An Urban Crisis with a Solution
When cities become desperate for clean water, changes tend to happen.
Water 4.0: The Past, Present, and Future of the World’s Most Vital Resource
By David Sedlak
Yale University Press 2014, 288 pages
We hear almost daily about struggles over water supply, yet most of us are shielded from the reality of this growing crisis by the ease of our daily access. Increasingly, however, dwindling supply, burgeoning demand, and skyrocketing costs are bringing water concerns to the fore. Access to clean water has been identified by the National Academy of Engineering as one of the core issues of this century, posing “engineering challenges of the first magnitude.”
In Water 4.0, David Sedlak, co-director of the University of California’s Berkeley Water Center, focuses on the issue of urban water management, using study of the past to provide models to draw from but also to transcend. Throughout history, populations have embraced small measures for immediate control of water, but when such efforts eventually fail, significant change occurs. Today, extreme weather and environmental damage may seem to tip the balance toward disaster, but Sedlak argues that our current challenges are no more overwhelming than those of our ancestors. We are simply reaching a new stage in water management: Water 4.0. For Sedlak, a civil and environmental engineer, “it is difficult to imagine that the rapid advances in electronics, materials science, and biotechnology of recent decades cannot help us solve these problems.” Successful response can be accomplished but will require deep investments of money, political will, and public awareness.
That Rome is credited with the first major shift in water management – Water 1.0 – will come as no surprise to readers. Yet the true feat of Roman engineering is located not so much in the city’s legendary aqueducts as in the underground pipes and tunnels used to bring water in for public fountains and baths, and send it out again, draining to the Tiber River. The historical survey of these early chapters details cities’ specific efforts – to develop limestone channels, build fountains, and devise municipal regulations, for example. The chapters also offer engaging tidbits: Sale of human waste as farm fertilizer was a profitable business, protected by guilds in Japan and regulated with crisp efficiency by the Swiss, who designed second-story household chutes to empty into designated waste alleyways.
Even as growing populations led to water crises, adjustments in the technology often lagged behind. Noxious sewage fumes plagued 19th-century Londoners and Parisians, and poor treatment caused sewage to seep into drinking water sources, prompting outbreaks of cholera and typhoid. American cities successfully exported their sludge; Chicago rerouted its waste from Lake Michigan to the Mississippi River but eventually faced resistance from downstream neighbors. Though chemists and engineers had experimented with treatment since the mid-century, the large-scale revolution of Water 2.0 – filtration systems and treatment – was achieved only after cities’ filthy streets and faulty water supplies reached desperate levels. Water 3.0 – sewage treatment – developed increased levels of sophistication over the course of the 20th century but introduced attendant pollution problems and health concerns.
By Chapter Seven, Water 4.0 turns to the myriad water issues facing urban centers today, whether through droughts, overflows, or aging treatment plants. Successful efforts by cities such as Las Vegas, Singapore, and Sydney are highlighted, as well as steps by smaller communities, with emphasis on the unique challenges of each locale. While arguing against a short-term “3.1” response, Sedlak acknowledges the roadblocks to substantive change, not the least being the tremendous cost of overhauling existing systems. Solutions he proposes stress the need for more aggressive water reuse, including “toilet to tap” recycling, desalinization projects, and a return to the decentralized systems of the past: household wells, rooftop water harvesting, and local groundwater use. An accessible study of urban water management, this book offers academics a thoughtful overview of the issues and could also appeal to both undergraduate and graduate engineering students.
Review by Robin Tatu
Robin Tatu is Prism’s senior editorial consultant.