This report urges WASH sector practitioners to take more seriously the threat of climate change and the consequences it could have on their work. By considering climate change within a risk and uncertainty framework, the field can use the multitude of approaches laid out here to adequately protect itself against a range of direct and indirect impacts. Eleven methods and tools for this specific type of risk management are described, including practical advice on how to implement them successfully.
- Professionals in the WASH sector have been slow to incorporate climate change, either because they consider themselves occupied with "more immediate challenges", they see climate change as not their problem, they face constraints to innovation due to governance systems, they are not sure how to best adapt to climate change, or there is a lack of political will.
- Climate change will potentially effect both supply and demand sides of water delivery systems. Potential impacts include increased demand for safe water because of prolonged drought and destruction and contamination of WASH infrastructure due to flooding.
- Statements from 2009 conferences in Nairobi and Stockholm agree that integrated water resource management (IWRM) should the governance framework for adapting water policy to climate change.
- Visioning, water accounting, Bayesian network analysis, and scenario building are just a handful of the tools recommended to identify, prioritize and manage risk and uncertainty.
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- Copyright 2011 IRC International Water and Sanitation Centre.
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