The Health research programme revolves around the supply of a basic need: safe and healthy water of high quality. Our approach focuses on problems that threaten the provision of drinking water, such as urbanisation, increasing use of chemicals, climate change and evolving demographics.

Enabling technologies are inventions or innovations that can be applied to drive (radical) change in the capabilities of society, ecosystems and the built environment. Enabling technologies are characterized by the rapid development of subsequent derivative technologies, often in diverse fields. These technologies comprise a collection of techniques, skills, methods and processes used in the production of goods or services, or in the accomplishment of objectives, such as scientific investigation.

To ensure our continued access to water into the future, we have to manage the watercycle sustainably. The Sustainable Water cycle research programme focuses on questions concerning water-wise management: How can we sustainably manage our freshwater sources? How can we deal with extreme precipitation and drought caused by climate change? And how can we achieve a climate-neutral watercycle in a circular economy?

How can one adapt effectively to the breathtaking pace of societal developments? How can we design resilient water cycles? What elements have an impact on water management? And what factors promote, or hold back, the necessary transformations? These are the questions we want to answer in the Society research programme, so as to help policy-makers, stakeholders and citizens collaborate in developing knowledge and shaping water-wise decision-making and policy.

In the Looking ahead research programme, we join social actors and stakeholders in looking at the trends that will influence society, the environment, science and technology, as well as impact the water sector and offer it an action perspective. We also develop models to study how the water cycle of the future can best be organised.