8. The Future of Water Resource Management?

In this penultimate blog I want to think more holistically about the future of water resource management, by building on the topic of renewable water supply in Egypt (as touched upon in Blogs 7 and 2) and by thinking about the role of scientific institutions in water management. In Blog 2 I attempted to critically evaluate the utility of the WSI and MARR as methods for estimating the extent of a nations water scarcity issues (using the case study of the GERD obscuring accurate estimations in Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia). One crucial aspect of the water problem in Egypt yet to be addressed is determining the proportion of water drawn out which can be regarded as renewable, as well as estimates of Egypt’s dependance on non-renewable fossil groundwater. As outlined in Blog 7, Egypt is situated above the Nubian Sandstone Aquifer System (NSAS), a fossil groundwater aquifer system. The volume and mechanics of which are currently unknown, as well as likely impacts that water extraction will have on the aquifer and the areas it serves. The below table gives an estimate of water usage in Egypt in 2000 (though rapid population growth means usage figures are likely to have risen exponentially since then). By the FAO estimations, the use of fossil groundwater made up 1.127% of Egypt’s water usage in 2000.

(FAO, 2016)

Current groundwater extractions (from renewable water resources) are said to be unsustainable (Khalifa, 2019), and the non-renewable NSAS is yet to be calculated on how long it could take to run out, this is something the IAEA is attempting to measure through isotope hydrology. The project is notable both in its scientific endeavour and in its aims to facilitate improved transnational cooperation between users of the NSAS. 

Understanding Isotope Hydrology 

Isotope hydrology traces water movements within the hydrological cycle, by using stable and radioactive isotopes. Water is naturally tagged with isotopic fingerprints, varying according to water body’s history and route in the hydrological cycle, due to the small changes in concentration of oxygen and hydrogen isotopes that occur in water molecules during evaporation and condensation. Once collected, the isotopes in a water molecule can be weighed using mass spectrometry. The utilisation of isotope hydrology in exploring underground aquifers can therefore find the water’s source, how it is recharged and whether there is risk of pollution and how they might be used sustainably. Such a picture is created due to the changes in oxygen and hydrogen isotopes registered by water molecules in every stage of the hydrological cycle, and the isotopes of pollutants are also easily traceable. The isotope fingerprint of a molecule is preservable for millennia, enabling the record of a fossil groundwater aquifer such as the NSAS to be recorded and understood (IAEA, 2019). 

Scientific Institutions as Foundational for Future Water Management Systems? 

Previous posts in this questioned the relation between citizen and state, as well as responsibilities of the state and other bodies over water management. In cases requiring vast transnational cooperation, one can determine governmental bodies as being the only authority large enough and with enough authority and non-corporate aims to undertake solving such issues of water. However as has been noted (see blog 2), governments are not without their own geopolitical undertakings and managerial inefficiencies (see blog 4). One might then consider what would be a feasible alternative to all of the above. African governments are noted as inefficient and corrupt, hindered by political bureaucracy, private corporations as managerially efficient yet no more constructively useful in providing affordable and available water (Bayliss, 2003; Gooloba-Mutebi, 2012). Common criticisms of existing water management systems focus on the inability of the aforementioned organisations to think holistically about impacts of the hydrological cycle; agriculture, ecosystem health, transportation, health and sanitation issues. Inefficiencies of current attempts at normalisation evaluation criteria of existing water management strategies depict the potential need for a shift towards water-resource specific evaluation criteria (White, 1998). Such a strategy would then be heavily reliant on emerging scientific techniques such as isotope hydrology, first in understanding the NSAS then creating policy aligning with the aquifer system. 

Furthermore in answering the questions of the renewability of Egypt’s water resources and dependance on non-renewable fossil groundwater, through further comprehension of hydrological systems, a greater holistic picture taking into account all areas of impact of water management may be obtained. Though one might assume that a scientific organisation such as the IAEA would undertake such a large scale project through scientific endeavour and altruistic intent, we must consider the background and possible alternate intent. The International Atomic Energy Agency is an international organisation with offices in 127 countries, seeking to promote the peaceful use of nuclear energy and to prohibit its use in military utility. Though the measure of the NSAS project is scientific in itself, the non-governmental nature of the organizations suggests its tendency for drawbacks common to other similar organisations (see blog 4).