What roles do architectural design and on-site water servicing technologies play in the water performance of residential infill?

More than half of new urban residential developments are planned as infill in Australia's major cities. This provides an unprecedented opportunity to use innovative design and technology to address urban water challenges such as flooding, reduced water security and related infrastructure and urban heat island issues. However, infill can have positive or negative water impacts, depending on architectural design and on-site water servicing technologies implemented.

Site-scale Urban Water Mass Balance Assessment (SUWMBA) to quantify water performance of urban design-technology-environment configurations.

Historically, little consideration has been given to water performance of urban developments such as "hydrological naturalness" or "local water self-sufficiency". This has led to problems with increased stormwater runoff, flooding, and lack of local contributions to urban water security. Architectural design, water servicing technologies and environmental conditions are each known to influence water performance.

Global socio-economic losses and environmental gains from the Coronavirus pandemic.

On 3 April 2020, the Director-General of the WHO stated: "[COVID-19] is much more than a health crisis. We are all aware of the profound social and economic consequences of the pandemic (WHO, 2020)". Such consequences are the result of counter-measures such as lockdowns, and world-wide reductions in production and consumption, amplified by cascading impacts through international supply chains.

Understanding urban water performance at the city-region scale using an urban water metabolism evaluation framework.

Water sensitive interventions are being promoted to reduce the adverse impacts of urban development on natural water cycles. However it is currently difficult to know the best strategy for their implementation because current and desired urban water performance is not well quantified. This is particularly at the city-region scale, which is important for strategic urban planning.

Life-cycle energy impacts for adapting an urban water supply system to droughts.

In recent years, cities in some water stressed regions have explored alternative water sources such as seawater desalination and potable water recycling in spite of concerns over increasing energy consumption. In this study, we evaluate the current and future life-cycle energy impacts of four alternative water supply strategies introduced during a decade-long drought in South East Queensland (SEQ), Australia. These strategies were: seawater desalination, indirect potable water recycling, network integration, and rainwater tanks.

Expert opinion on risks to the long-term viability of residential recycled water schemes: An Australian study.

The water sector needs to make efficient and prudent investment decisions by carefully considering the long-term viability of water infrastructure projects. To support the assessment and planning of residential recycled water schemes in Australia, we have sought to clarify scheme objectives and to further define the array of critical risks that can impact the long-term viability of schemes. Building on historical information, we conducted a national survey which elicited responses from 88 Australian expert practitioners, of which 64% have over 10 years of industry experience and 42% have experience with more than five residential recycled water schemes.

City-scale analysis of water-related energy identifies more cost-effective solutions.

Energy and greenhouse gas management in urban water systems typically focus on optimising within the direct system boundary of water utilities that covers the centralised water supply and wastewater treatment systems, despite a greater energy influence by the water end use. This work develops a cost curve of water-related energy management options from a city perspective for a hypothetical Australian city. It is compared with that from the water utility perspective.

A metabolism perspective on alternative urban water servicing options using water mass balance.

Urban areas will need to pursue new water servicing options to ensure local supply security. Decisions about how best to employ them are not straightforward due to multiple considerations and the potential for problem shifting among them. We hypothesise that urban water metabolism evaluation based a water mass balance can help address this, and explore the utility of this perspective and the new insights it provides about water servicing options.

Comparison of water-energy trajectories of two major regions experiencing water shortage.

Water shortage, increased demand and rising energy costs are major challenges for the water sector worldwide. Here we use a comparative case study to explore the long-term changes in the system-wide water and associated energy use in two different regions that encountered water shortage. In Australia, South East Queensland (SEQ) encountered a drought from 2001 to 2009, while Perth has experienced a decline in rainfall since the 1970s.

Why do residential recycled water schemes fail? A comprehensive review of risk factors and impact on objectives.

In Australia, recycled water schemes have been implemented in residential developments to contribute to sustainable urban development, improve water supply security and reduce pollutant discharges to the environment. A proportion of these schemes, however, have been decommissioned well before the end of their design life which raises questions about the adequacy of the risk assessment and management practices adopted for recycled water schemes. Through a detailed literature review, an investigation of 21 residential recycled water schemes and in-depth interviews with nine scheme stakeholders, we identified 34 risk factors arising from six sources which have the potential to impact the long-term viability of residential recycled water schemes.

Compiling and using input-output frameworks through collaborative virtual laboratories.

Compiling, deploying and utilising large-scale databases that integrate environmental and economic data have traditionally been labour- and cost-intensive processes, hindered by the large amount of disparate and misaligned data that must be collected and harmonised. The Australian Industrial Ecology Virtual Laboratory (IELab) is a novel, collaborative approach to compiling large-scale environmentally extended multi-region input-output (MRIO) models. The utility of the IELab product is greatly enhanced by avoiding the need to lock in an MRIO structure at the time the MRIO system is developed.