Water availability for sustainable energy policy: assessing cases in South and South East Asia
This study tries to identify the initial issues of the water energy nexus by determining the demand for water by the energy sector to meet the needs of the economy. It also estimates for certain countries the total water available in the long term for the energy sector. It has been observed that there is no such systematic approach taken by the regional governments to assess the long-term water availability exclusively for the energy sector. Water for human and commercial consumption is more or less monitored and reported but there is a large gap when carrying out estimations for the energy sector. However, the energy sector in south Asia is heavily water-dependent and more precisely water-inefficient in the context of specific water consumption for energy. As a matter of fact, Asian developing economies especially countries like India are very vulnerable to long-term water availability for energy production.