A Question about Water Supply Chain

Good evening everybody, 

I'm dealing a research thesis for master's degree in Emergency and Disaster Management.  I'm writing on this questions page, because I would like to have some advice from water experts who are active on this website. 

My thesis investigates the theme of water scarcity and water shortage at an urban level and tries to apply Supply Chain Management models and tools in the context of Urban water procurement. The thesis assumes that Water Resource Management at urban level might be seen as a supply chain network where the principal stakeholders involved are public and private companies of water sector, governmental institutions and international organisations, each with a specific role in the chain.

Whether it should be possible to design a water supply chain, as a sort of process in which water for urban needs goes through a path that include catchment from the source, procurement, treatment, warehousing and distribution before using it; the  water supply chain, differ from others, not only because of the nature of this resource, but also because, to arrive to the final product- potable water-  many stakeholders from both private and public level, but also intergovernmental and international level (maybe international organisations involved in water supply in contexts where it is scarce) are involved.

The existing literature is almost young about this theme and this vision look almost undefined, both from Supply Chain Management sector and Public procurement and Private/Public partnerships academics views. 

So, what about this theme from expert's side? 

Thanks in advance for the attention.

Cecilia

Taxonomy

• Utility Provider
• Public Private Partnerships in Water
• Water Management & Security
• Policy
• Water Supply

7 Answers

1. Dear Cecilia,

   by reading your matter, many thoughts run through my head, but one was a little scary - you talk about "  the ​final product- ​potable water ". Normaly, the natural resource is (should be) already "potable water" ! So i´m not quite shure whether you talk about a business-model to earn money by purifing (waste)water or a supply-chain in the mood of a multi-barrier-system to keep resources unpolluted.

   1 Comment

   1. Dear Thomas, thanks for answering. You correctly write "should be". Many cases show us that both rainwater and groundwater in particular, need to be treated because they are polluted. In the case of groundwater, it could be saline through intrusion of seawater, or the soil is very permeable so that is polluted by chemicals from the ground (the case of pacific islands). Rainwater also, it is not safe itself, but also the ways of storage rainwater could be obsolete and pollutant. Nowadays, I think, we can not take for granted that water from natural resources is potable.

2. Dr. Cecilia:

   I have been writing on emergency management and working with the UN, governments and military since 1995 on disaster management.

   It would be an honour to engage with you, I am based near Melbourne, Australia and have worked in Singapore many times in various projects.

   Please feel free to contact me to enter what could possibly be a most advantageous dialogue for us both.

   Regards, Dr. E. Hugh Pettman

   pettman@soleco-technology.com

   www.biophysics-research.net

    

   Please see attached.

3. Hi Celia  possibly the website www.solardew.com can give you some answers especially for disaster water supply and off grid point of use water supply in areas where there is contaminated or saline/brackish source water. Good luck  

   1 Comment

   1. Thank you for answering, I will check at that site. 

4. Email me and we can talk or move this long via email

   1 Comment

   1. Thanks for answering, at what email can I contact you? 

      1 Comment reply

      1. Cecilia Castaldo Will Sarni you can connect to each other and then will be able to message each other on The Water Network

5. Hi Cecila,

   The article Dynamic adaptive policy pathways: A method for crafting robust decisions for a deeply uncertain world. - contains a useful method for considering possible cliamte scenarios.  The contenct is for policy design - but you can use the came concept for your purposes.

   You  can source the article at https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S095937801200146X

6. Basic Supply chains Sources:

   1. Raw Water Source(catchment management, storage, distribution)>Bulk water suppliers(storage, distribution)> Bulk Treated water suppliers(storage, Treatment,distribution)> Treated Water Distributors(storage, Treatment,distribution)

   2.Raw Water Source (catchment management, storage, distribution)>Bulk Treated water suppliers(storage, Treatment,distribution)> Treated Water Distributors(storage, Treatment,distribution)

   The supply chain sources can be Public, private and  public Private partnership organisations involved depending on varios countries.

   1 Comment

   1. Thank you for answering, I think you get the point, is it possible to design a supply chain for Urban Water procurement? 

7. I will try to partially answer your question, from my point of view, and that is as soon as you mentioned Emergency and DIsaster Monitoring Remote Sensing come to my mind. Either optical or radar satellites can help you in what you are doing.

   1 Comment

   1. Thanks for answering, I think in my case yes, it would be a good opportunity to have those instruments of data collection. But unfortunately, I don't.