Attachments
Foreword
As climate change impacts escalate, the importance of freshwater storage is rapidly scaling the global agenda. Rising temperatures are scorching already-parched landscapes in some parts of the world, while floods inundate others. Countries from Australia to Zimbabwe are struggling with both water extremes, along with the concurrent threat of forest fires. In the last year alone, Europe, one of the world’s most temperate regions, has seen record temperatures, widespread water shortages, and massive flooding. Worldwide, the toll in human suffering, economic loss and instability, and environmental destruction is devastating. In some regions, the weather is erasing decades of gains in human development in a matter of days.
It is often said that climate change expresses itself through water. The inevitability of hydrological climate extremes is placing increasing pressure on all water practitioners to manage differently, and nowhere is that more necessary than in storage. Freshwater storage is at the heart of adapting to climate change, most obviously by saving water for drier times and reducing the impact of floods. Many populations are experiencing increasing levels of climate-based turmoil, and for them, any relief that comes with recovery is tempered by anxiety about the future. It is safe to say that going forward, the most stable, durable societies will, in many cases, be anchored in more resilient approaches to water storage.
However, as this report illustrates, the world is facing a growing freshwater storage gap. Just as we need more storage, the actual volume of freshwater storage is in decline, primarily due to the loss of natural storage, but buttressed by an underinvestment in the maintenance of built storage that increases vulnerability overall.
Improving how water storage is planned and managed is about more than climate. Securing reliable water services is also a fundamental part of socioeconomic development, underpinning progress towards not just SDG 6—“clean water and sanitation for all”—but also for the multitude of other SDGs that rely on water. The most recent SDG progress reporting (2021) suggests that approximately one-quarter of the world’s population lacks access to safely managed drinking water services, and 108 countries are unlikely to have sustainably managed water resources by 2030. Additionally, water storage services are clearly linked to goals in poverty, food security, energy, economic growth, sustainable cities, the environment, and climate.
The World Bank has produced this report because we recognize that many of our clients around the world are in unprecedented situations, struggling to cope with water-related disasters and grappling with how to develop, operate, and maintain more—and more resilient—water services. Climate change, twinned with a growing water storage gap, means traditional approaches to water storage must evolve. In developing our understanding of what a twenty-first century approach to freshwater storage could look like, the Bank reflected on its own many decades of experience with natural and built water infrastructure, searched the world for examples of water storage solutions that are not otherwise accessible to water practitioners focused on their local regions in isolation, and looked at the variety of new science and tools that could be brought to bear to achieve results.
There is no simple path forward; the solutions we need to invest in to meet our common challenge are many and complex. We must harness the power of nature and supplement it, where necessary, with built storage. We must take better care of our existing storage, and use it to meet the needs of multiple sectors, populations, and the environment. Critically, we need to do this while recognizing that all storage, big and small, natural and built, underground or on the surface, is part of a bigger water cycle and system that too require understanding and investment.
The need for a new water storage paradigm is clear. As this report illustrates, ultimately, true resilience lies at the system level rather than in individual storage facilities—and that requires a change in thinking and approach on the part of water resource innovators across the spectrum. What the Future Has in Store: A New Paradigm for Water Storage proposes the purposeful design of water storage solutions that impact many instead of few. Applying the concepts presented could manifest the kinds of resilient, sustainable, even life-saving storage services that both mitigate the impact of climate-related disasters and secure a water future for generations.
The ideas, examples, and tools contained here will help a variety of stakeholders begin to put a new approach into action. However, genuinely integrated approaches to storage at scale are still being developed, so the science of the possible is not yet fully known. For the World Bank, this report represents one step in a journey toward a new storage paradigm. It is a journey that will continue for years to come as the intertwined challenges of climate change and development continue to reshape the world around us.
Saroj Kumar Jha
Global Director, Water Global Practice
World Bank Group