WaterWired

EFF's Legal Guide For Bloggers

Ken Reid of AWRA sent me the link to a legal guide for bloggers from the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF).

Better give it a quick read before my next post.

Ditto for my colleagues.

"Litigation: A machine which you go into as a pig and come out of as a sausage." -- Ambrose Bierce

Kura-Araks Basin and South Caucasus Revisited: My Brief Career as a Foreign-Policy Pawn

Okay, it's back to the Kura-Araks basin of the South Caucasus. I gave this presentation to the  attendees  at the OSU fall water resources seminar.

It's similar to several others I have given over the past year or so. There is some updated information. And I am now a foreign-policy 'pawn' instead of a 'tool'.

 Download Campana_Foreign_Policy_Pawn_OSU_20October2010

"The optimist learns English. The pessimist learns Chinese. The realist learns Kalashnikov." -- South Caucasus colleague

Engineers Are Following My...

Twitter. 

The folks at Blogineering have decided that my WaterWired Tweets are worthy of following - 50 Engineers Worth a Follow on Twitter. I'm honored.

They realize that I'm not an engineer:

Michael Campana.  Certified hydrologist looking at better use of water around the world.

Truth be known I'm not a 'certified hydrologist', either.  I don't have any recognition as a hydrologist from any state (only a handful officially recognize hydrologists) or organization (except for my University of Arizona gradutae degrees).

The American Institute of Hydrology has certified me as a 'Professional Hydrogeologist', a designation I obtained in the early 1980s. I had applied to be a Professional Hydrologist, but the AIH reserves that designation for surface water hydrologists. Go figure.

So to set the record straight: sometimes I call myself a hydrologist, sometimes a hydrogeologist. It depends upon the day of the week and the phase of the moon. But I am not a 'certified hydrologist'.

Certifiable, perhaps, but not certified.

“Life does not consist mainly, or even largely, of facts and happenings. It consists of the storm of thoughts that is forever blowing through one’s head.” – Mark Twain 

OU WaTER Center Awards International Water Prize to Ben Fawcett

Colleague, very good friend, and hydrophilanthropist extraordinaire David Sabatini sent me the following. It's a press release from the University of Oklahoma.

OU instituted the International Water Prize two years ago and awarded the first one to Dr. Steve Luby. I was on the award jury.

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WaTER Center Awards International Water Prize to Ben Fawcett

Fawcett uses three decades of extensive international water and sanitation  experience to aid emerging regions

 NORMAN, Okla. – More than 3.5 million people die each year from water-related diseases, over 84 percent of them children, according to Water.org. That’s the equivalent of everyone in Chicago and Boston dying each year.

Fortunately, people like Ben Fawcett are working toward solutions to address this tragedy. The University of Oklahoma awarded Fawcett the 2010 International Water Prize, which recognizes and honors an individual or group that has made significant contributions in the field of water supply and sanitation for small villages and communities in remote regions of developing countries. For three decades, Fawcett has focused on providing access to water and sanitation for the billions of people without these basic necessities.

Through his book [co-authored with Maggie Black], The Last Taboo: Opening the Door on the Global Sanitation Crisis, and his work with Engineers without Borders, Fawcett draws attention to details the developed world usually overlooks. One of the main issues with water sanitation in developing countries is a lack of established restrooms. While not pleasant to think about it, this serious problem affects 2.4 billion people in emerging nations, according to the World Health Organization. Fawcett campaigns for toilets for these nations to help solve sanitation problems and create a cleaner water supply.

In addition to his work with Engineers without Borders, Fawcett, an environmental health engineer and professor at the University of Queensland in Australia, has helped numerous nongovernmental organizations, such as Oxfam, the Red Cross, Water Aid and Save the Children, and governments around the globe in development, humanitarian and emergency relief programs relating to water and sanitation. His focus on issues of gender and sanitation spotlight often overlooked issues in the drive to complete the U.N. Millennium Development Goals.

OU announced the winner during the WaTER Symposium, hosted by the Water Technologies for Emerging Regions Center, also known as the WaTER Center, and the OU School of Civil Engineering and Environmental Science. The symposium, held on Oct. 15, featured information on the progress of the U.N. Millennium Development Goals and how individuals can get involved in water and sanitation initiatives in developing countries, keeping in mind cultural and technical considerations and challenges when implementing these resources.

 Jurors for the selection of the 2010 International Water Prize winner were five noted experts in a variety of water-related fields, who also spoke at the symposium:

• Robert Adamski – vice president for municipal infrastructure programs, Gannett Fleming
• Diana Betancourt – regional manager for Central America, Water for People
• Jean McCluskey – former Global WASH Cluster manager for UNICEF
• James Mihelcic – professor of civil and environmental engineering, University of South Florida
• Feleke Zewge – associate professor, department of chemistry, Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia

“The symposium is an opportunity for students, faculty and community members to hear from international experts while they are on campus to select the second OU International Water Prize winner,” said David Sabatini, director of the WaTER Center, David Ross Boyd Professor and Sun Oil Company Endowed Chair of Civil Engineering and Environmental Science in the OU College of Engineering. “Ben Fawcett’s impact is enormous in rural and urban slum areas, and on issues of water sanitation and hygiene throughout Africa, Asia and Latin America.”

