Meeting of the Sustainable Water Resources Roundtable
On March 31st, a subgroup of USGS’ Advisory Committee on Water Information (ACWI) met in Washington, D.C. to discuss a range of issues, available tools, research, and experiences relative to the nexus between water quality and quantity. Since 2002, this subgroup, the Sustainable Water Resources Roundtable (SWRR) has brought together federal, state, corporate, non-profit, and academic sectors to advance our collective understanding of the nation’s water resources and to develop tools for their sustainable management.
Cross-cutting themes of from this week’s discussion may be summarized as follows: There are a host of available tools, information, and case examples (both nationally and internationally) that support sound integrated water resources management. There is also a renewed receptivity and willingness to explore these approaches and adopt these practices in many parts of the country — born, in many cases, of necessity and alarming trends. But, there still remains a gap between the existence of these tools and approaches and their routine application and implementation.
The SWRR meets twice a year, once in a Washington D.C. location and once in a location chosen throughout the US. The public is invited to attend SWRR sessions and share water resource knowledge. The SWRR publishes its proceedings in the Federal Register. Presentations from the March 31st meeting and other tools/information will be posted on the SWRR’s web site, accessible through the link above.
