First conference experience for ESR15 and ESR16 at Cranfield University Water Conference 2019

Written by Ellie Stone (ESR16) and Bilal Tariq (ESR15)

This week Bilal Tariq (ESR15) and Ellie Stone (ESR16) were invited by Yorkshire Water’s John Haley to attend the 12th Conference of the UK Network on Potable Water Treatment and Supply. This was a great opportunity for our first foray into the conference scene, as well as a chance to get the NaToxAq project out to water industry professionals from a variety of sectors and UK regions.

The conference was held at Cranfield University, a 2-hour train journey south of York. During registration we caught up with John Haley, and shared updates on our projects. We were then introduced to Professor John Fawell, a leading epidemiologist in the field of water quality and water supply, and an advisor to WHO . He shared his thoughts and experience with natural toxins in the environment and was very interested to hear what we are doing in NaToxAq. He will be joining us in Brno, so you will all have chance to meet him. During coffee breaks, we had useful discussions with some other researchers with different backgrounds but definitely in water sector. This gave us a very broad and diverse understanding about latest research going on in water sector and water companies interest in it.

Throughout the day we enjoyed talks on a variety of topics from the emerging issues for drinking water in the face of climate change, to new research on microplastics, and the algae production of geosmin and MIB (Methyl-Isoborneol) under different catchment scenarios. These topics gave us a good grip on what the water industry current focuses are and found it great that many of the posters focused on algae toxins!

Overall the day was a success, and we look forward to our next conference experience (- which is this week at the Fera 2019 Science Conference!).