it's like it has already happened.
7:39
I, I, I almost think that with the European legislation, they've had a look at what's happened here, because on every single outfall, we now have what's called the vent duration monitoring.
7:52
So they'll tell you how long or spill is occurring, and then you can go back and calculate the volume, right?
7:59
But that's, again, it's happening, it happened.
8:01
So I think what Europe is looking to do instead is create these integrated management plans to sort of prevent getting to that point.
8:12
As global populations rise and urban areas expand, water management has become one of the most urgent challenges of our time.
8:23
By 2050 / 5 billion people could face water scarcity.
8:30
At the same time, entreated wastewater contaminates rivers, oceans and local communities, threatening both human and environmental health.
8:48
But added to sort of like the age of the, the infrastructure, we've also got the, the, the fact that the, with weather patterns are change, changing.
8:58
So climate change is real.
9:00
It's here, it's been spoken about on a daily basis now and climate change brings about a number of issues for our drainage networks.
9:09
So we're finding that those extreme flooding events, those low probability, high impact events are happening more frequently than ever before.
9:18
It's to be on the news every year now, whereas previously it might have been on the news once every few years or something like that.
9:24
Absolutely.
9:25
It's never stated to see homes being ruined due to that, isn't it?
9:30
Yeah.
9:30
And there's brings about like so many impacts as well, those flooding events, whether it's sort of impacts on transportation or or buildings.
9:39
You've got the impacts to environment.
9:41
You've got direct costs related to the operational clean ups and the infrastructure improvements.
9:48
But you've also got the indirect costs as well with loss of business productivity and having to rehome people when you've got reduced property values in areas that keep get your flooded and increased insurance payments.
10:01
So these floods and you know, those high impact flooding events bring about a number of challenges.
10:07
And with climate change, those flooding events are happening more frequently.
10:11
So I think between December last year and February this year, they met off said that there was 29% more rainfall than the long term average.
10:21
And those particularly wetter sort of like eastern England and and Scotland as well where some areas receive more than 1 1/2 times their average rainfall in one go.
10:32
So what we're finding is that as the the atmosphere's heating up, the atmosphere increases its capacity to hold moisture, which is leading to these more intense rainfall events.
10:45
So all of a sudden those drainage networks that we had underground with a, you know, very limited capacity is no longer fit for purpose.
10:52
So we're having to find new ways to manage that water and sustainable drainage is one of those ways that we can look to prevent water in from the network as quickly and maybe we can look to sort of infiltrate or attenuate the water, reduce the run off into the the drainage networks.
11:17
In regions like Jordan, where water scarcity is a daily reality, managing water efficiently is not just a challenge, it's a necessity for survival.
11:29
Professor Rafid Al Khabar has been at the forefront of a project that aims to revolutionise water use in this arid region.
11:38
I was in Jordan, no, no, about 2025 years ago.
11:44
And we had a project to world back project to for again, it's about educating on the water side as well.
11:53
And you go there and you run and try and go there historical places and there's a place which used to do what they called water harvesting and you're talking 2 1/2 thousand years ago.
12:05
So that's just something new.
12:06
We went into the desert called Jawah Deserts, and you could see the remnants of rivers in the in the desert where huge rocks are in the middle of that river when it was.
12:22
And we were asked to say, well, yeah, these were huge flooding when it used to rain and the water was so strong, they carried all these.
12:30
And you see, again, the remnants of the lakes or other ground lakes as well as reservoirs where they store the water.
12:40
So that technology and that thing was there from the beginning.
12:45
Imagine going through a beginner bottle or filling it and drinking it.
12:48
Can you do that?
12:49
Can you can consider if the water finishing, it's funny.
12:55
Yeah.
12:56
So it's not still stagnated water.
12:59
So it's almost treating itself as a good water will treat itself during the time.
13:05
Yeah.
13:06
So when we do our wastewater treatment plant, we are just accelerating the process, right.
13:12
If you leave water for a long enough time in the nature, it will treat itself, but it needs air, it needs movement, it is mixing and with these things, then it will treat yourself.
13:26
I mean, there's the oldest treatment, whether it's called an oxidation tank, OK.
13:32
An oxidation tank is basically a tank where the water comes in and goes out and it's supposed to be while it's coming in and out by the movement, the mixing and everything, it will treat itself.
