Dear Alan,

I think the right choice of words to express the concept of green infrastructural development is important to reflect core objectives and ideas required to drive this innovative rainwater management approach and enhance acceptability/implementation. Although Low Impact Development seems to be a much broader terminology, it is being viewed in some quarters as a high-risk and high-cost initiative characterized by value-laden process systems. In order to optimize the realization of the beneficial attributes of this management approach, it needs to be expressed to practitioners, non-engineers and the community at large in a way that it strongly resonates with them. At the heart of SuDS is “sustainability”, a term that reflects capacity for development that meets present needs without compromising on the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. I believe this is a stronger driving force which can positively influence changes in thinking and practice among the populace.

Thanks.

Dear Alan,

I think the right choice of words to express the concept of green infrastructural development is important to reflect core objectives and ideas required to drive this innovative rainwater management approach and enhance acceptability/implementation. Although Low Impact Development seems to be a much broader terminology, it is being viewed in some quarters as a high-risk and high-cost initiative characterized by value-laden process systems. In order to optimize the realization of the beneficial attributes of this management approach, it needs to be expressed to practitioners, non-engineers and the community at large in a way that it strongly resonates with them. At the heart of SuDS is “sustainability”, a term that reflects capacity for development that meets present needs without compromising on the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. I believe this is a stronger driving force which can positively influence changes in thinking and practice among the populace.

Thanks.

Alan, thanks for initiating this debate. I agree that SUDS is no longer appropriate, but in my opinion , it is mainly because SUDS no longer captures or reflects the multi-benefit component of the systems such as renewable energy (GHPS), water harvesting, reduction of temp of run-off to natural ecosystem, etc. One of the drawbacks of SUDS triangle is that the amenity component of SUDS is under- studied and difficult to quantify. Furthermore, the term SUDS may be hampering adoption particularly, in the developing world where there maybe too much rainfall or too much drought at different seasons and water scarcity is major problem during dry periods as it might be seen as a confusing term. Also, drainage is broader than it is been used in SUDS. Drainage is also associated with agriculture. I think it is better to highlight that this is mainly about stormwater management. However, I do not think that low impact development (LID) is the appropriate term to replace SUDS. LID is mainly to copy the natural drainage pattern and incorporate it into design of a new development. The term LID, as SUDS will struggle to capture or reflect the diverse components and the emerging ones driven by research in this area. The world's cities are mostly engineered with conventional designs and what is required is retrofitting with better stormwater management methods with added benefits. It would be difficult in such circumstance to copy natural drainage. Also, LID will struggle to be adopted in developing countries where the major concern might be how to take care of great amount of flooding after heavy rainfall (which might have fallen continuously for 3-4 days in the tropics) and maybe threatening housing and traffic. My understanding is that LID is part of the best management practice (BMP) in the US. Hence, BMP is the equivalent of SUDS in the UK/Europe? Whilst we may not copy and use BMP exactly, I suggest 'Stormwater Management Best Practice' (SWBMP) as replacement for SUDS

Thanks for responding guys. I was hoping this would generate a little more interest but clearly I have misjudged this. To Fred I would say that whilst the aims of sustainable development are an important thing to strive for we are fooling ourselves if we think that the application of SuDS achieves this. Furthermore with the current political climate in the UK, particularly in local government, the term"sustainable" may even be becoming counter productive. Planning officers may find it easier to convince their political masters that they should implement a policy of "Low Impact Developent" than one of "Sustainable Drainage". Words can be very important in local government. 

Dear Alan and colleagues,

This question is of high importance cause there are excesive number of ways to call SUDS across the world. There is no particular consensus in defining a common name for them and that produces some problems to identify the research carried out for other researchers in other parts of the world. In my experience in Spain, we have used no less than 3 different names to refer to these systems, being the acronym SUDS the most accepted across the country lately. In the Spanish case SUDS stands for "Sistemas Urbanos de Drenaje Sostenible", replicating almost literally the English acronym that lies in the centre of this question.

I agree with the comments from my colleagues when they pointed out that Low Impact Development (LID) techniques are part of a much wider set of techniques that includes not only drainage techniques but also environmental techniques. Not only that but also LID is consider as a phylosophy and its techniques are called Best Management Practices (BMPs). Within these practices, the Stormwater BMPs are the ones that can be compared with the UK and Spanish SUDS terminology.

In conclusion, I agree with Alan that the US definition and terminology is perhaps more accurate to define these systems, at least from a civil engineering perspective. The name is open as can see in BMP and also is part of a wider phylosophy. Also the term stormwater makes an even clearer approach to the application of these systems. Nevertheless, I would like to have the opinion of other colleagues across the world with different professions and backgrounds to open this dicsussion to all the SUDS and BMP community around the world.

Thanks,

Luis

Dear all, I also think that Americans' concepts are too much simplified: they talk about LID meaning SUDS, when it is a quite more complete philosophy, and they use BMPs referring only to Stormwater BMPs, when there are Erosion BMPs, Energy BMPs... In this discussion I'm with the Australians: WSUD is quite more direct and clear to talk about we want to talk. I think that WSUD is being assumed in US and even in UK, why not in the rest of Europe?

Some proposals for Stormwater BMPs:

Water Sensitive Urban-and-road Design

Low Hydrological-impact Development

Thanks Jorge and Luis for contributing to this discussion. I look forward to other contributions, perhaps from those who can argue the case that "Sustainable" in SuDS can really be justified.

Dear collegues,

I think that it is a very important question, so i want to make my little contribution to the discussion started by Alan.

In my opinion, all the names used right now: LID, BMP or SuDS does not shown the real purpose of the techniques described. For example, the first time that i listen the term "Low Impact Development", the first idea that cross my mind was: what kind of impact? and what kind of development? Similarly occurs with the terminology of Best Management Practices. As other collegues pointed out, LID is used in a wide sense because refers to many aspects, and not only to drainage. The term BMP is normally used to the techniques applied for LID, so there are many BMP depending on the application field. Hence, in my opinion, both terms are not too accurate.In this sense i think that the use of SuDS terminology is more clear because, at least, defines the field that we are talking about: drainage. Maybe the complete US terminology: Stormwater BMP is more accurate in the description of the techniques, as Ernest suggested.

Personally, I think that the inclusion of the term "Sustainable" can be usefull to "sell" the idea to the society for the implications that this term have. In fact SuDS techniques fulfill the sustainable triangle, so the sustainable approach exists in this techniques in comparison with the traditional drainage systems. However, in many countries, the "sustainable" terminology is probably identified by public agents as expensive solutions (at least initially) whose benefits can only be perceived after so many time, and for that reason are probably limited to particular applications, and not widely used in new urban developments or in retrofitting actions. Hence, although SuDS techniques are sustainable, and the term is correctly used, i agree with Alan that it could probably be counter productive.

I propose two alternative names, with and without the term Sustainable: Low Impact Drainage Systems (LIDS) or Sustainable Stormwater Management Systems (SSMS)

Thank you Valerio. In fact I had, in response to previous comments, been thinking about "Low Impact Drainage Systems" myself. When thinking about the term "Sustainable" my position ( and it is not shared by many, I think) is that something is either sustainable or it is not, and cannot be more sustainable or less sustainable. However my major objection to the word is the more practical ones I expressed above.  Once again , thanks for the contribution and please encourage others to take part.