The requirement for improving managing the virological safety of drinking water has prompted renewed interest in the potential application of coliphages for assessing the risks posed by human enteric viruses. Coliphages are a diverse group of viruses that share the ability to infect the faecal indicator bacterium, E. coli and other closely related genera, and are shed in high numbers in faeces. This review was undertaken to examine their ability to indicate the virological quality of source waters and their potential to determine the virus elimination capacity of water treatment works.  Information is presented on various conventional and emerging methods for enumeration of coliphages. The report concludes by considering their suitability within the operational framework for monitoring drinking water quality.   

This project has systematically reviewed UKWIR methods and tools in the context of climate change following the Met Office’s recent release of the latest UK climate change projections (UKCP18). This review has particularly focussed on water resources and drainage and has taken into account current usage, industry needs into the future and the potential impact of adopting the new UKCP18 projections. As part of this, comparisons between the range of UKCP18 products with those available under UKCP09 are presented and, given the broad similarities between the projected impacts, recommended that urgent action in relation to submitted plans was not required. The study’s prioritised recommendations for updates to methods and tools has also considered other ongoing complimentary research and industry studies and has identified key research gaps for the future, recognising that the water industry methods are undergoing significant evolution at this time.

The UKWIR project ‘Improving Understanding of Household Consumption’ collated and analysed water metering data to explore patterns in demand for water. The project used innovative data analysis methods to separate measurements of individual household use into ten weekday and ten weekend profiles. These were then interpreted with reference to environmental and socio-economic factors and their influence on customer behaviour. Changes to patterns of water demand through time were also explored. The project report included:

• Detail of the processes applied for data collection and management, the methodology used to partition households into ‘clusters’ and the results of the data interpretation.
• Guidance for water companies and other organisations on the implementation of the methods presented, including supporting information on which methods to use and practical guidance.
• Recommendations for the development of a longitudinal study of household data, to ensure that data collected in future are suitable for data analysis.

Frontier Economics was commissioned by UKWIR to identify the priorities of its members for future improvements to economic regulation, and to define scopes of work for future projects to explore these further. To achieve these objectives, Frontier Economics held  interviews with individual water companies to identify their strategic priorities for the future, hosted workshops with all water companies to discuss options and ran a discussion forum with water companies and stakeholders.

Drawing on these discussions, Frontier Economics developed the following scopes of work for future deep dive projects. 

• How could the regulatory framework better reflect and incentivise long-term investment?
• How should customers’ and stakeholders’ views be used in regulatory decisions?
• How can the assessment of risk and reward be enhanced to better articulate the actual risks borne by companies and the calculations be made more consistent across the industry?

This report details these discussions and presents the deep dive scopes.

There have been some significant developments in relation to environmental assessment of WRMPs and drought plans since UKWIR published guidance for practitioners in 2012. Ricardo have undertaken a review and update of the 2012 Guidance, including updated guidance on SEA and HRA as well as new guidance covering WFD compliance assessments and ecosystem services and natural capital accounting. The guidance relates to regional water resource plans as well as individual water company plans.

The updated guidance facilitates a smooth and efficient process of proportionate environmental assessment that supports decision making and consistency with relevant legislation.

The study assessed current practice of drainage design of the use of SuDS and the SuDS standards for developments draining to sewers. The water industry is concerned that best practice is not being applied and that more appropriate criteria might be needed to maximise the benefits of SuDS on sites which are typically small redevelopments.

 The project report provides:

- the historical context of the criteria required in the SuDS standards;

- a review of the experience and opinions of local planners across the UK;

- evaluated a number of SuDS for their use of SuDS;

- culminating in suggestions for revisions to some of the criteria in the SuDS standards.

A second stage then investigated the widespread use of SuDS on a verified model for a typical town, both current and proposed criteria, which showed the considerable benefits that SuDS might offer in meeting the objectives of BQ6.

The Chemical Investigations Programme (CIP) was established by UKWIR in response to emerging legislation on surface water quality. The first phase provided an overview of the occurrence, behaviour and management of trace contaminants in wastewater. This second phase aims to identify sites at which action might need to be taken and to act as a basis for proposed solutions that are effective, proportional to the Water Industry contribution to contamination, and demonstrably justifiable down to a detailed local level. The outputs are published in four volumes (available separately) as follows:

• Volume 1 Part 2 (2015-2020) Monitoring of Sewage Effluents, Surface Waters and Sewage Sludge - Review of Programme Results and Conclusions. This volume replaces the interim (Part 1) monitoring report which was published in 2018 (Report Ref. No. 18/EQ/01/12). A copy of the Part 1 report will be provided with the Part 2 report.

