The words “Water Infrastructure Investments” are getting increased play as buzzwords among environmentalists, public health experts and economic development advocates. Rising interest in the high costs – environmental and other – associated with bottled water’s growing popularity have further boosted interest in the subject.

Imagine if the hundreds of millions being spent on single-serving bottled water were instead invested to upgrade the nation’s aging water infrastructure, where Clean Water Fund and others have documented staggering needs and huge funding gaps.

The existing systems, which society counts on to deliver clean, safe drinking water and to treat and dispose safely of wastewater, are old. Much of the technology dates from before the Second World War. Some dates from the early 1900s or earlier. Nearly everywhere, the pipes, treatment plants, collection and distribution systems are beginning to decay and fail.

But the solution is not simply to invest more money, public and private, into fixing these problems. For one thing, the costs could far outstrip available funding in the coming decades. Especially given these resource constraints, a smarter infrastructure investment
strategy is called for. For example, investments which deliver the most clean, safe water benefits for the monies which are invested as opposed to “business as usual” approaches which allocate scarce infrastructure monies to subsidize new sprawl development, returning only marginal clean water benefits.

Clean Water Fund is on the cutting edge of developing and promoting technologies and infrastructure investment strategies to create a New Water Paradigm. Examples of this are outlined in recent Clean Water Fund fact sheets, produced to help inform planning for long-overdue water quality improvements in New Hampshire’s Seacoast region. Contact Clean Water Fund to learn more.

Clean Water/Clean Energy Project
There are critical points of overlap and synergy between global warming problems, energy “solutions” and clean, safe water issues.

Mounting public concern and urgency among policy makers about global warming do not guarantee policy outcomes that match the steps consensus science tells us are necessary to avert the worst impacts of global warming. For one thing, global warming’s impacts on water quality and quantity are not being fully considered in the current policy debate.

And although public awareness, concern and even involvement in global warming debates are at all time highs, the public’s voice remains too small of a factor influencing those debates. Many who are aware and concerned remain on the sidelines, and many others who have a stake in the outcome are not yet engaged.

That’s another place where water issues come into play. Global warming’s impacts on water are potentially huge and disastrous. Moreover, the water impacts associated with many of the “solutions” (and false solutions) vying for attention are equally huge and disastrous. “Clean coal,” corn-based ethanol, and nuclear power are all being promoted as global warming “solutions,” yet, if their true water impacts are factored in, they are not really solutions at all.

The Clean Water/Clean Energy Project
For these reasons, Clean Water Fund and others believe that water issues have a way of making the stakes in these debates more real and more motivating for more people, including voices still absent from the discussion. Bringing those voices to the table to advocate for strong policies and against “false solutions” which damage water and health is one urgent need which Clean Water Fund plans to meet head on through its new proposed Clean Water/Clean Energy project.

The goals and objectives are simple: strong global warming and energy policies at the state and federal levels. Such policies would significantly reduce use of fossil fuels and accelerate transitions to clean, renewable energy sources and increased energy efficiency. Key to this strategy is Clean Water Fund’s ability to engage people and motivate them to take action. Understanding the connections between our energy choices and their impacts on water quality and quantity are the key. Contact Clean Water Fund to learn more.