Strategic water services

Our award-winning work combines analytics, automation, digital creativity, and emerging technologies with our engineering and deep domain knowledge. We embed digital processes and tools throughout the whole lifecycle of a project, from inception and design to construction, management, maintenance and retrofit.

From creating digital models of whole city’s sewerage networks to solve problems and drive efficiencies, through to using machine learning techniques to optimise the reliability of water filtration, we use data to improve every element of the water industry.

We value teaming with industry partners where it makes sense to do so.  We have partnership agreements in place with companies including Infotiles, where we enable water companies to unlock hidden value from within their asset data. We are also working with Scalgo, where we have collaborated to create NatureInsight – a web-based tool which identifies suitable nature-based solutions (NbS) that can address flooding, sequester CO₂ and restore habitats.

We are leading the way in the innovative uses of wastewater for monitoring by helping clients set-up and operationally deliver wastewater-based epidemiology (WBE) programmes locally and nationally. We help clients monitor and reporting on the health of animals, humans and the environment using water as a data source.

Learn more

• Wastewater: a reflection of our health
• Digital twin: managing real flood risks in a virtual world
• NatureInsight
• Terrain

We guide planning proposals at each stage of the development control and management process. This includes developing strategic advice on proposals, managing consultation, assessing project impacts, preparing applications for planning consent and supporting applications through decision-making and post-decision processes. 

Whatever the goal at hand, bringing in a dedicated programme or project management team (PPM) offers clients many advantages. Responsible and creative leadership; insights drawn from other sectors; and the confidence of an experienced team, ready to take on the largest and most complex commissions.

We provide real project experience and support to ensure and enable enhanced capital delivery of water utilities' major programmes, building from initial capability assessment and development, all the way into delivery transformation. 

In a world moving towards net zero, all organisations need to improve the way they consume, conserve and manage water at scale. We support the assessment and delivery of projects that will lead to more sustainable provision, consumption and reuse of water.

Find out more about our project and programme management service

Our end-to-end approach provides the framework and insights water sector businesses need to produce sound management, higher returns and greater flexibility from the assets that their businesses depend on.

Our approach is based on three key activities:

• Strategy and planning – investment and scenario planning
• Managing assets – asset control, performance and optimisation
• Assurance – maintaining resilience, safety and regulatory compliance

We help clients to invest in assets for long-term benefit, driven by a deep understanding of a business’ operating environment, its future risks and opportunities, and taking a ‘total value’ decision making approach.

Digital tools and techniques are increasingly at the heart of successful asset management strategies. We are at the heart of developments which are turning operational data into the operational business intelligence that organisations need.

We are working with Norwegian company InfoTiles to empower water companies unlock hidden value in their asset data. By adopting a collaborative approach, Arup and InfoTiles, known for its innovative use of AI and ML in water and wastewater management, will co-create tailored solutions including data and proof of value exploration, scale out support and address the challenge of how to use data and achieve new operational outcomes to create value driven impact and meaningful change.

We have also used our own Fuse software to manage storm overflow for clients like Dwr Cymru Welsh Water. The platform enables efficient storage and management of asset data, performance monitoring and knowledge sharing.

Both voluntary and compliance markets are emerging for outcomes such as carbon removal, nutrients, biodiversity net gain and water availability. Arup is at the forefront of nature market policy development and is actively helping structure and deliver nature markets around the world. 

We provide independent technical expert review for sustainable financing and facilitating access to green bonds and finance that will be used to help support nature recovery. This includes evaluating investment opportunities in nature and understanding the potential impact on nature from investment decisions.

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This comes amid a rising customer consciousness of environmental impacts, and increasing regulatory and reporting requirements. 

We provide advice to support clients who are ready to embrace ESG; from developing an evidence base to developing the strategy, through to supporting detailed implementation. 

Learn more

• How the water sector can embrace net zero
• Applying the circular economy concept to water operations
• Learn more about our ESG services
• Learn more about our climate and sustainability consulting services

This is why the Global Commission on the Economics of Water called for a radical transformation of how we manage, govern, and value water as a common good, through a fundamental reshaping of the roles and responsibilities of both governments and the private organisations that operate within the water system.

Arup supports governments and regulators to develop and implement frameworks, models and processes that:

• work with water as a system
• integrate across the water sector and other relevant sectors, from enabling multi-outcome solutions to facilitating pooled funding and financing
• enable, promote, incentivise and scale new ways of working with a strong focus on Nature and Community Based Solutions (CNBS)
• apply decision-making at the appropriate scale with a strong focus on catchment-level governance
• build trust with communities and citizens

Our advice is underpinned and strengthened by our deep technical, on-the-ground expertise working with the natural and built environment.

However, our urban environments and surrounding areas face escalating risks and challenges, including flooding, droughts, food insecurity, and public health issues, which are exacerbated by the effects of climate change and urbanisation.

We work closely with our clients and partners to better understand how we and they can better manage our depleting water resource, influence how we use the water more efficiently in our homes and businesses, and how our governance systems can be improved to provide better outcomes for the public. 

We also work with our partners to understand the limits to the interventions, better quantify residual risks, and develop and deploy better early warning systems for flooding, droughts, and mitigating public health risks.

The City Water Resilience Approach

The City Water Resilience Approach (CWRA) was developed to help cities grow their capacity to provide high quality water resources for all residents, to protect them from water-related hazards, and to connect them through water-based transportation networks (“provide, protect, connect”).

Find out more and download your copy of the City Water Resilience Approach

We provide financial advisory services on public-private partnerships (PPP), project finance and merger and acquisition (M&A) water transactions across the world. Our insight into technical and operating issues enables our financial advice to focus on real deal drivers and outcomes.

Arup provides a range of strategy and economic advisory services for the water sector, including modelling, policy design, regulatory business planning, strategy development and impact assessment.

Learn more about our business investment advisory services