Water Resources: Quantity and Quality

The basic water resources management concepts are given in this chapter by explaining the meaning of water availability (hydrological cycle, water budget), water use (drinking water, agriculture, industry, ecosystems), environmental risk and water pollution. The ecosystems approach for defining the new concept of water quality (eco-hydrology) is described in the framework of Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM). Legal texts translating this concept into regulations, such as the EU Water Framework Directive and the UNECE Convention for transboundary waters are summarised. The meaning of environmental risk is explained in this chapter in a first step, which lead into methodological tools in Chapters 2 and 3 for risk identification and risk quantification respectively. The theoretical concepts are illustrated with questions and numerical problems with answers in Appendix C.