British Water’s Technical Forum Is All About Collaboration

The Technical Forum was created to share knowledge and best practice and to inform members by encouraging debate and collaboration about technical and policy developments and technological advancements.

The Technical Forum, sponsored by Marsh Industries is home to five focus groups where technical knowledge and expertise are discussed and shared.

These include focus groups on:

• Date and analytics
• Innovation
• Sustainable water
• Micropollutants
• Wastewater

The forum, chaired by Dr Edoardo Piano, and its focus groups act as portal for discussing and delivering formal responses to government and industry consultations on technical issues, collaborating and debating the development of industry standards and codes of practice which can be rolled out across the water sector.

It also gives members a more powerful voice by enabling members to work together to lobby government and regulators for changes to consultations, and rules and regulations which will benefit the supply chain and the sector as a whole.

The Technical Forum also helps members to benefit from more knowledge and insight as it enables members to communicate, collaborate and innovate among members and with expert third parties at the bleeding edge of technical developments who can be invited in to engage with focus groups members.

The focus groups also enable members to share successes and lessons learned helping the UK water sector to learn from one another and successful businesses in the water sector operating around the world.

Earlier this year the Technical Forum’s Data & Analytics focus group heard about a ground-breaking initiative to encourage open data sharing from water companies which is aiming to rebuild trust, increase transparency and improve performance among UK water companies.

STREAM is a collaboration between 100 people from 15 water companies aimed at reporting and unlocking insights from water data.

STREAM will share water company performance datasets in a secure, standardised and easy to access way to help the sector identify trends in data and come together collaboratively to solve tough sector challenges.

The new platform is set to go live this month <> and will initially see water companies jointly share three sets of data related to water efficiency. Those three datasets are:

• Water consumption
• Water stock levels
• Leakage

One of the leads of the STREAM programme is Melissa Tallack, open data lead at Northumbrian Water and Managing Director of C2Life Ltd.

Melissa told British Water some of the achievement of STREAM so far include getting all water companies involved to agree to a common set of standards to improve the transparency of water data and make it easier for people to find out about their water company’s performance in key metrics.

Melissa said the partners involved want to expand the number of datasets they publish.

Future datasets which could be published include drinking water quality and reporting on Combined Sewer Overflows CSOs.

While STREAM will provide a platform for individual and collective data publication.

Individual water companies can also publish data independently or collectively in cross-company datasets. 

Stream has developed processes for data risk assessment, licensing, and quality descriptions to facilitate safe data publication. 

By building a community and a website STREAM will enable users to find data, discuss challenges, and showcase what they've done with the data.

Earlier this year the Technical Forum’s Micropollutants focus group heard from a world-leading study based in the UK aiming to tackle antimicrobial resistance (AMR) through nature-based solutions.

Global surveys have shown nearly 10 million people could die each year as a result of antimicrobial resistance (AMR).

Defra's 25-Year Environment Plan, the Water Industry's National Environment Programme, and the Environment Agency 2025 Plan have created a unique opportunity to consider constructed wetlands (CWs) as nature-based solutions which can deliver wastewater treatment and reduce antimicrobial resistance (AMR).

British Water members heard from Dr Tao Lyu at Cranfield University who is conducting the first field survey in the UK to collect evidence from four constructed wetlands in England and Wales and their ability to remove antimicrobial resistance (AMR).

Supported by two UK water companies Anglian Water and Welsh Water and Aarhus University in Denmark the team will assess the undervalued contribution of reactive oxygen species and indicate adaptations of constructed wetlands towards promoting rhizosphere-activated free radicals to oxidise AMR. 

Ultimately, this project aims to develop resilient nature-based wastewater treatment infrastructure to mitigate the spread of AMR and will establish collaboration between international academics and industrial practitioners, by sharing experiences, discovering knowledge gaps, exploring technology innovation, and supporting evidence-based policymaking. 

Edoardo Piano, Technical Forum Chair at British Water, said: “The Technical Forums are providing real value and opportunities to our Members by engaging regulators, triggering new business and keeping abreast of what is a fast changing landscape.”

Steve Boyer, Managing Director of Marsh Industries, which sponsors the Technical Forum, said:

“British Water has been instrumental in enabling Marsh Industries to inform the membership of our innovative products. British Water highlights the issues within UK water industry and through the use of the forums, such as the Technical Forum, allows a coordinated response from manufacturers and regulators alike. British Water’s Technial Forum provides us with valuable insight which helps Marsh Industries with new product development and adapting existing products to better meet the challenges the water sector is facing. The fact that Marsh Industries has been a sponsor of the Technical Forum for four years is a testament to the value the Technical Forum bring us.”