The 17th Global Water Summit held in Paris saw more than 1,200 delegates focus on the topic of accelerating investment in water management, an area where Alfa Laval can offer expertise and world-leading technology.

The three-day event, organised by Global Water Intelligence (GWI), is the only one of its kind that brings together a range of stakeholders from across the sector, including end-users, investors, bankers, solution providers and politicians.

According to Alfa Laval’s Water Industry Manager Eline Suijlen, the summit offered useful insights and practical ideas to help tackle the world’s biggest water challenges.

“The summit is important because it brings together the major players in the water sector and promotes inter-industry collaboration and sharing of best practice, which is vital in tackling the challenges ahead,” says Eline. “There were many insightful and useful takeaways and also positive steps taken in developing a global strategy and approach.”

The GWI team is working closely with the World Bank on water use, and they tapped into the expertise on hand at the summit to help develop a tangible target for global water re-use. This comes in the wake of a report from the Global Commission on the Economics of Water last year, which suggests a re-use figure of 50% should be achieved instead of the 8% currently being reached.

The summit was an opportunity for leaders and decision-makers to give their views on whether such a target was achievable in practice, and Alfa Laval is keen to be part of the water re-use coalition that will now be formed to work up a proposal to go back to the next UN Conference on Water in Abu Dhabi 2026.

With so many key stakeholders under one roof, the event represented and unrivalled opportunity to take the pulse of the water sector and understand emerging themes, which this year included business continuity in the face of climate change, 

Eline says: “There is an exponential increase in floods and droughts that will have a growing impact on the operations of industries, driving companies to invest in water security and solutions for their specific challenges. What I noted at the summit was that companies were becoming more prepared to have a longer return on investments if the solution was directly linked to sustainability.

The summit highlighted the importance of shifting mindsets, and approaching water management holistically, seeing the bigger picture rather than tackling a series of specific localised issues.

“We as humans think in a linear way, but nature is about ecosystems and circularity, whether it’s water, soil or nutrients, and there was a clear call for organizations to shift thinking and develop water solutions that are part of an ecosystem,” says Eline. “Water is complex and integrated with everything, and we need to bring that understanding to our technology to enable the best corporate water stewardship.”

The summit showed that the complexity is driving organizations to spread the risk when it comes to seeking solutions. An example came from Singapore, which is adding wastewater recycling for non-drinking applications and seawater desalination to its armoury of water-saving solutions, supporting the traditional methods of stormwater capture and buying-in water from Malaysia.

“If I were an investor, I would spread that investment to spread the risk, and now it is the same with water resilience,” says Eline. “Invest in several solutions so that you can combat the impacts of climate change, which are only going to get worse.”

As well as climate change, another clear theme of the summit was the challenge that organizations are facing from shifting legislation and regulations.

“Legislation is a driver for investment, but those investments are typically made with an expectation that the solution will deliver against the regulations for the next 20 to 50 years,” says Eline. “There is clearly a compliance risk if the legislation is changing regularly, and that was identified as a significant challenge at the summit.”

While innovation continued to play an important role in advancing water reuse, the real challenge lies in scaling existing solutions and overcoming barriers such as fragmented regulations, low water pricing and limited public awareness of the pressure on water resources, says Eline Suijlen. “Alfa Laval is committed to addressing these challenges by empower industries to strengthen their corporate water stewardship, transforming their wastewater into a resource and working with partners to making proven technologies more impactful across industries.”