SWITCH

SWITCH: Sustainable Water management Improves Tomorrow’s Cities’ Health

SWITCH is the first joint project ever between a UN organization and the European Commission. The project proposes a global switch in urban water management for the City of the Future. It is a partnership with the European Union and a consortium of 32 reputed world wide partners led by UNESCO-IHE. The project spans a duration of 5 years (2006 - 2011).

SWITCH aims at the development, application and demonstration of a range of tested scientific, technological and socio-economic solutions that contribute to the achievement of sustainable and effective urban water management schemes in ‘The City of the future’ (projection 30-50 years from now).

It will operate via three interactive activity clusters; research, training, and demonstration. Learning Alliances will be set up to ensure the smooth exchange of knowledge and experiences between these activity clusters.

The project will operate at three levels:

  • At the city level it will develop efficient and interactive urban water systems and services, develop rational water use and reuse practices;
  • At river basin level, in the context of the city’s geographical and ecological setting the project will consider water detention options and ecohydrology approaches;
  • At the global level the solutions must be robust, flexible and adjustable to a range of changing global pressures.

SWITCH will engage in full scale testing of new solutions in demonstration cities across the globe such as Birmingham, Lodz, Zaragoza, Beijing, Accra, Bogota and Belo Horizonte.

Project Participants

  • UNESCO-IHE Institute for Water Education, NL (Project Coordinator)
  • International Water and Sanitation Centre, NL
  • ETC Foundation, NL
  • Wageningen University, NL 
  • Middlesex University Higher Education Corporation, UK 
  • The University of Birmingham, UK 
  • Ove Arup and partners Limited, UK 
  • UGMT Limited, UK 
  • Technische Universität Hamburg - Harburg, DE
  • Mekorot Israel National Water Co., IL
  • The Hebrew University of Jerusalem,  IL  
  • Chongqing University, CN 
  • Chinese Academy of Sciences, CN 
  • Ayuntamiento de Zaragoza, ES
  • University of Lodz, PO
  • International Water Management Institute, GH
  • Kwame Nkrumah University, GH
  • Prefeitura Municipal de Belo Horizonte, BR 
  • Univesidade Federal de Minas Gerais, BR 
  • ICLEI - European Secretariat, GmbH, DE 
  • Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne, SW 
  • National Technical University of Athens, GR 
  • Universidad del Valle, CO
  • IPES - Promocion del Desarrollo Sostenible, PE 
  • Ingenieurgesellschaft Prof. Dr. Sieker mbH, DE 
  • Technische Universität Berlin, DE 
  • Loughborough University, UK 
  • House of Water and Environment, PS 
  • Centre for Env & Dev for the Ararab Region & EU,  EG 
  • Universidad Nacional, CO 
  • University of Abertay, UK 
  • Hamburg Municipality, DE