WATER PROVISION

Water Provision

Table of Contents

Introduction3

Background5

Philosophies of Managing Water Quantity in the United States7

Prior Appropriation8

Minimum Flows And Levels9

Water Provision

Introduction

Water is supposed to be the source of any kind of life. It has an essential meaning for human beings and it is an ending good. Therefore it became a subject of challenges for the future within the last decades. Integrated Water Resource Management has become a key factor regarding the treatment of a sustainable water resource. Water management is not only a matter of providing potable water but it is a matter of integrating ecological, economical and social aspects. Clean potable water supports the efforts of containing Diarrhea (still cause of death to 1.5 million people every year. If sewerage is treated before being used in agriculture, the occurrence of diseases related to. toxic and bacteriological pollution can be reduced. Furthermore the consumption of potential drinking water decreases. This is just one example that shows how simple methods can improve the situation remarkably. Many regions across the world suffer from acute water shortage. This situation will tighten even more due to climate change, An increased population growth, and along with this a Significantly higher demand of potable water. The precipitation is especially in arid regions too low to countervail the extraction of ground water. In these cases specific methods have to be implemented (on the supply side as well as on the demand side) to Provide an Ensured water supply for future generations. Therefore an Integrated Water Resource Management according to the UN Millennium Development Goals is indispensable.

Water provision refers to a set of ideas and strategies orientated toward making less water do more. Thus, water provision is about both increasing the efficiency of every unit of water used in all spheres—domestic, industrial, and agricultural—and also using less water overall. After decades of blind faith in “supply-side” solutions (ever-larger dams, etc.), policy makers now prefer to focus their energies on reducing demand across the entire range of users. The British government's strategy for water provision published in 2008, Future Water , talks about revising policies to encourage provision behaviour, including altering architectural and planning codes, changing the way water services are priced and regulated, and investing in consumer education. Water provision policy in the United States is more complex, with some states (e.g., Arizona) working hard to promote provision and others (e.g., Alaska, South Carolina) doing relatively little. Federal agencies such as the Natural Resources Provision Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture act more in an advisory than a regulatory capacity. (Hall et al, 1988, 626-631)

Background

The exact nature of provision measures undertaken will, of course, also vary, with the structure of demand prevailing in any given country or region. In the United Kingdom, approximately two-thirds of water consumption is related to domestic use, so this is the relevant point of application. The Environment Agency for England and Wales estimates that the introduction of water metering, low-flow showers, low-flush toilets, and a variety of other water-saving technologies could save approximately 65 megaliters per ...