Water Pollution 2020

15^th International Conference on Monitoring, Modelling and Management of Water Pollution

30 September–2 October 2020
Online

Overview

With the main objective to preserve our delegates’ wellbeing, but also with the belief that the scientific community should not be stopped, WIT decided that Water Pollution 2020 should not take place as scheduled, in Valencia, Spain, but take place as an online event instead.

The conference was organised by the Wessex Institute, UK, represented by Professor Stefano Mambretti, Member of the WIT Board of Directors and the Polytechnic University of Valencia, Spain represented by Jose Sergio Palencia Jiménez (Chairman) and F. Jose Mora Mas (Honorary Chairman).

The meeting has been held in a variety of different locations every two years since it started in Southampton in 1991. The Conference provides a forum for discussion amongst scientists, managers and academics from different areas of water contamination. The wealth of information exchanged in this international meeting continues to be of great benefit to all involved with water pollution problems.

The environmental problems caused by the increase of pollutant loads discharged into natural water bodies require the formation of a framework for regulation and control. This framework needs to be based on scientific results that relate pollutant discharge with changes in water quality. The results of these studies allow the industry to apply more efficient methods of controlling and treating waste loads, and water authorities to enforce appropriate regulations regarding this matter. Environmental problems are essentially interdisciplinary. Engineers and scientists working in this field must be familiar with a wide range of issues and, in view of the scarcity of available data, it is important that experiences are shared on an international basis.

Opening of the Conference

The conference was opened with a presentation of the Wessex Institute followed by a welcome address by Conference Chairman Jose Sergio Palencia Jiménez, who explained the purpose and great benefits of this year’s online event.

Invited Speakers

There were a series of invited lectures on advanced topics of research and applications, as follows:

• “Hydrochemical study in a portion of Paraiba do Sul River basin, Sao Jose dos Campos city, Sao Paulo State, Brazil”, by Daniel Bonotto, of São Paulo State University, Brazil
• “20 years of progress: how the regional water resources program in the Pacific Northwest (USA) reduced water pollution”, by Robert Mahler, of the University of Idaho, USA
• “Assessing climate change linkages related to water quality trading effectiveness for incorporating ancillary benefits”, by Michael Barber, of the University of Utah, USA
• “Ecological and molecular approach to the assessment of oil pollution: a comparative study between two coastal marine (Mediterranean and Patagonian) ecoregions”, by Giuseppe Zappala, of the National Research Council, Italy
• “Using dewatered sludge from drinking water treatment plant for phosphorus removal in constructed wetlands”, by Carmen Hernandez-Crespo, of the Polytechnic University of Valencia, Spain
• “Nature-based water treatment solutions and their successful implementation in Kathmandu valley, Nepal”, by Zuzana Boukalova, of VODNI ZDROJE, a.s., Czech Republic
• “Modeling of particulate matter fate on urban highway stormwater control systems”, by Mariana Marchioni, of the Polytechnic University of Milan, Italy
• “Nine strategies to protect and enhance waterways”, by Glenn Browning, of Healthy Land and Water, Australia

Conference Sessions

The papers presented during the conference were classified under the following headings:

• Water contamination
• Assessing, monitoring, modelling and forecasting
• Coastal and offshore pollution
• Wastewater and water reuse
• Sustainable urban drainage systems

Conference Publication

Papers presented at this conference are published in Vol. 242 of the WIT Transactions on Ecology and the Environment (ISSN 1743-3541). Papers presented at the meeting are available Open Access in the eLibrary of the Wessex Institute (https://www.witpress.com/elibrary) from where they can be freely downloaded by any interested parties.

A few papers were selected for publication in the International Journal of Environmental Impacts, and one for the International Journal of Computational Methods and Experimental Measurements.

Closing of the Conference

We are very sorry that we were not able to meet our delegates in person this year.

WIT is aware that one of the benefits of the conferences is the networking among colleagues and the only reason for implementing this strategy is the exceptional circumstances created by the covid-19 crisis. Thus, to allow the authors to maintain that capability, delegates who registered for this conference, and had their paper accepted for publication, are able to attend the next conference in the series (or a different conference of their choice devoted to similar topics that takes place prior to that) free of charge, and if they wish, make an oral presentation of their published paper.

We would like to thank the delegates for participating in the event and look forward to meeting them at the next conference in the series.

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