LiveRoof ’s products allow companies and cities to make better use of rooftops in ways that reduce storm water runoff, improve environmental conservation, and enhance quality of life. The company is also managed in a way that encourages, and in fact requires, innovation among its employees, partners, and customers. In this interview, Amber Ponce, LiveRoof ’s business development manager, tells Municipal Water Leader about how the company’s green rooftop projects are revolutionizing the management of infrastructure and storm water runoff.   

Working with varied stakeholders on complicated issues to produce innovative, effective solutions is a considerable challenge, particularly for water-related issues. But John Verduin has made a career of doing exactly that, particularly in his current role as managing partner of Anchor QEA, a company that uses innovation and collaboration to solve complex environmental and water issues ranging from irrigation and municipal water supply to storm water, wastewater, and green infrastructure. In this article, Mr. Verduin tells Municipal Water Leader about Anchor QEA’s origins, the company’s approach to the challenging projects it undertakes, and how it has created a culture of innovation and collaboration both internally and externally.   

Sergie Albino’s career has truly gone to the moon and back. After helping NASA with its effort to search for water on the moon, he wanted to find ways to improve the water on Earth. With that in mind, he started ecoSPEARS, a company that has developed technologies to clean up environmental contamination. These include the use of ultraviolet (UV) technology to clean contaminated water and alcohol and absorbing spikes to treat soil and sediments. In this interview, Sergie Albino tells Municipal Water Leader about ecoSPEARS’ cost-effective treatment solutions and the importance of a holistic approach to environmental protection.   

Innovation can take many forms, and these can include making existing technology work better and more efficiently. Swirltex is committed to doing exactly that. The company produces custom, modular wastewater treatment systems that use buoyancy-based membrane filtration to more efficiently separate solids and liquids, producing higher-quality effluent and better production rates while requiring less energy. Swirltex’s technology is designed to augment existing wastewater infrastructure, eliminating the need for expensive capital upgrades. In this interview, Swirltex CEO Melanie McClare tells Municipal Water Leader about how Swirltex is driving innovation across the wastewater management sector.   

Reducing and reusing waste material are important conservation issues for both the water and the food industries. Bryan Eagle cofounded Glanris to develop a new technology that employs discarded rice hulls to create a filter material that can remove metals and organic material from water systems, all without any plastic or artificial components and with the added benefit of sequestering carbon after its use. In this interview, Mr. Eagle tells Municipal Water Leader how the Glanris technology works, its advantages over other filter materials, and the crucial role it can play in addressing climate change.   

The evolution of robotics is continually opening more places for exploration, research, and productivity. These can include places that would be dangerous for people to interact with in person, but that robots can reach while controlled from a safe distance. Robots can collect accurate scientific or engineering data, repair or modify existing systems, and even install new equipment safely and efficiently. Copperstone Technologies is leading the way in finding more applications for robots in mining, wastewater, and other industries. In this interview, Craig Milne, Copperstone Technologies’ CEO, tells Municipal Water Leader about how robots increase safety while improving data accuracy, the technologies that make the company’s robots unique, and future…

Coachella Valley Water District (CVWD), formed in 1918, protects and conserves local water sources across a vast region in Southern California. CVWD has grown into a multifaceted agency that delivers irrigation and domestic water, collects and recycles wastewater, provides regional storm water protection, replenishes the groundwater basin, and promotes water conservation to sustain the region’s population and industries. In this interview, CVWD Engineering Manager David Wilson and Director of Communications and Conservation Katie Evans tell Municipal Water Leader about CVWD’s L-4 pump relocation project, its Oasis in-lieu recharge pipeline projects, and other conservation and sustainability efforts.   

Congressman Peter A. DeFazio has represented Oregon’s 4th Congressional District in the U.S. House of Representatives since 1986. He has served as the chair of the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure since 2019 and before that had been its ranking member since 2015. In this interview, Chair DeFazio tells Municipal Water Leader about his commitment to federal funding for smarter, safer, greener, and more resilient infrastructure and explains the importance of the Water Quality Protection and Job Creation Act, which he recently reintroduced.