Experts discuss water management in Qatar

Polypipe Gulf’s Adam Smith, Degremont Marubeni’s Guilhem Joly and Composium Group’s Ron Daniel were among the experts who gave presentations at the event.By Salman Siddiqui/Staff ReporterAlthough there is enough water in Qatar to provide for its 1.9mn people at the moment, the question is whether it will have enough in the future.The Qatar Green Building Council’s Water Interest Group analysed the situation by hosting several presentations on the topic of water management issues in the country on Wednesday night at the Wyndham Grand Regency Hotel. It was followed by a lively debate on Doha’s future urban ecology.Adam Smith, Business Development manager, Polypipe Gulf, said that if water conservation issues in Qatar were not taken seriously, the country could land itself in serious trouble. However, he was optimistic that the situation would improve since efforts were being made to create awareness and conserve more water in the country.In his presentation, Smith pointed out that more than 45mn people in the Arab world or 10% of the population, lack access to clean water and safe sanitation. Based on current trends, water consumption through 2020 is expected to increase 5.4% a year for Qataris and 7% a year for expatriates. As of 2009, studies show that Qatar consumed 1,200 litres per person per day, which is very high. In comparison, the average person in the UK uses 150 litres of water a day, he said.He warned that 35% of the world’s population will be living in water scarce regions by 2025.He proposed a number of solutions, including having storage tanks that accumulates water from rains and other sources on the roof top of high rise buildings.“Millions of air conditioning units run here in Doha. One can conserve the clean water coming out of it instead of wasting it in drains,” he said.He called upon the state to draft laws that would penalise the people who waste valuable sources of water. Ron Daniel, general manager, Composium Group, is the brainchild of the Incrediwell process, which he proposed was an inexhaustible solution that provided an infinite source of water without the very real and significant risks currently associated with traditional desalination methods.He gave the examples of two major projects in Bahrain, including Durrat al Bahrain, as successful models of this process. Guilhem Joly, manager, Degremont Marubeni, explained how a green natural lagoon was created recently near the Doha West Sewage Treatment Plant in the west of Doha that became a haven for birds and local flora that thrived on the constant flow of water produced by the plant. “We would like to see the transformation of this lagoon into a conservation park that could be used for educational purposes and scientific studies,” he said.When the discussion began on the types of flora and fauna one should expect in Qatar in the future, Qatar University’s Dr Nobuyuki Yamaguchi said the society at large would decide what it wanted in its environment.“Whatever we do, how we judge something as good or bad, we basically work on the platform of consumer choices,” he said. Similarly, nature conservation would be guided by consumer choices. But how one should define ‘natural’ flora and fauna for Qatar, he asked. If the people of the city tomorrow decided to bring an elephant here as part of its fauna, would that be termed ‘natural’ to the city. “Basically it’s all about what you may want to have in the future here…some people even say that we humans are ‘natural’ too, but I think now I’m dabbling into philosophy,” he said.Dr Renee Richer, who teaches at the Weill Cornell Medical College in Qatar, suggested that there was a danger in leaving everything to choices since sometimes the consumer makes good choices and sometimes poor choices. “The Qatar Vision calls for conserving what’s unique and special about Qatar. So, we need to make better choices,” she said.She added that as development increases in Qatar and provisions are not made to provide species their natural habitat, they’ll either vanish or go somewhere else.Dr Paul Alan Cox, chairman Seacology, an environmental organisation based in California, said that as one built national parks, the environment itself would dictate what kind of fauna exist.For example in Hawaii, he said, we discovered that when we developed national parks, the endangered species were eating the endangered plants. “All of us would love to deal with such kinds of problems,” he said.  He called for a botanical garden as part of Qatar’s national heritage.“Doha is well placed for the world’s best botanical garden using native Qatar species to landscape its environment,” he said.