SWAGºÏ¼¯

• Professor Jerry Knox

As a water management professional you will need detailed knowledge of the design, construction and management of water sources for domestic and small-scale agricultural use, as well as of the engineering aspects relating of water pumps, open channel and piped distribution systems. This needs to be underpinned by an understanding of rainfall, evapotranspiration, runoff, groundwater recharge, groundwater storage, and groundwater movement. This module aims to provide you with a sound theoretical basis for the design of water resources capture and distribution systems, with learning reinforced by comprehensive practical experience. The focus will be on rural areas of lower-income countries.

 This module is 20 credits.

• The hydrological cycle and anthropogenic influences.
• Basics of hydraulics: SI Units, properties of fluids, basic mechanics. Hydrostatics: pressure, pressure measurement, pressure and forces on submerged surfaces. Fluids in motion: types of flow. Continuity, energy and momentum equations and their applications. Behaviour of a real fluid.
• Precipitation, measurement of precipitation amount and intensity, spatial analysis. Interception and depression storage.  Evapotranspiration, Penman approach, actual evapotranspiration. Runoff processes; overland flow, interflow, base flow.
• Discharge measurement; velocity area methods. Structures; hydraulic principles of weirs and flumes. Stage measurement. Rating curves and other methods.
• Groundwater: Aquifer properties (transmissivity, storage coefficient, significance); recharge, groundwater movement including flow lines and equipotentials, natural flow, flow to wells; conduct and analysis of pumping tests including limitations and assumptions.
• Water sources: surface water abstraction; rainwater harvesting; surface water storage; protected springs – principles and practices; wells and boreholes.
• Open channel and gravity and pumped pipe systems for water conveyance: - hydraulic principles, design practices.
• Mud rotary, cable percussion and manual drilling techniques including record keeping (logging).
• Exploration and investigation techniques available for groundwater studies.
• Post-drilling activities - borehole development, test pumping, water quality sampling and testing.

On successful completion of this module you should be able to:

• Describe the basic hydraulic principles of static and moving water.
• Design piped water distribution systems, specifying appropriate pipe sizes, materials, and pumps configuration.
• Conceptualise the occurrence and movement of groundwater and evaluate groundwater flow problems.
• Design a borehole from a set of site data, including supervising a borehole drilling rig and understand the necessary post-drilling activities.
• Evaluate the working principles and requirements of small-scale water supply technologies, including handpumps and rainwater harvesting systems at household and community levels.

• Dr Alesia Ofori

This module will evaluate the socio-economic and political enablers and barriers to the provision of water, sanitation and hygiene services across urban and rural contexts. It will locate the provision of water within broader processes of societal change and development, providing you with the theory and practice of development and a critical discussion of mainstream developmental concepts and strategies. You will examine the water governance challenges across multiple scales (international, national, and local), particularly in ‘developing’ countries.  The module will illustrate how these challenges can be communicated, researched, and managed. You will be equipped with relevant tools and methodologies for the management and implementation of WASH interventions, providing students with a detailed approach to social research methods and design.

This module is 20 credits.

 

 

• Theory and Practice of Development.WASH and development.
• Evaluating WASH scarcity across scales (transboundary, national, urban &rural).
• The gender-WASH nexus.
• WASH service delivery in urban and rural contexts: politics, management and governance.
• Social research: paradigms, methods, ethics and design.

On successful completion of this module you should be able to:

• Analyse and critically appraise the key theories and frameworks of development, emphasizing their applicability and limitations within the field of development studies.
• Determine the influence of mainstream concepts in water development on policy formulation and governance, considering their impact on local, regional, and global scales.
• Compare and contrast the various governance and management challenges encountered in various contexts of water management, identifying and proposing practical and effective solutions to address these challenges.
• Evaluate the need, demand and supply for water, sanitation and hygiene services across urban, peri-urban and rural contexts.
• Design appropriate research methodologies, development frameworks, and governance tools to execute, monitor, and evaluate water development interventions and research projects. 

• Dr May Sule

Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 6 requires that governments ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all.

Underpinning this Goal are a set of aspirational targets to be accomplished by 2030, requiring: the achievement of universal and equitable access to safe and affordable drinking water for all; the achievement of access to adequate and equitable sanitation and hygiene for all and end open defecation; and improvements to water quality by reducing pollution, eliminating dumping and minimising release of hazardous chemicals and materials, and halving the discharge of untreated wastewater to the environment. 