13:44
The bacteria inside the water will actually feed all the organics in the water.
13:52
So it will self treat it.
13:53
And by the end that water shouldn't be safe enough to not drink, but at least to utilise for something for drinking, you might need to.
14:03
But again, in the old days there was no disinfection.
14:07
Believe it or not, they used to.
14:10
I went to a place called Petra in Jordan.
14:12
I don't know if you heard about it.
14:14
Yeah, I'm being an water engineer.
14:16
You look for these things.
14:17
So I was going, do you go to have you been to Petrel?
14:21
No, I've never been.
14:21
It's it's a it's a magical place.
14:24
Yeah.
14:24
So to get to Petrel, you walk about a mile or so in between mountains, between the hills and until you reach the village of Pantrel.
14:33
Yeah.
14:34
So when you walk, I noticed something interesting on the other side of the of the path.
14:41
There were like ditches in the in the walls, in the sides.
14:48
Some of them were covered, some of them were open.
14:51
So when you look at them, you wonder obviously they're for collecting water.
14:56
And every so distance in there, there is a hole in there.
15:01
And then as we adverse when I went, there's a museum there and I was there apparently the covered one are for drinking water.
15:10
So they collected because and petrol when it trains, floods, comes in and the water goes really 3-4 metres high and goes through these paths that we were in.
15:23
So when it succeeds, it goes into these small channels, let's call it and they collect it.
15:29
The cupboard ones are for drinking, the open ones for washing and everything else.
15:34
And these holes every now and there is the, for some dementation they call them.
15:39
So if there is any particles in it, as the water slowly goes through, the particles will be caught into these dishes almost like a sieve.
15:47
Like a sieve.
15:48
The water goes forward and it's collected.
15:53
And in the museum you see the old pipes there.
15:55
You're so you look at the technology that's three 4000 years ago again, so incredible.
16:01
It is incredible when you see that being somebody who's obsessed with these sort of thing.
16:05
Wherever I go, I picture these things and anything about water, you see that and you say when the knowledge is there is how you apply that knowledge, how you rekindle that knowledge and bring it back and look at it from this side.
16:22
And then at least you understand where we're coming from and how we can use that.
16:27
I mean, we have in Manchester huge amounts of brain, so we have no problem with the water.
16:32
You go to the Gulf countries, they think they don't have enough water, but actually when it trains, trains.
16:41
But So what do you do with that water?
16:44
It's plants all over your streets just goes to the the sea or it goes to the ground.
16:51
So why can't we collect it and use it instead of the most expensive way of treating of treating water as desalina tion plants?
16:58
They have Gulf countries are the biggest in the world in desalina tion and the that's called the litre of water reuser is much more expensive than a litre of fuel or petrol.
17:23
Historically, managing wastewater was often a reactive process with limited understanding of its long term impact on rivers and ecosystems.
17:35
Early methods focused on basic filtration and rudimentary drainage systems, which, while groundbreaking at the time, fell short of preserving water quality.
17:46
Today, technology is transforming the way we address these challenges.
17:51
From advanced filtration systems to real time monitoring of water quality, innovative tools are helping us safeguard our rivers and ecosystems.
18:03
By harnessing the power of data automation and sustainable design, we can reduce pollutants, optimise resource use and create cleaner waterways for generations to come.
18:17
Let's take a look into how these technologies are reshaping the future of water conservation.
18:23
Do you see technology helping in, in coming out with innovative ways to to protect our rivers?
18:32
Well, the technologies here, it's just a matter of applying it.
18:36
I mean, one of the things that they've always done in the water industry is they do know what where their network goes and they have a hydraulic model.
18:44
So the hydraulic model is essentially like a replica of of their network, except it's a model and that allows you to run different simulations scenario.
18:54
So if you get a lot of rainfall, different types of storm, you can model that in and you can see what the impact would be on the flows in your network.
19:02
There are water digital twins out there.
19:04
So digital twins are, it's quite a, a large topic and there's sort of multiple definitions of what a digital twin is.
19:13
But in the water terms do have a, a, a digital twin for the water industry.
19:21
This is all around sort of being used for master planning and then it helps you predict where you might have sewer overflow.
19:27
So in a sense, they already have the technology and a lot of the water utilities here are using it and they're using it to plan.
19:36
They used to plan capacity because it'll give them an idea under what conditions they're going to have these problems.
