Technological platform for catchment water safety planning

Abstract

Water safety plans (WSP) is a concept introduced by the World Health Organisation (WHO, 2004) for risk assessment and risk management in drinking water systems. This approach has been increasing embraced by water suppliers, governments and other stakeholders. Raw water quality is a key factor for ensuring good and safe drinking water. Water use, land use and polluting human activity in the catchment area all have significant impacts on surface and groundwater quality, and thus the level and complexity of treatment plants necessary to ensure that the water leaving the works is safe and acceptable to consumers. Protection of raw water sources should be seen as the first, and often the most important, barrier to prevent microbial, chemical and radiological contamination of drinking water sources (Vieira et al., 2011). Due to continuously emerging threats to the drinking water quality from organic matter, pesticides, fertilizers, pharmaceuticals, trace metals, and other types of contaminants, much effort has been put in the development of knowledge that is capable to effectively identify potential risks. Information on catchment characteristics (e.g. geology, hydrology, meteorology, land use, competing water uses), surface water bodies (e.g. flow rate, water quality and seasonality) and groundwater (e.g. aquifer flow rate, flow direction and aquifer vulnerability to pollution) and application of models to quantify the spatial and temporal dynamics of transport and attenuation of hazards that arise from the pollution sources across a catchment are of paramount importance for evaluating and prioritizing risks in raw water sources (Vieira & Pinho, 2014; WHO, 2016). This paper presents the use of the Delft-FEWS platform (Werner et al., 2012) in implementing an early warning system supported by proper hydrodynamics and water quality models for supporting catchment water safety plans in two river basins of the NW region of Portugal.