Operationalising water safety plans for Melbourne - a large city case study.

A wholesale/retail model delivers drinking water to over 5 million residents in metropolitan Melbourne (Australia). Water Safety Plans were implemented in 1999 ahead of being regulatory mandated in 2003. With over 20 years of WSP application, this collaborative paper by the wholesaler and retailer utilities presents practical examples of drinking water quality risk management in challenging operational environments, highlighting lessons learnt, improvements made and outcomes achieved.

Development of a tool to support operationalising water safety plans: experiences from a national water utility in Ghana.

Since their incorporation into the 2004 version of the World Health Organization's (WHO's) Guidelines for Drinking Water Quality (GDWQ), Water Safety Plans (WSPs) continue to be the pre-eminent process for the delivery of safe drinking water to consumers. WSPs achieve this by prioritising proactive, rather than reactive, management of risks to drinking water quality. Since the use of WSPs was incorporated into the GDWQ, a range of supporting resources have been produced to assist water suppliers in preparing WSPs.

Application of a risk management system to improve drinking water safety.

The use of a comprehensive risk management framework is considered a very effective means of managing water quality risks. There are many risk-based systems available to water utilities such as ISO 9001 and Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP). In 2004, the World Health Organization's (WHO) Guidelines for Drinking Water Quality recommended the use of preventive risk management approaches to manage water quality risks.