THE theme of this year's Singapore International Water Week
focused on clean, affordable water to ensure sustainable
cities.
Yet, while clean and affordable water is vital for sustainable
cities, it is not enough. Such cities, as one speaker suggested,
need holistic governance.
The meeting's discourse reflected ecological modernisation, the
view that technology can fix environmental problems. We need clean
and affordable water, so we use technology. That is, as long as
technological innovation continues, we can supply cities with
reliable drinking water.
When drinking water is supplied, 'value' is added through
treating raw water with chemicals to remove bacteria and sediment.
When wastewater is released back into the natural system, it is
treated to levels that do not pollute the environment. Why does
water have 'value' added to it when supplied to consumers, but is
treated to only non-polluting standards when returned to the
natural environment?
New technology is encouraged to maximise what we get out of
nature, but hardly an equal enthusiasm exists for maximising the
quality of what we return to it. Our attitude towards nature, in
this sense, is exploitative.
Ecological modernisation has been criticised for
over-emphasising technology's potential for solving environmental
problems to the neglect of other aspects like design and
governance.
It encourages, for example, the continued settlement of
water-scarce regions because it pervades the belief that water can
be piped across distances.
Currently, technology's goals also seem self-serving. Unless the
water week meeting recognises the importance of non-technological
factors, the gathering risks being a boilerplate forum.
Lau Ying Shan (Miss)
