- The Long Term Water
Research Requirements Committee had its origins in the recommendations
of the House of Lords Select Committee on Science and Technology. It
met 8 times between May 1984 and December 1985.
- In this report we review the need for research on:
- longer term issues affecting the water authorities and
other
water undertakers;
- other longer term
problems of water policy including those relating to water
conservation, the aquatic environment and public health.
We also examine the current organisation of water research
in the
UK to assess its capacity to respond to longer term needs.
- The Committee has
concentrated throughout on identifying areas of weakness rather than
making detailed proposals for research. Our general conclusion is that
at present there are no major gaps in current and projected research
but that a change of emphasis and some expansion of effort is required
in several areas. Provisional estimates suggest that our
recommendations are broadly equivalent to 5% of the total water
research budget but more detailed study of possible programme
adjustments is required to assess the overall implications The pace of
social change and scientific and technological advance is such that
gaps could appear in the future and we therefore feel that long term
research needs should be reviewed in about
Recommendations
- Our major recommendations are set out below under two
headings:
- Environmental Research
- Engineering and Processes Research.
The first
of these categories covers the whole range of phenomena about which
Government and industry need to know if they are to plan sensibly for
the future. The research fields involved span almost the whole range of
the environmental and social sciences. A proportion of the studies
required can be undertaken within the Water Research Centre or by
individual water authorities. Much more forms part of the wider
development of the environmental sciences for which we look to the
Research Councils (especially NERC and ESRC) and the academic community.
The
second area covers the technological developments the water industry
must attend to in response to the changing context of its operation. A
good deal of this research will fall to the industry itself, although
SERC, NERC and some universities, and private sector firms, can make
substantial contributions.
We have
used our best judgement in selecting our major recommendations,
accepting inevitable subjectivity of this approach. We have tried
especially to identify area where research is likely to produce
significant financial rewards or contributions the quality of life; we
have also considered the urgency of the problems and the practicability
of solving them using the research techniques currently available.
A list of all our recommendations is set out in Chapter 7.
- Environmental
Research
Our major recommendations are:
Environmental
Protection
|
- Study the merits and
investment implications of combining an EQO/EQS approach with emission
limits for black list materials(2.7).
- Study dispersion and neutralisation mechanisms and
develop
predictive models for hazardous substances (2.8).
- Expand basic research
on the physiological and biochemical responses of aquatic organisms to
pollution in the context of long term investigations of their
population performance (2.10).
|
Drinking
Water Quality and Health
|
- Identify non-volatile organics in potable and water
(2.14).
- Investigate effects of distribution systems on
chemical
quality
(2.14).
- Continue work on basic toxicological and medical
research
(2.17, 2.19).
- Examine effects of water treatment on pathogenic
viruses
and
protozoa (2.20).
|
Social
and Economic issues
|
- Develop methodology for the application of risk
analysis
in the
water industry. (2.27)
|
Climatic
Change
|
- Evaluate the need for new research on the
implications of
climatic change for the hydrological cycle and water management (3.6)
|
Freshwaters
|
- Continue basic
research on hydrological and hydraulic processes for the purposes of
predicting run-off and recharge to groundwater (3.7), sediment
transport and effects of sub-surface flow on water quality (3.8)
- Investigate occurrence, causes and effects of
contamination of
groundwaters by trace organic substances (3.12)
|
Marine
Environment
|
- Develop understanding
of the processes determining water quality and simulation models to
predict the response of marine ecological systems to pollutant inputs
(3.21)
|
Sludge
Disposal to Sea
|
- Assess the costs and
feasibility of establishing an integrated field and laboratory based
programme of work to evaluate new approaches for measuring the effects
of sewage and sludge disposal to sea (3.32)
|
Agriculture,
Forestry and other Land Uses
|
- Evaluate water quality
and other implications of changing agricultural practices including
cropping patterns (4.5), fertiliser usage (4.6), pesticides (4.7),
animal slurry (4.9), silage (4.10), and irrigation (4.12).
|
Waste
disposal on Land
|
- Further study of the
effects of sludge disposal o soil fertility and the long term
implications of sludge disposal to land (4.37)
|
Monitoring
and Collation
|
- A long term and
multi-disciplinary programme to of Data develop understanding of how
organisms respond to their physical and chemical environments and how
organisms are inter-related within their communities (6.5)
|
- Engineering and Processes Research
Our major recommendations are:
Water Demand |
- Assess the implications of domestic metering and
the
prospect
of controlling demand through tariff structures (5.3).
|
Water Treatment |
- Develop reliable and cheap plant for the removal of
nitrate
from potable water (5.8)
- Evaluate alternative methods of disinfection and
means of
removing mutagenic compounds and their precursors (5.9)
|
Intake
Protection |
- Develop effective
water quality sensors using biological and physical/chemical sensing
systems and application of risk analysis to operational procedures for
handling pollution incidents and the design of work (5.11) Sewage,
Trade Effluent
|
Sewage,
Trade Effluent and Sludge Processing |
- Study the implications
of stimulating the development and Sludge Processing of British
pollution control equipment and instrumentation (4.34, 5.13)
- Explore the
possibilities of collaboration between the water industry and
universities on the application of advanced biotechnology to sewage and
sludge treatment (5.14)
- Expand existing research on the reduction of toxic
metals
and
persistent organics in sewage sludge (5.15)
|
Underground
Services |
- Develop understanding of the effects of traffic
loading
on
water mains and sewers (5.10)
- Monitor progress on
development of trenchless pipelaying techniques and consider a
financial contribution to development costs (5.10).
|
- Future Activities
We do not
recommend the continued existence of our Committee. We do consider,
however, that some forum for continued surveillance of long term
research strategies in this broad field is necessary in addition to the
existing machinery for research formulation. We recommend that a small
working group, chaired by the Chief Scientist, DOE, is established to
facilitate and monitor implementation of our recommendations as
described in Chapter 8.
Copies of this report may be available as an Acrobat pdf download under the 'Find Completed Research' heading on the DWI website.