Urban Drainage Group

Our vision and aims

The CIWEM Urban Drainage Group (UDG) sustains the excellence of people professionally engaged in urban drainage management now and for future generations. It continues the work of WaPUG which was established in 1984.

The aims and objectives of the Urban Drainage Group are aligned with CIWEM’s Royal Charter. They are to:

• Advance the science and practice of urban drainage management for the public benefit.
• Promote education, training, study and research in urban drainage management and to publish the results of such research.
• Establish and maintain appropriate standards of competence for urban drainage management Professionals.

Please contact us at udg@ciwem.org

UDG community page

Get more involved with the Urban Drainage Group! For the latest announcements and discussions, please visit your UDG community page by logging into your account.

UDG New Members Development community page

This is a page for all people working towards becoming a qualified member of CIWEM. We are hoping this would be an opportunity to have discussions on key topics; keep up to date with events and activities relevant to those in training; and ask questions of senior members of the UDG communities.

There is a recognition that many members in the UDG community have the same challenges in completing their competencies, and sharing examples of how these objectives are met can help overcome these hurdles. The value of this page will increase with use, so do contribute.

If you have suggestions on how to improve this page please contact James Hale james.hale@rpsgroup.com or Fiona Barbour fiona.barbour@mottmac.com.

Diary Dates 2022

UDG Annual Conference - 8th-10th November 2022

CIWEM’s Urban Drainage Group continues it long traditional of hosting its annual conference in the autumn as the culmination of a year of highly regarded events including our first time hosting our Spring Conference in conjunction with our colleagues at Flood & Coast.

UDG AUTUMN CONFERENCE 2022 will be taking place at HILTON BIRMINGHAM METROPOLE from 8th -10th November.

With Urban Drainage making headlines in the popular press and generating emotive debate in the House of Commons it has never been more timely for us to return to an in-person event and come together to continue to share best practice, emerging techniques and technologies, and debate how to address numerous fast approaching challenges.

In confronting these challenges this year we will focus on 3 main themes:

• Delivering on societies expectations for overflow spill reductions and mitigating wider environmental impact – including, and spanning well beyond, the modelling implications of achieving both interim reductions in frequency and ultimately 10 spills per annum whilst maintaining the serviceability of the network
• Sewerage Planning - with the Drainage and Wastewater Management Plans coming to a conclusion and the Periodic Review for England and Wales in full swing numerous aspects of our evolving approaches to managing risk, asset health, and future change will be considered against the backdrop of stakeholder engagement
• Partnership Outcomes - Recognising that concrete alone can not offer viable solutions to all flooding and overflow reduction ambitions the importance and benefit of partnership working is ever increasingly. With schemes now successfully operating it is opportune to reflect on both successes and lessons learnt.

To support these themes, we are delighted to be welcoming a number of guest speakers from across the spectrum of opinion and continuing to build on recent successes will be hosting a series of round tables to explore viewpoints, test the status quo, and provide direction to our Urban Drainage community to tackle the upcoming significant changes.

The event offers a range of formal papers and workshops spread across 3 days, an expected 200 plus delegates, an exhibition space, and the Conference dinner.

Full Conference Programme

UDG Annual General Meeting 2022 | IN-PERSON

Notice is hereby given that the Annual General Meeting of the CIWEM Urban Drainage Group is scheduled to be held on Thursday 10 November 2022 2:00 pm GMT at the Hilton Metropole Hotel, NEC Birmingham, United Kingdom.

Items for the Agenda

Any member wishing to raise a subject for discussion at the Annual General Meeting shall send written notice specifying the subject to the chair, Kieran Downey at Kieran.Downey@scottishwater.co.uk or the honorary secretary, Mark Russell at mark.russell@yorkshirewater.co.uk by 9:00am Thursday 13 October 2022.

Call for nominations to the Branch Committee

Those members wishing to be nominated for election for the vacant positions on the committee should send their completed nomination forms to the chair, Kieran Downey at Kieran.Downey@scottishwater.co.uk or the honorary secretary, Mark Russell at mark.russell@yorkshirewater.co.uk by 9:00am Thursday 13 October 2022.

The draft minutes of the CIWEM Urban Drainage group Annual General Meeting 2021 and nomination form are available below along with a description of the committee role summary:

Draft minutes of the CIWEM Urban Drainage Group Annual General Meeting 2021

Nomination form 2022

Committee role summary

Diary Dates 2023

UDG Training Day | 28-29 March 2023, Hybrid - Zoom and regional hubs (tbc)

UDG Spring Conference within Flood & Coast | 7th June 2023, Telford

UDG Annual Conference | 7-9 November 2023, venue tbc

CIWEM UDG Annual Conference - Highlights 2022