/pdf/world-water-and-food-to-2025-dealing-with-scarcity-4lg6cl3ndb.pdf

World Water And Food To 2025: Dealing With Scarcity

In response to the growth of private sector involvement in water supply management globally, anti-privatization campaigns for a human right to water have emerged in recent years. Simultaneously, alter-globalization activists have promoted alternative water governance mod- els through North-South red-green alliances between organized labour, environmental groups, women's groups, and indigenous groups. In this paper, I explore these distinct (albeit over- lapping) responses to water privatization. I first present a generic conceptual model of market environmentalist reforms, and explore the contribution of this framework to debates over 'ne- oliberalizing nature'. This conceptual framework is applied to the case of anti-privatization activism to elucidate the limitations of the human right to water as a conceptual counterpoint to privatization, and as an activist strategy. In contrast, I argue that alter-globalization strategies— centred on concepts of the commons—are more conceptually coherent, and also more successful as activist strategies. The paper concludes with a reiteration of the need for greater conceptual precision in our analyses of neoliberalization, for both academics and activists.

/pdf/the-commons-versus-the-commodity-alter-globalization-anti-2isrhe1pw6.pdf

The “Commons” Versus the “Commodity”: Alter‐globalization, Anti‐privatization and the Human Right to Water in the Global South

https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1018&context=cee_facpub

Hydro-economic models: concepts, design, applications, and future prospects.

The 1989 privatization of the water supply sector in England and Wales is a much-cited model of market environmentalism—the introduction of market institutions to natural resource management as a means of reconciling goals of efficiency and environmental conservation. Yet, more than a decade after privatization, the application of market mechanisms to water supply management is much more limited than had been expected. Drawing on recent geographical research on commodities, this article analyzes the reasons for this retrenchment of the market environmentalist project. I make three related claims: resource commodification is a contested, partial, and transient process; commodification is distinct from privatization; and fresh water is a particularly uncooperative commodity. To illustrate these claims, I explore how water's geography underpinned the failure of commodification initiatives in England and Wales. I focus specifically on contradictions faced by industry regulators, water companies, and ...

http://www.ielrc.org/activities/conference_0901/content/bakker%20neoliberalising%20nature.pdf

Neoliberalizing Nature? Market Environmentalism in Water Supply in England and Wales

Energy is consumed at every stage of the cycle of water supply, treatment, use and disposal. The intensity of energy consumption (kW h/m 3 ) depends upon the specific technologies applied at each stage of the water cycle. For some technologies, the intensity may be relatively low, whereas the intensity of other technologies is substantially greater. This report surveys the available literature on energy intensity for water use in the municipal and agricultural sectors and separates the process into several stages. Water supply, water treatment, residential end use, wastewater treatment, and agriculture end use are considered. Representative values of the energy consumed per unit water are given for a broad range of processes. Water extraction and pumping from ground and surface sources is considered. The energy intensity of treatment required for different types of water source is found to vary widely between the extremes of relatively fresh surface waters, which use energy mainly in pumping, and seawater, which requires desalination. Energy usage for different methods of irrigation including pressurized as well as surface irrigation is studied. The energy intensity of residential end use is very high relative to other parts of the water supply cycle. Processes such as heating water, washing clothes and dishes, and cooking are briefly studied within the water end-use stage. Hot water usage is responsible for making end use the most energy intensive stage of the water cycle. Hot water use in different buildings is briefly reviewed. Wastewater treated with various processes is considered, and the energy intensity is found to be highest when advanced wastewater treatment methods are applied. Energy consumption in the agricultural sector, which is principally related to irrigation pumping, is generally of lower energy intensity than for the municipal treatment or end use.

Energy requirements for water production, treatment, end use, reclamation, and disposal

http://pacificwater.org/userfiles/file/IWRM/Toolboxes/financing%20IWRM/Water%20is%20an%20economic%20good_Rogers,%20de%20Silva,%20Bhatia_Water%20Policy.pdf

Radhika de Silva

Papers

Water is an economic good: How to use prices to promote equity, efficiency, and sustainability