The Institute for Sustainable Infrastructure recently awarded Kansas City Water's Middle Blue River Green Infrastructure projects its Envision Platinum award. These projects were specifically engineered to cut combined sewer overflows and improve water quality in the project region - which …
The ASCE 2017 Wastewater Infrastructure Report and Asset Management Planning
Wastewater and Stormwater infrastructure in the 2017 ASCE report Card received a D+. This is up from the 2013 report card grade of D. This is in part due to the fact there has been some innovation with the treatment plants to ensure protection against flooding and cross-contamination and new more …
ASCE 2017 Infrastructure Report Card and Asset Management Planning
The American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) releases a report on the state of the USA’s general infrastructure both on a Federal and State level every few years, with the previous report being issued in 2013. The ASCE conducts this detailed report in sixteen major target areas of …
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1.1 Billion People More in 2030 – Are We Planning Globally to Meet the World’s Population Growth and Challenges?
By 2030, scientists predict that another 1.1 billion people will be inhabiting planet earth, bringing the world's total population count to a number just shy of 9 billion. Most of them will be born in densely populated urban areas in Asia and Africa - areas that cannot sustain such immense …
21st Century Approach to Water Utility Resilience
For those investing in water infrastructure and water solutions, there is a concept that must be grasped: water will always win against human control. It is possible to think outside the box and not trying to stop or change the naturally occurring patterns in waterways or geographically wet …
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Infrastructure Asset Management Challenge – Sanitation Failures and Hookworm Infections in Rural Alabama
In Lowndes County, Alabama, many septic systems are old, leaking, or have failed completely. Problems thought to have been solved at the turn of the 20th century have again surfaced, mostly in the form of hookworm infecting many children living in these rural communities. Often this is so …
Important Highway Asset Management Lessons from the Boulevards of Paris
You might have read the article "The revolution that built the streets of Paris" that BBC Future published. It dealt with the urban plan Baron Georges-Eugene Haussmann created during the Second French Empire, which resolved the congested and complicated layout of medieval …
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New Investment Center Initiative to Aid Water Systems and Development in Western USA
The U.S. Department of the Interior launched a new center in December 2015 to encourage water infrastructure investment in the dry West of the United States. The Natural Resource Investment Center (NRIC) has been set up in the hopes that new infrastructure will be developed and invested in as …
Infrastructure Asset Management Planning Thoughts on EPA-Funded Water Infrastructure Projects of Connecticut
On 1 December 2015, EPA announced it had awarded Connecticut $26 million to help finance water improvement projects. These funds are intended for the upgrading of sewage plants and drinking water systems, as well as dealing with aging infrastructure through the state. The EPA …
Fitting the Great Lakes Region Roads with Green Stormwater Infrastructure
In the Great Lakes regions of both the USA and Canada, infrastructure managers are considering how they could use road runoff by creating a green Stormwater infrastructure to handle the excess water that is often rapidly channeled to nearby ponds, rivers, or lakes. Often, if the water runs into …
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21st Century Innovations to Solve Water Shortages – Infrastructure Management
It has been observed by many that quite often water utilities are trying to replace aging infrastructure from the 20th century or earlier with very similar infrastructure such as central water and wastewater systems. What if this thinking was turned upside down? What if new, innovative, …
Forging Public-Private Agreement as a Water Utility Infrastructure Management Strategy
Phoenix, Arizona's EPCOR Water, and Maricopa Water District announced an innovative agreement on the 17th of November 2015 that will assist in supplying water needs in western metropolitan Phoenix as land uses changes from farming to residential. The partnership is signed for 50 years, allowing …