The Global Water Summit 2022 was held 16-18th May and was our largest gathering with over 800 high-level executives from industry, municipalities and international water companies, representing over 60 countries. Read on, or use the links below, to explore the various facets of GWS 2022:

To see the various facets of GWS 2022 highlighted on this page you can navigate using the links below:

• Theme
• Delegates
• One-to-one meetings
• Agenda Sessions
• Roundtables
• Audience participation
• Speakers
• Awards
• GWS 2022 in pictures

Climate change is changing water. Let’s make it a change for the better. That was the objective of the 2022 Global Water Summit in Madrid: mapping out a route to a better future for water through the climate emergency.  

The threat of greater extremes of floods and droughts is a challenge for the water industry but it is also an opportunity. The linkages between water and energy mean that we can fix emissions by fixing water and we can fix water by fixing emissions. These synergies together with the global political commitment for climate action create the potential for transformational change. We as an industry need a strategy to make best use of it.

We called it water positive zero carbon. It is about looking for new ways to contribute to the wealth and reliability of the world’s freshwater resources while at the same time reducing emissions to mitigate the impact of climate change. It is a complex challenge. It will involve finance, innovation and the evolution of new services. It needs to be understood by utility and industrial water users alike. Everyone across the supply chain has a contribution to make. 

That’s why over 800 industry experts joined us in Madrid fro GWS 2022. On-line meetings had been good for maintaining relationships but nothing matched the creative energy of face-to-face engagement during an intense two day summit. It is simply the best way of connecting with new people and new ideas to reimagine the future. Delegates left the Summit with a mind buzzing with new possibilities and an enlarged and refreshed professional network.

Read more about what happened during GWS 2022 in GWI Publisher Christopher Gasson’s column “Eight things I learned at the Global Water Summit”:

Senior executives from over 60 countries joined us in Madrid for 3 days of intense discussions and a whirlwind of sessions.

The summit this year saw intense one-to-one networking, with over 600 confirmed one-to-one meetings taking place. Below you can see the full network chart of all meetings that happened during GWS 2022.

This year the Summit held 16 sessions during the agenda sessions, grouped under 7 strands. The tree diagram below shows which sessions happened during GWS 2022.

This year the Summit hosted 40 roundtable discussions. The wordcloud below shows what was discussed during the roundtables session.

Members of the audience were asked to participate in voting on various questions during the Summit to aid panel discussions and get a sense of what the global water industry thinks about various issues. You can find some of the results below.

This year we welcomed over 200 speakers to GWS, the list below shows speakers who participated in the Opening Plenaries on days 1 and 2.

The Global Water Awards took place at the La Quinta De Jarama in Madrid on Day 1 of The Global Water Summit. 13 awards were presented to celebrate the greatest achievements over the previous year, rewarding the initiatives and companies in the water, wastewater and desalination sectors that are moving the industry forward through improved operating performance, innovative technology adoption and sustainable financial models.

Trophies were also presented to new members of the Leading Utilities of the World network. Membership in this network is a recognition that a utility is among the best in the world, based on relative improvement as much as absolute achievement. The five new members were accepted into the network in a meeting held at The Global Water Summit on 17th May where each presented their achievements to the network’s advisory board – all of whom also represent utilities that have an unimpeachable record of innovation and performance.