Springer launches new water platform to mark World Water Day

The 20th anniversary of the first World Water Day is March 22nd. The United Nations has specifically highlighted the importance of this vital resource by declaring 2013 the International Year of Water Cooperation. Springer is underscoring this initiative by launching a new, interdisciplinary platform on water at springer.com/aboutwater.
Springer’s new Water Program brings together Springer publications from a wide variety of scientific disciplines. Researchers, policymakers and administrative decision makers, engineers, lawyers and water sector experts can access interdisciplinary specialist information to help them make far-reaching, sustainable decisions. The content will be drawn from more than a thousand new specialist articles from journals and books each year. The most popular water-related downloads from journals are posted on the website and can be accessed free of charge at any time. Open access articles are also clearly marked and available to anyone interested.

Basic issues on the movement, distribution, and availability of water are addressed, as are specific applications for producing, supplying, and treating drinking water, such as innovative desalination plants, irrigation technologies, and membrane technologies. Platform users will find information on virtually all the relevant aspects of the water sector, including national and international regulations and guidelines on water use. Content is selected in consultation with a committee of international experts including Asit K. Biswas, founder of the Third World Center for Water Management and winner of the Stockholm Water Prize, as well as Jim LaMoreaux, Editor-in-Chief of the international journal Environmental Earth Sciences and Chairman of PELA GeoEnvironmental, whose expertise will guarantee the high standard of the new Water program.

“If the current trends continue by 2030, the world will confront a water crisis of a magnitude which no other generation has yet had to face. However, there is absolutely no scientific reason why the world should face such a crisis,” said Asit K. Biswas. “There are solutions to all the world ́s water problems and future scientific and technological advances are likely to make such solutions increasingly more efficient. Springer ́s efforts to bring the relevant knowledge from different sectors and disciplines, as well as presenting solutions that are already working in specific parts of the world, to the attention of all professionals who are working on the problems, is not only laudable, but will also go a long way to ensure their solution.”

The new Water Program contains comprehensive scientific information from all water-related disciplines, such as hydrology, water resources, water quality, water pollution, health, water industry and technology, water policy, water administration, and water management.

Springer launched an Energy Program, along the same lines as the Water Program, in 2011 at springer.com/energy. A Climate Program is scheduled to be launched in April, thus completing Springer’s interdisciplinary portfolio.

Springer Science+Business Media (www.springer.com) is a leading global scientific publisher, providing researchers in academia, scientific institutions and corporate R&D departments with quality content via innovative information products and services. Springer is also a trusted local-language publisher in Europe – especially in Germany and the Netherlands – primarily for physicians and professionals working in the automotive, transport and healthcare sectors. Roughly 2,500 journals and more than 7,000 new books are published by Springer each year, and the group is home to the world’s largest STM eBook collection, as well as the most comprehensive portfolio of open access journals. Springer employs more than 7,000 individuals across the globe and in 2011 generated sales of approximately EUR 875 million.