19 nov. 2014
00:00
—
21 nov. 2014
00:00
Conference // International Conference on Water, Energy, and Food Nexus for Sustainable Development, Pattaya City/Thailand
The conference aims to link scientific understanding and progress with policy and decision making to implement a water, energy and food nexus for sustainable development. Furthermore it targets to develop partnerships and networks between interested individuals and institutions with expertise in the water, energy and food sector.
Water, energy and food have been the most important resources that directly influence the socioeconomic development of any country. Water and energy have a symbiotic relation where every form of energy production requires water in their lifetime either for fuel extraction or operation. In the power sector, thermal power plants use large amounts of water for cooling and part of this is lost as evaporation. Hydropower plants use significant quantities of water and interfere with existing water flows, changing silting patterns in river basins, and also lose a considerable amount of water as evaporation. Significant quantities of water are also required for other energy processing activities, such as refining oil products or manufacturing synthetic fuels. Similarly energy is required for conveyance, treatment, distribution of water, and desalinization of brackish and sea-water to provide new freshwater sources. The extraction of water from aquifers, pumping from the surface sources and its conveyance, distribution as well as treatment and recycling of wastewater requires energy. In water and wastewater treatment systems, energy is used to pump, transport, heat, cool, pressurize, and treat the water. Actual treatment consists of pressurization, transport, filtration, addition and removal of chemicals, aeration, etc. Globally about 7% of commercial energy production is used for managing the world's fresh water supply.