On November 9th, 2022, Politecnico di Milano team presented the research work entitled “The use of an hydrological model to support copartecipate and cocreative strategies for water management” within the framework of NEXUS NESS project. The event was held at University of Genoa (Italy), organized by Italian Geological Society.
In recent years, the adoption of participatory processes in defining water resource management policies that provide for the inclusion of stakeholders is assuming ever greater importance. In this context, the use of hydrological models assumes a key role, not only in describing the current state of resource use, but also in assessing how different strategies influence the use and availability of the resource itself. In order adopt measures that are sustainable, the process should be inclusive of the various processes in which water is used, from agricultural processes to energy ones and, last but not least, the ecosystem must be neglected. This inclusive approach of water NEXUS is therefore the way to make conscious and sustainable decisions. An example of how the models can be applied in this context is represented by the WATNEEDS model, developed at the Politecnico di Milano, within the NEXUS-NESS project: 4 different case studies defined as living labs are studied and analyzed within the project, located in the Mediterranean area in 4 different countries: Spain, Italy, Tunisia and Egypt. The 4 NELs are very different from each other in terms of problems and characterization, but united by the scarcity of water that affects agricultural production. The WATNEEDS model is a spatially distributed and flexible hydrological model to describe the current state of water resources in the 4 basins and evaluate a series of potential alternatives proposed by the various stakeholders.