19:42
So, so there is that baseline level of knowledge.
19:44
I think what needs to happen next is they need to move it more into real time.
19:49
So that's what everyone's working on now.
19:51
It's like, how can I give myself the lean time to prevent the problem from happening?
19:56
You don't want to wait until you get that EDM alert saying that you're having a sewage still somewhere.
20:02
It's modelling your underground drainage networks.
20:04
It's modelling the Overground, the Overground surface and the flow paths.
20:09
And it's modelling the the rivers as well, all within one integrated model TO1 stand.
20:14
You want to have at least a day or more, you know, to find out what you can do to prevent it from happening, whether that's reorganising your storm tanks, changing some of your capacity around or, or even, you know, if it's circus water and flooding.
20:34
We're learning the people in that area, you know, it's always about early warning.
20:38
It's like getting an early warning system out.
20:40
And that's the kind of thing that I see a lot of water utilities working towards now.
20:44
Can you tell us a bit more about, you know, what we can do as individuals to prevent pollutants entering the rivers or, you know what, what, what can we do to help out?
20:57
OK, so ask the public to help out.
20:59
I guess we have to be very careful about what, what we're putting down our drains.
21:04
We have to, there's a lot of guidance out there around what you can and can't put down sort of your your sinks, toilets, sort of especially around things like wet wipes that block the the systems.
21:17
I think we have to be very careful around that and ensure that if we do put down is right.
21:23
And I think we have to be very careful like when we do go into the rivers that we we need to be careful and maybe look online to see if there is any information locally around, you know, what is the, the quality of the water at that point of time, especially after there has been a heavy rainfall event.
21:42
So if there has been a heavy rainfall event, it's probably the times like those where there's likely to be more pollutants in the within our waterways.
21:50
If I could see anything happen, I almost think we need to, we need, we need to reinvent sanitation in a way.
21:59
I think, I mean, if you think about it, this is something we're still using Victorian systems, right?
22:06
What other, what other industry do we still use a Victorian system like this?
22:11
I mean, if you think about wastewater, and I do a lot, unfortunately you're taking your toilet is being filled up with drinking water, right?
22:23
That water is treated, it's abstracted from, it's abstracted with pumps and energy and it's treated to a really high standard using chemicals and then it's pumped all the way back to your house, right?
22:35
And then what do you do?
22:37
You flush it.
22:38
I think a third of all of the water consumption at the household level is just flushed.
22:43
Now.
22:43
Why aren't we treating water to be drinkable and then doing that?
22:48
And why are we doing that in the 1st place?
22:49
It's almost like the whole, the whole system is, is, is needs to be redesigned.
22:56
I don't know how, but maybe the next generation will come up with something better because that would, that would possibly address two things.
23:07
I mean, one of them is high water consumption.
23:10
We're not actually consuming that water.
23:11
We're using this to transport waste away from our homes.
23:15
And then also, why are we putting the waste in water?
23:20
I don't know.
23:21
You know, originally it was to get it away as fast as possible and now everyone wants to go swimming in rivers and seas and that are clean.
23:29
So maybe we need to rethink the whole entire what we call urban water cycle.
23:41
From the smallest streams to the vast oceans, water shapes our world.
23:46
It sustains life, Dr economies and connects us all.
23:52
But as we've seen, it's also a resource under immense pressure, a challenge we must all confront together.
24:01
The solutions are within our reach, innovative technology, sustainable practises and a shared commitment to protecting this vital resource.
24:11
But it takes collective action from policy makers and engineers to communities and individuals.
24:19
The amount of water is finite in the world doesn't change.
24:23
Water is more than just a resource, it's life itself.
24:28
If we take care of it, it will take care of us.
24:32
A lot of data is being put into the public domain.
24:35
So you have citizen science now, you can go and look at your local area and you can see what's what what's happening.
24:43
The tools are there.
24:44
It's up to us to use them wisely and build a sustainable future for generations to come.
24:50
I think what's really, really important is to remember that the software and the solutions are enablers.
24:56
We still need that engineering knowledge to be able to drive these solutions.
25:01
It's not just about solving today's problems, it's about envisioning a better tomorrow.
25:10
Our Planets feature depends on how we manage its most precious resource.
25:15
Together, we can rise to the challenge and ensure that every drop counts.
25:21
What will you do to protect our water?
