The Inaugural SWIG Awards

SWIG - The Voice of Sustainable Water Neal Landsberg, Chair of SWIG and Marketing Director, Watermatic Ltd opened the event explaining that SWIG is The Voice of Sustainable Water. The theme of the past year has been �The Next Decade � doing more, better� and we have covered many topics in other SWIG events and meetings including green infrastructure and sustainable water management with a variety of excellent speakers.

Sustainable water management has been ignored and is still often ignored until the last minute when it becomes unnecessarily expensive.� An example of this is when groundwork and excavation phases have passed without provision for rainwater storage when such work is low cost, and later plans are prohibitively costly. Proper planning and integrating sustainable water management systems at the beginning of a project is cheaper and more cost effective.

Mr. Landsberg thanked the London Mayor, Mr. Boris Johnson, and the Greater London Authority for its support and introduced the first speaker for a welcoming address, Kulveer Ranger, the Mayor�s Director of Environment, at the Greater London Authority who attended on behalf of Boris� Johnson.

Putting the Village Back into London

By capturing and using the romantic view of village life and understanding the values of something, then together Londoners could make improvements to the capital. �The Mayor of London�s environmental strategy�, said Mr. Ranger, �has three facets: Climate Change Adaptation, Energy and Water. We need to treat water as the valuable resource it is.�

In order to make our cities pleasant to live in, we need to protect air quality, use our energy and water wisely and create green infrastructure.�This approach will attract investment, create jobs and produce economic benefits. Mr Ranger also stressed the need to make sure that the super sewer planned for the Thames really delivers the benefits promised.

Economic benefits of green infrastructure

Dusty Gedge, the urban ecologist and green roof designer, spoke of the importance of green infrastructure in cities:�green roofs cool a building and avoid the need for air conditioning; they reduce the urban heat island effect, clean the air, create leisure and food growing spaces, increase insulation and extend the life of the roof.�� Furthermore, green roofs help to control water run-off and prevent flooding.�

32% of London could have green roofs retrofitted tomorrow and brought attention to the fact that the environmental benefits of green roofs and walls clearly translate into economic benefits.

In July 2009 seven intense storms flooded London with 26% of the rainfall in the Victoria area.�It forced the closure of 17 underground stations and caused so much financial loss that the Business Improvement District commissioned a report on green roofs for the area.

Mr Gedge also explained that adequate green infrastructure can reduce the size and cost of super sewers.

The Judges

	Name	Company	Bio
	Zac Ribak	Watermatic Ltd
	Armando Raish	Treebox Ltd
	Miranda Pennington	Metropolis Green
	Cath Hassell	ech2o
	John Griggs	CIPHE
	Lutz Johnen	Aquality Trading & Consulting Ltd
	All Judges	Download all Judges in one PDF

Award Winners

	Residential Building	Retrofit	Hill House www.watermaticltd.co.uk
		New Build	No eligible entries
	Non-Residential Building	Retrofit	Cardiff Bus Depot
		New Build	Paultons Theme Park www.paultonspark.co.uk
	Behaviour Change		Be Water Aware www.ech2o.co.uk www.hackneycityfarm.co.uk
	Water Companies		No eligible entries
	Open Spaces and Agriculture		The Epping Golf Course www.eppinggolfcourse.org.uk
			T W Busby & Son www.twbusbyandson.co.uk
	Products		Water Standards www.aecb.net
			Drainwave www.konserve.co.uk
			Eco Compac www.aqua-lity.co.uk