Despite considerable efforts to improve water management, India is becoming increasingly water stressed due to multiple factors, including climate change, increasing population, and urbanization. We address one of the most challenging problems in the design of water treatment plants: how to select a suitable technology for a specific scenario or context. The process of decision making first requires the identification of feasible treatment configurations based on various objectives and criteria. In addition, the multiplicity of water quality parameters and design variables adds further complexity to the process. In this study, we propose a novel Decision Support Tool (DST), designed to address and support the above challenges. In this user-friendly tool, both Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis (MCDA) and Multi-Objective Optimization (MOO) methods are employed. The integration of MCDA with MOO facilitates the generation of feasible drinking water treatment solutions, identifies optimal options, and ultimately, improves the process of decision making. This implemented approach has been tested for different contexts, including for different types of raw water sources and system implementation scales. The results show that this tool can enhance the process of decision making, supporting the user (e.g., stakeholders and decision makers) to implement the most suitable water treatment systems, keeping in view the trade-offs.

The over-arching goal of the WATERLINE project is the creation of a European Digital Water Higher Education Institution (HEI) Alliance, with a core part of this goal being the development and delivery of meaningful water engineering education through extended reality technology, allowing students to engage with virtualised water engineering models, such as flume tanks and water distribution networks in a manner that will promote engaged deep learning. To realise this goal, researchers need to engage with pedagogic, creative, and technical considerations to ensure that water engineering students are presented with engaging applications that provide the “right” knowledge and provide experiences where deep and memorable learning can take place.