About – Non Conventional Water Resources for Resilient Urban Water Management

The cumulative impacts of climate change and demographic shifts in the Mediterranean will increase both the stress on freshwater resources and the difficulties in all countries to sustain water supply security (WSS), meaning making sure there is always enough safe and reliable water available. This joint challenge will be particularly felt in urban coastal catchments (UCC), that is low-lying city areas near the coast where water collects and drains into the sea, which suffer water deficits due to high population densities and limited inland freshwater resources. These resources are further threatened by anthropogenic pollution, meaning pollution caused by people’s activities such as industry, farming, or sewage, and sea-water intrusion, referring to when salty seawater seeps into freshwater and makes it unusable.

The RESWATER project focuses on urban water demand hotspots and will identify trends in water resources availability and water demand development to assess inherent future risks to WSS. It will develop resilient Urban Water Management Plans (UWMPs) for sustaining WSS which complement current solutions, namely centralized supply augmentation measures such as (basin-scale) sea-water desalination, the construction of dams for surface water reservoirs and/or end-of pipe wastewater treatment.