28/05/2026
Great to be at the Water NZ Stormwater Conference this year and see the momentum building across the sector.
A big congratulations to Charlotte Arcus for winning the Best Poster Award, and to our team for being shortlisted for the Best Paper Award, “All Dressed Up With Nowhere To Flow: The Curious Case of Fitzgibbon’s Alternative Water Supplies” — exploring the regulatory, governance and institutional barriers to decentralised alternative water supply, and the key lessons learnt that Australia and Aotearoa can draw from for advancing water security.
We also heard excellent presentations from Riley de Jong and Sean Hinton at Bligh Tanner and from Tonkin + Taylor’s Mark Ho**er, Tessa Allan, and Lisa Dowson, alongside a strong programme of workshops and panels exploring how stormwater reform is taking shape in practice. Alex Cartwright’s paper on bridging the gap between systems and responsibilities to better manage risk was another highlight.
One of the strongest themes throughout the conference was the shift from reactive flood recovery to more proactive risk management. With flooding events becoming more frequent and severe, the need for sustained investment in stormwater infrastructure is increasingly hard to ignore, particularly compared with the regulatory focus on drinking water and wastewater.
It was encouraging to see the progress made across the industry in the last year, including discussions around potential revisions to rainfall considerations and how organisations are working toward meeting statutory requirements under reform.
