WSAA welcomed Chris Rayburn, Chief Research Officer from the US-based Water Research Foundation (WRF) to re-connect with his Australian counterparts last month.

Chris had a packed agenda of fifteen meetings, workshops and site visits across Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide. Here is Chris’ account of his visit:

“I recently had the pleasure of visiting Australia and meeting with WSAA staff and several key association members, including Sydney Water, Melbourne Water, Yarra Valley Water and SA Water, as well as the Board and staff of Water Research Australia and representatives from several other research organisations.

As in past meetings with Australian colleagues, I’m struck more by the similarities between the Australian and North American water communities than by the differences. Both face similar challenges with regulatory compliance, rising customer expectations, workforce planning, and measuring and recovering the full value of the service they provide to their communities. Both also recognize similar opportunities; one example is the potential to improve utility operations and enhance customer service through intelligent water networks.

These meetings underscored for me the high value of continued collaboration and knowledge exchange between the Australian and North American water communities. WRF subscribers have long benefited from this collaboration, as evidenced by more than twenty years of joint research in areas ranging from water supply diversification to bushfire impacts, catchment and reservoir management, infrastructure condition assessment, and cyanobacteria control.

I am very appreciative of WSAA and my Australian colleagues for the warm welcomes and productive discussions on my recent visit, and for your ongoing support of WRF’s research cooperative. Thank you!”

 

WRF and WSAA have a unique arrangement that allows WSAA utility members to access WRF’s research cooperative, WRF’s research programs and the world’s largest repository of water knowledge, while WRF gains the benefit of Australian water community involvement, and input into our research program.

31 Mar 2016

Laura Jaquest

Laura Jaquest

Communications Advisor