• Volume 2 Monitoring of Substances of Emerging Concern, Report Ref. No. 18/EQ/01/13

• Volume 3 Wastewater Treatment Technology Trials, Report Ref. No. 18/EQ/01/14  

• Volume 4 Catchment Investigations, Report Ref. No. 18/EQ/01/15

These publications document CIP findings and will form the basis of future policy on the control of chemicals in the water environment

This project has delivered an upgraded and enhanced version of SAGIS that will enable its continued use for investment planning, river basin management and novel research applications into the foreseeable future. The legacy VBA code has been migrated to the Python and C# programming languages and the host GIS platform upgraded from ArcMap 10.2 to ArcGIS Pro 2.3. The potential risks arising from the deprecation of VBA from the ArcMap platform have been removed. The code has also been transitioned into a formal professional software development environment following a standardised development approach, with key functional elements developed as modular components. Geoprocessing logging available in ArcGIS Pro provides modellers with direct information on the status of data processing tasks and support with process failure diagnosis. The new version represents a substantial and unprecedented technological leap and opens up the possibility of new and previously unconsidered development applications.

This report is sold together with previous SAGIS reports;

• 20/WW/02/12 Modelling a Dynamic and Uncertain Future – Preparing SAGIS for Changes in Climate, PR24, RBMP Cycle 3 and Brexit.
• 20/WW/02/11, UKWIR’s Source Apportionment GIS Model (SAGIS): Research, Planning and Management. ISBN 978 1 84057 887 4
• 19/WW/02/10, UKWIR’s Source Apportionment GIS Model (SAGIS): Version 3.0. ISBN 978 1 84057 866 9
• 10/WW/02/2, Chemical Source Apportionment under the Water Framework Directive – Model Scoping Document. ISBN 1 84057 575 1
• 12/WW/02/3, Chemical Source Apportionment under the Water Framework Directive. ISBN 1 84057 637 5
• 14/WW/02/8, Extending and Updating UKWIR's Pollution Source Apportionment Tool. ISBN 1 84057 732 0
• 18/WW/02/9, Extending and Updating UKWIR's Pollution Source Apportionment Tool (2). ISBN 1 84057 855 6
• 13-WW-02-4, WFD Requirements for Lakes, Transitional and Coastal Waters: Source Apportionment for Nutrients and Priority Chemicals. ISBN 1 84057 743 6

If you have already purchased the previous SAGIS reports, please contact cham@ukwir.org.uk to buy this upgrade at a reduced price of £100.

Managing and removing surface water from sewers offers a number of operational benefits. Using different types of sustainable interventions can create substantial wider community benefits.

There is an increasing appetite across the industry to consider and deliver such interventions to help manage a range of drivers. However, this appetite is not matched by an in depth understanding of the factors that make surface water removal options more cost beneficial than traditional engineering solutions.

This UKWIR project led by Stantec, CIRIA and Anthony McCloy Associates helps to develop that understanding through:

• providing examples of surface water removal projects from the UK and Ireland and globally
• identifying the factors which make surface water management solutions successful
• understanding some of the UK and Ireland legislation that effects the delivery of surface water interventions
• developing a decision support tool to help those undertaking surface water removal projects in making better decisions

The UKWIR research project “Deriving a best value Water Resources Management Plan” was commissioned to provide a comprehensive framework and guidance incorporating technical, economic, environmental and legal perspectives to allow organisations to derive a best value strategic water resources plan (WRP) in the UK and Ireland.  The project has developed a best value WRP framework which includes support guidance on environmental regulations, regulator engagement, stakeholder engagement and customer engagement.  The generic approach within the framework is based on multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) and sets out the steps that planners can follow to develop their best value WRP.  The framework provides a definition of a best value WRP and identifies principles of best value planning.  The deliverables include a final report and a practitioner’s guide.  This project ensures that companies and regional groups have a framework they can use for best value planning.