Fawcett will give the plenary lecture at the 2011 Oklahoma WaTER Conference, to be held Oct. 24 and 25. The two-day conference will include keynote speakers and poster and paper sessions devoted to water and sanitation in remote regions of developing countries and much more.

 Conference registration is $290. To register, go to www.coe.ou.edu/water. For accommodations on the basis of disability, please contact Molly Smith at (405) 325-5913 and/or [email protected].

 About the University of Oklahoma WaTER Center

 The WaTER Center is part of the OU College of Engineering. The center started in 2006 as an organization focused on bringing water and sanitation to remote villages. The vision of the WaTER Center is a world in which all humankind has safe, reliable drinking water. The center’s mission is to help solve drinking water challenges for impoverished regions, both internationally and locally, through innovative teaching and research initiatives.

 OU’s WaTER Center was established to meet a growing need for university-based programs, personnel and resources, including technical innovations and educational opportunities for U.S. students and citizens of the affected regions. The United Nations is working to reach one of its Millennium Development Goals, during the International Decade of Action, to cut in half by the year 2015 the number of people without clean drinking water.

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I am looking forward to the October 2011 WaTER Conference; missed the inaugural one due to illness.

"Every wall is a door. " -- Ralph Waldo Emerson

A Common Christian NGO Statement on WaSH

Thanks to Robert Adamski for forwarding this to me.

 Download Christian_NGO_WaSH_statement_14oct10

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A Common Christian Statement on Water
By attendees of the Gathering of Christian NGOs Working on WASH
Held at World Vision, Washington, D.C., October 14, 2010

We representatives of various Christian non-governmental organizations (NGOs) committed to serving Christ in the world express our common commitment and dedication to improving the water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) conditions for the health and well-being of the billions of our fellow human beings – created in the image of God -- who are thirsty, sick and in need.

Water is essential to all life and is a basic human right.   Our common responsibility to address a world-wide vision of clean water for all comes from the heart of our Christian faith -- the gospel call to hear the voice of Christ in the cry of the poor.

We pledge to collaborate with other WASH organizations -- both faith-based and secular -- toward target 10 of the Millennium Development Goals: .. to “(h)alve by 2015, the proportion of the population without sustainable access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation.”

Called to be instruments of Christ’s peace and servants working for a more just world, we commit ourselves to using the knowledge, technical skills and resources given to us to work towards a world where no one lacks safe water, basic sanitation or hygiene services.

Our commitment is based on three essential truths:

We are all children of God with responsibilities to our Creator and to each other.

As people of faith, we find common cause with those who work for both the physical and spiritual welfare of all.  We recognize our mutual responsibilities as sisters and brothers to each other and our Creator.  Water plays a dual role underlying the physical and spiritual connections binding us together.  It serves to remind us of our common destiny here on Earth and in Heaven.

We are stewards of God’s creation.

The air, the land, the waters of the rivers and the seas – indeed, our very bodies – are aspects of this vast creation.  Here at the beginning of the 21^st century, in a world crying out for humanity, we now recognize just how fragile and interdependent all of us are.  Deep care, respect and stewardship for all of God’s good creation must characterize our work on WASH.  We are called to use our talents wisely, equitably and with special concern for the use and preservation of these gifts of creation for our children’s children.

We have particular opportunities as WASH professionals.

As WASH professionals, we have been given knowledge, skills, access to organizational resources and significant opportunities to bring hope and action to communities lacking sustainable water, sanitation and hygiene.  And as representatives of Christian NGOs, we have clear responsibilities to use these opportunities to demonstrate Christ’s call to service in our areas of expertise.  We also are called to plead the cause of those struggling to overcome poverty, to help empower them to improve their lives, and to advocate for appropriate WASH legislation.  We are committed to learning and growing together, aiming always to carry out God’s will for the benefit of all those in need.

Tyree A. Anderson – Harambee International Development
Peter Chasse – The Water Project
Ron Clemmer – World Vision
Julie Davis – Food for the Hungry
David Douglas – Watersheds
Christopher Gammill – Christian Broadcasting Network
Wil Howie – Living Waters for the World
Ray Martin – Christian Connections for International Health
Steven Mayer – 20 Liters
Jonathan Mitchell – Ministry Spotlight
Stan Patyrak – Living Water International
Michael Plato – Living Water International
Jeffrey A. Spainhour – Staff of Hope
Robert Thorp – Compassion International
Dennis Warner – Catholic Relief Services
Bitsat Yohannes – World Vision

The above signees support this statement as individuals, and organizations are listed for identification purposes only.

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 I like the three essential truths, especially the last two.

"When the poor and needy seek water, I will open rivers on the bare heights, and fountains in the midst of the valleys; I will make the wilderness a pool of water, and the dry land springs of water."  --  Isaiah 41: 17-18

 “I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink.”  -- Matthew 25:35