Urban stormwater management manual

The manual titled Australian Runoff Quality: A Guide to Water Sensitive Urban Design was prepared by Engineers Australia's National Committee for Water Engineering and published in March this year by Engineers Media.

In recent years, stormwater quality and water shortages in urban areas have been identified as major issues. As a consequence, the potential synergies between stormwater quality management/reuse and potable water use minimisation have been recognised by industry as a priority.

The manual provides an overview of current best practice in the management of urban stormwater in Australia, within the context of total urban water cycle management and integration of management practices into the urban built form.

It contains a framework for successful approaches in Water Sensitive Urban Design, addressing various spatial scales of integration of urban drainage planning with the design elements of urban hydrology, ecologically sustainable development, land use planning, urban landform and asset life cycle economics. The document also presents an overview of institutional capacity building activities to underpin the sustainability of the technological approaches to WSUD.

The document provides guidance on the following fundamental questions in WSUD: what objectives should we be trying to meet with respect to urban water pollution; what pollutant loads can be expected from urban catchments around the country; how can these pollutant loads be managed using the range of management practices available to us; how does the governance of urban water infrastructure affect the applicability and long-term viability of the range of management practices identified; and how can we integrate stormwater quantity and quality management with the 'conventional' elements of the urban water cycle (ie, sewage and potable water).

The document draws on the latest findings and recommendations from Australian and international research. Recognised experts in relevant fields have been invited to prepare relevant sections of ARQ under the editorial leadship of Dr Tony Wong.