Periodic Reporting for period 3 - MULTISOURCE (ModULar Tools for Integrating enhanced natural treatment SOlutions in URban water CyclEs)
Periodo di rendicontazione: 2024-06-01 al 2025-05-31
Increasing urbanization poses challenges, including water scarcity, insecurity, and loss of ecosystem services. In light of the increasing pressure on water resources worldwide, integrating decentralized approaches into existing infrastructure is essential for sustainable, efficient water resource management and reuse, establishing a circular water economy. Urban surface and groundwater are polluted, affecting quality of life, ecology, and land values. Chemical and biological hazards from inadequately treated water are growing concerns, especially with micropollutants and microplastics. Nature-Based Solutions for water treatment can complement grey infrastructure in urban environments, providing improved water quality, flood risk reduction, ecological connectivity, and attractive urban landscapes. Despite their potential, large-scale integration remains limited, as noted in the European Green Deal. Decision-makers often lack strategic tools, and technical knowledge gaps exist about system performance and response to climatic fluctuations. From an economic perspective, financing to stimulate rapid uptake of these NBS must look beyond private sector investment and towards spatial planning, regulation, and tax incentives. Tailored urban water management scenarios and frameworks are needed to help private stakeholders implement them citywide. MULTISOURCE has demonstrated a range of enhanced natural treatment systems for urban water and developed innovative tools, methods, and business models that support citywide integration of NBS for water treatment. The project has delivered new knowledge on contaminant removal, co-creation demand-driven tools, policy recommendations including three policy briefs, and a publication on mainstreaming gender inclusivity, thus reducing barriers to sustainable urban water management.
During the 48 months of the MULTISOURCE project, monitoring of seven technical NBS pilots was conducted (D1.2) including identification of measurable co-benefits, target and non-target screening for micropollutants and microplastics. Pilot data were processed for risk assessment (D2.2 and D2.3). This has led to the production of an international knowledge base on NBS (D4.2). Practical guidelines to business models were developed (D3.4) and a set of recommendations for gender-responsive bidding documents and PPP contracts were prepared (D3.5). The MULTISOURCE Technology Selection tool, NAT4WAT, is tested and fully available online (D4.4) including web-based tutorial on its use (D4.6). An open access textbook on treatment wetlands (28 chapters, > 1,500 pages with color illustrations) is in the process of being published (D4.5). The MULTISOURCE spatio-economic planning tools were evaluated for the municipality partners, developing and ranking various scenarios for integration of NBS into existing catchments. The results we achieved are significant since they are generated through automated routines and transferable to other European cities, making it an effective tool for preliminary feasibility analysis for city-wide planning. International engagement established cross-continental knowledge exchanges and informed regionally adapted recommendations for decentralized water management and NbS business models, contributing to globally transferable framework for future initiatives (D6.4 6.5 6.6 6.7) including stakeholder workshops in Vietnam and Brazil. Continued dissemination and exploitation of project outcomes will be supported by the Horizon Booster programme.
The MULTISOURCE project has:
• demonstrated the pollutant removal and risk abatement capacities of enhanced natural treatment systems, as well as the ecosystem benefits and values they provide. The seven NBS pilots were monitored for global wastewater parameters, microplastics, and pathogens, and an associated risk assessment of pilot effluent was completed (D2.2).
• enabled stakeholders in developed and developing countries, including local municipality and metropolitan areas government staff, to reduce pressure on existing infrastructure and freshwater resources by using MULTISOURCE tools to plan, finance, and implement NBS in their region. The establishment of an international knowledge based on nature-based solutions for water treatment was completed (D4.2) the NAT4WAT tool and MULTISOURCE Planning Platform developed, and progress a 28-chapter >1,500 page open-access textbook on the fundamentals, design, operations and maintenance is in the process of publication (D4.5).
• accelerated the uptake of nature-based solutions in urban water management worldwide. Business models for NBS were created and published in a reference handbook entitled “Financing and O&M Best Practices” (D3.1) along with cost-benefit functions (D3.2) and descriptions of new business models and technical design guidelines (D3.3).
• provided advice to normalize social equality as an integral target of green infrastructure and smart urban development, and enhanced cross-sectoral international collaboration among governmental staff, educators, researchers, and the general public. MULTISOURCE contributed to the discussion related to the prioritisation of NbS in the UWWTD by actively engaging with rapporteurs in the European Parliament and their relations with the European Parliament. Beyond the recommendations presented in Policy Brief #3 concerning the implementation of the EU water acquis, MULTISOURCE has helped highlighting a broader structural issue: the misalignment amongst some water-related legislations, which currently hinders the effective deployment of NbS in urban areas.
• demonstrated the pollutant removal and risk abatement capacities of enhanced natural treatment systems, as well as the ecosystem benefits and values they provide. The seven NBS pilots were monitored for global wastewater parameters, microplastics, and pathogens, and an associated risk assessment of pilot effluent was completed (D2.2).
• enabled stakeholders in developed and developing countries, including local municipality and metropolitan areas government staff, to reduce pressure on existing infrastructure and freshwater resources by using MULTISOURCE tools to plan, finance, and implement NBS in their region. The establishment of an international knowledge based on nature-based solutions for water treatment was completed (D4.2) the NAT4WAT tool and MULTISOURCE Planning Platform developed, and progress a 28-chapter >1,500 page open-access textbook on the fundamentals, design, operations and maintenance is in the process of publication (D4.5).
• accelerated the uptake of nature-based solutions in urban water management worldwide. Business models for NBS were created and published in a reference handbook entitled “Financing and O&M Best Practices” (D3.1) along with cost-benefit functions (D3.2) and descriptions of new business models and technical design guidelines (D3.3).
• provided advice to normalize social equality as an integral target of green infrastructure and smart urban development, and enhanced cross-sectoral international collaboration among governmental staff, educators, researchers, and the general public. MULTISOURCE contributed to the discussion related to the prioritisation of NbS in the UWWTD by actively engaging with rapporteurs in the European Parliament and their relations with the European Parliament. Beyond the recommendations presented in Policy Brief #3 concerning the implementation of the EU water acquis, MULTISOURCE has helped highlighting a broader structural issue: the misalignment amongst some water-related legislations, which currently hinders the effective deployment of NbS in urban areas.