As future workers in this sector, you should be equipped with a technical understanding of sanitation technologies and water and wastewater treatment processes. You will also need a critical appreciation of their applicability within different scenarios and contexts. This technical competence must be deployed with due consideration to the benefits of improved services and a cleaner environment including public health improvement, quality of life, convenience, dignity and personal safety.  Furthermore, the vital importance of human behaviour and behaviour change must also be considered within the context of hygiene, ending unsanitary practices such as open defecation, and the creation of demand and willingness to pay for a more sanitary environment.

This module is 20 credits.

• Pathogen Exposure and Disease.
• Water Quality & Public Health.
• Drinking Water, Chemicals & Health.
• Water Treatment Principles.
• Water Treatment Challenges.
• Advanced Technologies in Water Treatment for Development.
• Community Considerations for Appropriate Water Treatment.
• Introduction to Wastewater Treatment.
• Low Energy Wastewater Treatment.
• Advanced Technologies in Wastewater Treatment for Development.
• Resource Recovery from WS&S Technologies – Nutrients, Water and Energy.
• Appropriate Technology Selection.
• Water Safety Plans.
• Health and hygiene: classification of water- and excreta-related disease; relationship between water, sanitation and related disease; risk behaviours in relation to water-and excreta-related disease; hygiene evaluation and promotion.
• On-site excreta disposal systems: Why they are not used, benefits of their use, pit latrines, VIP latrines, pour-flush latrines, composting latrines, septic tanks, soakage systems, ecological sanitation.
• Urban sanitation: Conventional and low-cost sewerage, container-based sanitation, faecal sludge management.
• Sanitation management.
• Systems thinking approaches to WASH and Casual Loop Diagrams.
• Circular economy (transition to Circular Sanitation systems) and challenges in implementing.
• Policy, planning and challenges in delivering infrastructure.

On successful completion of this module you should be able to:

• Identify the principal transmission routes of water and excreta-related diseases.
• Describe different water quality parameters and how they are measured.
• Evaluate the basic principles of drinking water and wastewater treatment and how these can be used at different scales including household, community and municipal.
• Assess how different treatment technologies might be applicable in different contexts.
• Design a basic sanitation and hygiene programme for taking into account behavioural and technical dimensions.

• Dr Alison Parker

The combined pressures of climate change, population growth and urbanisation create a demand for transformation in the relationship between development and resilience. As proposed in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and Sendai Framework, there is a need to embed resilience within public, private and community planning so to support sustainable services and livelihoods in this era of rapid change. While there is no widely accepted definition, the concept of resilience implies both long-term thinking, to better anticipate and plan for emerging challenges, and the ability to deal with near-term (and potentially unexpected) shocks and disruptions. Achieving this ambition creates significant challenges for water, wastewater/sanitation and hygiene in terms of how to supply growing populations (in planned and/or unplanned settlements); how to plan new, and manage ageing, infrastructure; how to interact with the natural environment; and how to deal with the increasing frequency and severity of disruptive events and the growing uncertainty surrounding them. This module will examine these challenges and provide you with the skills to identify, contextualise and evaluate different management strategies and approaches. 

This module is 20 credits.

• Global challenges and future trends for water and wastewater management including population growth and the climate crisis.
• Long term planning, community and city disaster response where it relates to water and sanitation.
• Nature & type of shocks (natural and man-made disasters, rapid- and slow-onset, complex emergencies), and phases of emergencies (acute, post-acute, transition to development/normality).
• Disaster/emergency response: sheltering displaced people, protecting public health (water supply and sanitation), coordination with other sectors and between stakeholders (humanitarian, public authorities).
• Introduction to frameworks for humanitarian response and relief (e.g. SPHERE and Common Humanitarian Standards).
• Safety & security issues – acceptance, deterrence and protection. Personal, organisational and served population security. Ambushing, kidnapping, theft, mines, ongoing conflict, building collapse and natural threats, for both local population and aid workers.

 

On successful completion of this module you should be able to:

• Explain key global challenges for water, wastewater/sanitation and hygiene management and their implications for long-term planning at community, city and regional scales (including climate change, population growth, and infrastructure provision).
• Differentiate and describe the characteristics and phases of different types of disruptions, shocks and emergency situations that impact on WASH systems.
• Identify and discuss the main issues surrounding responses to shocks and emergencies in different contexts, including relationships between key actors (national, municipal, humanitarian), logistics and longer-term management.
• Evaluate, select and design appropriate strategies (tools, technologies, management approaches) to help enhance resilience and respond effectively to shocks and emergencies.