Water You Doing? EP. 3 | Derek Vollmer
Droplet Water Project is excited to share a new episode segment with Derek Vollmer. The purpose of our new video series is to educate people about various topics related to the water crisis, water purification, and overall environmental sustainability, and to interviewing experts in their respective fields. We are static to share with you our third episode with Derek Vollmer, Senior Director for Freshwater Science at Conservation International.
Please see below for the transcript for our latest video:
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TRANSCRIPT:
Jenna Heath: Access to safe water remains a fundamental issue for global health and poverty alleviation. Droplet Water project is a 501 (C3) non-profit organization dedicated to improving the global effort to provide access to clean drinking water in a unique way. With our mission is helping to provide access to clean drinking water through direct impact projects, engagement and knowledge creation and training. In today's episode, I spoke with expert Derek Vollmer to get his thoughts on the current water crisis and how his company is helping to protect and find innovative ways to help our environment.
Derek Vollmer: My name is Derek Vollmer, I'm the senior director for freshwater science at Conservation International.
Jenna Heath: A big part of his job is integrating the use of integrated science. Integrated science allows Derek to speak with and have a better understanding of a particular project he is working on for a community by speaking with multiple different experts, whether that speaking with other scientists, hydrologists, engineers, and community members.
Derek Vollmer: You know, I think a general issue that I face or that we as a team face, too, would be short-sighted and narrow thinking. The water challenges that we're trying to address are. Like I said, complex and still a lot of decision-makers and donors, even the media tend to gravitate towards solutions that can fit neatly into a sound bite or can be explained in a tweet. You know something, that's a win win win or a silver bullet.But lasting solutions to complex problems are always going to require interventions at multiple scales. A blend of policy, science, technology, sustainable financing, and often a lot of engagement with different stakeholders. And that all takes time. It's never going to be simplistic and it doesn't do anyone any good to try and reduce things down to something that sounds simple when it's not.
Jenna Heath: In an article, H2O does not equal CO2. He points out the importance of distinguishing the difference between climate change and the global water crisis between the two. We cannot use the same approaches to address climate change, to also address the water crisis.
Derek Vollmer: They always have a sort of local dimensions to them. There are going to be different drivers from place to place, and a lot of times these crises, they're being undermined by weak water governance. So it's not, again, simple solutions such as reducing water consumption or increasing access. There are a lot of things at play that create these crises around the world.
Jenna Heath: One of the main responsibilities that Derek and his company have is by working closely with a particular community and their government and their members and also speaking with other organizations to tackle each watershed community at a time. A watershed is an area of land where all the water that drains off goes to in the same place, which could be a creek, river, stream or lake. For example, many of us have our own watershed that drains to a particular area depending on where you live.
Derek Vollmer: We work on aligning them around a concept that we call freshwater health. So in other words, how can they ensure that they're getting the benefits that they need from their watersheds without compromising the ecology, the biodiversity, basically the functioning of the river and lake systems where they're living and operating because they depend on those healthy watersheds. And so, again, it's not as simple as reducing some consumption. There are a lot of things we have to look at to help them understand what's it going to take to get this river to a healthy level, but meaning that it's also providing the water needed for different uses and also supporting biodiversity in the wildlife that people value there.
Jenna Heath: Another main issue that Derek helped seeks to address is the idea of equity. Freshwater resources around communities are being equally distributed within each area, creating more problems in certain areas in their community and their community members.
Derek Vollmer: And equity is an issue across sustainability topics. So if we just think about the amount of consumption that takes place in developed countries, and this is what's contributing to the climate crisis that, you know, some of us, including myself, have historically, it consumes so much energy and generated so many carbon CO2 emissions. And the rest of the world wants to catch up once to be able to consume more. So we have to find a sort of balance and there has to be a give and take ultimately on a lot of these issues within sustainability. So it's, again, not finding the silver bullet. It's really understanding and managing the tradeoffs and that real in some cases means that some of us have to scale back our consumption, scale back our activities and allow other people to thrive. But keeping the balance of the planet's ecosystems, OK.
Jenna Heath: But Derek and his company are hoping to make a positive impact on these areas and illustrate on a global scale that their impact in research can help the community members and the ecosystem around them.
Derek Vollmer: We want to, within five years or so, be able to measure and communicate that we've had an impact on a landscape scale. So that means ideally we want to say, look, all of the inputs that we have in this place are not degrading the ecosystem, that we're confident that we're able to be improving livelihoods. So the farmers, the fishers, other people who are dependent on natural resources. Are gaining the income that they need, able to sort of work with the resources they have without degrading them, and that we're having what we say is a planet positive impact. And so we're working more on restoring parts of the landscape that have become degraded. So not only protecting, but also restoring and then finding ways where we are producing. Whether it's tree crops or other commodities, make sure that the impacts there are manageable. So we're monitoring biodiversity. We don't want to have any negative impact on the plants and animals that are in those landscapes. And so that requires changes in practices. It requires scaling back production sometimes. But we are confident that we'll be able to document and share those kinds of experiences. And the key is to do it at a scale where we can say, yes, this works at a large scale, that this is not just a lucky little community project, that this is happening over entire watersheds. And so we have several of these landscapes. We're working around the world, and that's going to be a major focus of ours. A focus for my team on freshwater over the next five years is is helping to demonstrate and document that we can really have these practices work at a full landscape and watershed scale.
Jenna Heath: Finally, Derek and I discussed how you can help become more aware and make a small impact in your backyard.
Derek Vollmer: So I'll start with water, because I do like to advise people that they can start in their own backyard because water issues are local. First thing is to find out and understand where your water comes from. We like to say water doesn't come from the tap. Know it comes from an ecosystem somewhere. And so nowhere your water source is what reservoir or river or lakes system is providing that water before it goes to a treatment plant and into your pipes. Know where your wastewater goes and if you've got a yard where the stormwater drains off to because it's all connected and the little things that you do, like having rain barrels and rain gardens, having water-saving devices in your home, they do all have an impact within your watershed. And then related to that is to just understand that your actions aren't necessarily going to have any kind of impact elsewhere in the globe. But that's OK. Focus on protecting your watershed and you're doing a good thing.
Jenna Heath: Well, thank you so much for being here at the interview today. I know everything that you said was awesome and amazing, and I hope our audience can take something away from it. But thank you so much. I really appreciate you taking the time to speak with me today. Thanks for watching. If you have enjoyed this video, be sure to give it a thumbs up and subscribe. Follow us on our social media pages and stay on the lookout for more videos in the upcoming weeks.