Planning for Sustainable Water Infrastructure
Effective planning is essential for water and wastewater systems to manage their operations and infrastructure and ensure the sustainability of the communities they serve.
Planning for Sustainability: A Handbook for Water and Wastewater Utilities - This handbook describes how utilities can enhance their planning processes using cost-effective life cycle analysis. Benefits from considering sustainability during infrastructure planning include:
- Optimizing environmental, economic, and social benefits by setting goals and selecting projects through a transparent and inclusive process with the community;
- Realizing consistency across a range of alternatives that address both utility and community goals; and
- Enhancing the long-term technical, financial, and managerial capacity of the utility.
Webcasts about Planning for Sustainability for Water and Wastewater Utilities
Effective planning is essential for utilities to sustainably manage their operations. Planning ensures that water infrastructure investments are cost effective over their life cycle, resource efficient, and support other relevant community sustainability goals. EPA hosted several webinars covering the core elements of the handbook, Planning for Sustainability: A Handbook for Water and Wastewater Utilities:
- Planning for Sustainability for Water and Wastewater Utilities - An introduction for water and wastewater utilities on approaches for incorporating sustainability considerations into planning.
- Community Consultation for Sustainability Planning - Focuses on how utilities can engage community stakeholders to establish sustainability goals that reflect utility and community priorities.