I just watched SIWW MD, Michael Toh’s interview about Singapore’s increased and consistent investment in next generation water technology as well as a quick preview on SIWW 2012. Michael talks about how Singapore embraces and welcomes new ideas and its ambition to “mimic nature” in how it treats and manages water. Our friend, Tom Freyberg, editor of Water and Wastewater International rather pithily equated the approach as the ”adaption of the human kidney into the water industry.”

The relentless innovation is happening at multiple levels, and it’s being driven from the top. This was incidently one of the key findings from our joint SIWW workshop (see more detailed initial findings here) and my colleague Ralph speaks to this in the first half of his video interview.  He also went on to talk through how Dutch company PWNT is working with PUB on one exciting and potential water technology as well as the how Singapore’s own Hyflux demonstrated a creative and tangible example of applying lessons from a deeper understanding of the nexus of water and energy. “Believe me, that caught the industry’s attention,” Ralph said.

Leadership from the top - a key finding of the WaterDialogue workshop @SIWW. Pictured is Prime Minister of Singapore, Mr. Lee Hsien Loong and Mr. Tommy Koh, Ambassador-At-Large, Ministry of Foreign Affairs at the inaugural Water Conversation. Coutesy of SIWW

What caught my attention was when Michael touched on the special characteristics of mangrove plants – how they can survive in fresh and salty conditions. It reminded me of picking up bug bites last September helping to clean up the Pandan Mangrove at the 25th annual International Coastal Clean-up.

Despite that odd allergic reaction, it was such a rewarding experience with my colleagues. Chen Feng convinced me to give up my Saturday when he said, “We are doing more than just collecting rubbish! We’re collating data and this will be used by Government to determine and update anti-littering and public smoking policies.”

Early morning at Pandan Mangrove. A remarkable ecosystem in Singapore that little people are aware of, and is unfortuantely a little mistreated. But with knowledge comes a power to act.

Everything is connected. One of the organisers said at the time that the Singaporean public were largely unaware of the volume of rubbish that reaches their shoreline everyday because waste collection services clean beaches every morning before 7.  And do people in Singapore know that Pandan Mangrove, which is only in reality a fragment of a Mangrove, still contains “more plant biodiversity than  many large mangroves in South America,” according to the same organiser?

The point for my high horse is that there is still lots to learn and lots to strive for, even in Singapore. We are only learning more by coming together and sharing. It’s why there are many at Black & Veatch who are dedicated to running the SIWWDIARY blog every year with our friends at PUB – thank you again this year to Sharon Chang and Syed Omar Fadzil especially. Thank you to all the roving reporters and Joh Ting Koh (now at PUB too!) who stayed involved in the project and also helped re-enlist some old friends from Ngee Ann Polytechnic too. And thank you to all our new journalism and media friends from Singapore Polytechnic: Trudy Lim and Gamar Abdul Aziz and their students from the first and third year classes. We hope everyone keeps learning and sharing.

345 posts in three years and counting!