EPA Office of Water Publishes New Sustainability Doc for Water Systems

On April 8th, EPA published Moving Toward Sustainability: Sustainable and Effective Practices for Creating Your Own Water Utility Roadmap.  Designed by water and wastewater utilities in concert with Federal and State partners, the purpose is to “…assist utilities to move toward sustainability by implementing proven practices over time at a pace consistent with their needs and the needs of the communities they serve.”  The “Sustainability Roadmap” offers three critical caveats for users:

• This document does not define one roadmap for utilities to follow. It provides the utility with the flexibility needed to meet their specific needs.
• The document reflects extensive input from federal, state and community stakeholders, and contains practical examples utilities can use to determine what level of sustainability they are currently operating at. Future goals can be established accordingly.
• Every utility’s circumstances are unique. Example practices can be scaled to meet the appropriate level of technical, financial and managerial capacity.

The document is organized around the 10 attributes of effectively managed utilities – another collaborative effort that resulted in the concepts behind Effective Utility Management.  You may download this document and learn more about sustainability and water by going to:
http://water.epa.gov/infrastructure/sustain/sustainable_systems.cfm.  A fact sheet about this “Sustainability Roadmap” is attached for your review and use.
ATTACHMENT: Attachment — Practices Roadmap Fact Sheet FINAL 4-8-14