New Water Policy and Practice Issue 4, Number 1, Fall 2017 | Page 46

New Water Policy & Practice Journal supported four other positions in drinking water quality management and supply, including ensuring water quality in Perth’s metropolitan distribution network and regional operations. More recently, Emma has joined the AWA YWP committee in WA, as well as the AWA YWP National Specialist Network. Emma has come to appreciate that it takes more than just a strong technical ability to positively address water management challenges, it also requires strong communication and collaboration skills to ensure the right people work together to provide informed, relevant, and effective solutions. With this, she felt motivated to begin her Masters of Integrated Water Management through the International Water Centre part time in 2016. This has been a professionally and personally re- warding experience for Emma. She has seen her final master’s project as an oppor- tunity to pursue international experience with water management challenges, a personal ambition of hers, and so will be undertaking her final project in Portugal in 2018. Emma hopes this will lead to further opportunities to apply her skills to address water challenges in the international water industry. Risk-Based Pesticide Monitoring in Drinking Water Catchments in Western Australia T his paper will introduce a three-year research project developed and undertaken by Emma at Water Corporation (the Corporation) to in- vestigate pesticide risk to drinking water quality in WA, and how this fits within the water governance in the state. Pesticide Research Project The pesticide project, solely funded by the Corporation, began in September 2015 and has an estimated completion date of June 2018. The objective of the project is to identify and implement efficiencies with risk-based pesticide monitoring in drinking water catchments in WA. This project was developed to address two key areas: (1) the Corporation’s drive to increase its under- standing of pesticide risk to drinking water quality, and (2) that the Corpora- tion’s regulatory requirement for pesticide monitoring could increase in the future, as had occurred in 2014 on the adoption of the 2011 version of the Australian Drinking Water Guidelines (ADWG). The 2011 version included an extensive list of 155 pesticides, not all of which relevant to WA. Prior to this project, initial work was completed to identify all relevant pesticides for ongoing routine monitoring which included an increase from 45 to 97 pes- ticides. This presented cost and resourcing challenges to the Corporation. It is expected that this regulatory requirement could increase in the future as more chemicals enter the market. 44