Smart Water Management: the way to (artificially) intelligent water management, or just another pretty name?

Abstract

This is the second special issue prepared on behalf of the International Water Resources Association (IWRA) under the aegis of its Science, Technology and Publications Committee. The first, we hope you recall, appeared in April 2018 (vol. 41, no. 3): The Wicked Problems of Water Governance. These IWRA special issues are intended to complement existing IWRA initiatives. As foreshadowed in the earlier special issue, the focus of this one is Smart Water Management (SWM). It evolved from a collaboration with K-water, the Korean water authority, that resulted in a report including a number of case studies of SWM from around the world. Following this introduction is a summary of the findings of that report, including a description of what SWM is (in a nutshell, the application of new technologies to water management), a general characterization of its progress to date, a summary of findings (benefits, factors for success and policy recommendations), and prospects for further development (Kuisma, Clench, et al., 2020). We follow with a small sample of summaries of the cases in that collection, from Mexico (Villareal et al., 2020), Korea (Yi et al., 2020) and France (Tabuchi et al., 2020), covering a range of issues and domains, from water quality monitoring at a campus level, to a nationwide flood monitoring system, to the sanitation sector of a global city. Villeareal et al. present a case of the development of SWM technology on a major university campus (UNAM) in Mexico. Here the project, focused on data monitors managed by a specific programme with the acronym PUMAGUA, has been aimed at improving water quality, reducing water consumption and encouraging behavioural change in students and the university community. This programme has reduced potable water consumption by 50% through improved practices and leak detection, while improving the quality of drinking water, treating wastewater to levels specified in Mexican regulations, and promoting participation of the entire university community in using water more efficiently. Yet the authors note that while SWM can build trust in water users, it requires a lot of time and effort to manage and maintain, especially in the early stages of its implementation. Given the speed and scope of technological change, they further argue that it is essential to have the financial resources and capacity to maintain and upgrade technology to ensure that is continues to yield benefits. Yi et al. (2020) showcase the ability of SWM to significantly improve drought and flood management for an entire country (in this case, South Korea) through the use of an

Smart Water Resource Management Using Artificial Intelligence—A Review

“…Most of the countries developed a Smart Water Management system (SWM) which contained various policies and technologies for dynamic water management for the new age. A summarized report written by Nickum et al [98] highlights the various SWMs in different countries. Mexico, Korea and France developed a smart flood monitoring system which uses the IoT network and AI for prediction analysis.…”