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| Sustainable Water Management Represents As Big A Risk As Carbon |
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These are busy days for companies' risk management executives, as the world is getting more and more educated from an environmental perspective as each day goes by. Stakeholders in every arena understand how constrained living is important and they expect all the companies that they do business with to think in similar terms. In addition, there are so many new regulations and constant potential for intrusive, new legislation.
These are busy days for companies' risk management executives, as the world is getting more and more educated from an environmental perspective as each day goes by. Stakeholders in every arena understand how constrained living is important and they expect all the companies that they do business with to think in similar terms. In addition, there are so many new regulations and constant potential for intrusive, new legislation. Risk analysts are called before corporate boardrooms to explain how the company should approach sustainable water management. This is a difficult problem to understand in the beginning, as we have, over the ages, considered water to be essentially a free resource. This is probably why we're so bad at allocating real worth to its value, despite the fact that we rely on it for the production of almost everything. There are two issues associated with sustainable water management. Population growth is the most significant, especially when you consider that the world's population will top 9 billion people by 2050, a banner year when global sustainability efforts are focused. Population growth like this will put huge demands on freshwater availability. On the other hand, global warming has been exacerbated by our unsustainable energy use and approach to living and associated temperature change will mean that the amount of water naturally distributed will be reduced. There are so many factors to bear in mind when creating a sustainable water management plan. Perhaps the most perplexing is the fact that total elimination of water use is often worse than water inefficiency. Sustainable water management likely points to efficiency but not elimination, as often excessive energy use can be associated with total elimination, while this can also lead to solid waste generation and the problems associated there. If we look at emerging economies such as China, India and other countries, we should have growing concern. After all, as these populations grow, they are expecting higher standards of living and this will result in an exponential increase in the demand for sustainable water management, developed by companies in those countries. Companies must think in global terms when they create a sustainable water management policy and really understand the pressure points within the product lifecycle. Reliance on supply chain organizations could be an issue, as these companies could be located within a completely different resource management environment. Levels of education rarely seen before will be called for as complex sustainability matters impact business strategy decisions. Corporate sustainability reporting is not a top priority for the typical organization, with a majority of companies not including these reports within their annual revelations. If they do, they will almost certainly only refer to energy use and carbon emissions and not produce a sustainable water management plan, let alone reveal it. As executives spend many a late evening trying to develop a sustainable water management plan, many are seeking software solutions that will allow them to put together all their efforts. They need to see how one particular sustainability initiative may impact, sometimes negatively, another, while allowing them to reveal the big picture and plan accordingly. About the Author: Daniel Stouffer has a lot of information about your sustainable water management and how a visit to www.verisae.com will aid you. |