Water knowledge for the whole world

Tom Franitza pours himself a glass of water. From the tap, of course. “There is nothing better,” he says and drinks. He should know: the 25-year-old is studying water management and has just passed his master’s exams at the TU Dresden. During his studies, however, he not only dealt with the quality of German drinking water: water supply, water treatment and flood protection are global issues. For example, when tomatoes, peppers and dates flourish in the scorching heat of Israel, some people wonder how that works? The answer is simple at first - with a lot of pouring. But where do you get the water from, in an area where it is particularly precious and rare? This is where water managers play an important role. They know how to treat, store and reuse the resource water. This is also the case in Israel: In a huge infiltration system near Tel Aviv, purified wastewater from the largest sewage treatment plant in the country is filtered through several layers of soil - afterwards it is almost drinking water quality and is pumped for irrigation of the vegetable fields. “As a result of climate change, such models are also becoming more and more interesting for our regions,” says Tom Franitza.

In his bachelor thesis he dealt with the optimization of infiltration systems using the example of the system in Tel Aviv and researched for several months in Israel. “This unit has been working for around 20 years, but the capacity will not be sufficient due to the population growth. So a question arises: how we can infiltrate more wastewater? ”For Tom Franitza an exciting research topic - and in the future, perhaps for millions of people, an important contribution to irrigation, even in dry and hot summers.

An English master's degree

The international orientation of the hydrosciences at TUD also shows how popular water knowledge is worldwide: the English master’s course "Hydro Science and Engineering" with around 60 places is mainly attended by students from China, the Arab region, Africa and Colombia, informs Christina Görner from the field of hydrosciences. "The education in Germany has a good reputation."

Marco Andres Diaz-Suarez followed this reputation: the Colombian studied civil engineering and environmental engineering in his home country. He then worked for an engineering consultancy company, where he also dealt more closely with water: "Water supply, quality and disposal are a big issue in Colombia," says the 33-year-old. When looking for an English course in this direction, he finally decided on Germany after a stay in Australia. He received a scholarship from the DAAD and was able to start studying at TUD. Cologne and Hanover would also have been possible - but in Dresden the program and the structure of the course convinced him the most, he says.

He was particularly impressed by an excursion to flood protection systems in central Germany and the Czech Republic: "I was able to learn a lot about flood risk management from the real examples" he says. In his master's thesis, he dealt with the question of how dam breaks can be simulated in software and thus also prevented. This software is also international: Developed as freeware by researchers from Zurich, it is further programmed by scientists worldwide. Marco Andres Diaz-Suarez now works for the Dresden engineering office iKD Ingenieur-Consult and advises the Free State of Saxony on flood protection, among other things.

More information about the project

Tom Franitza's bachelor thesis is part of the SATPlanner project, which researches and develops infiltration systems. The stay abroad, which lasted several months, was made possible by the financial support of the federal government in the Young Scientist Exchange Program YSEP:
SAT Plannerweb or more information here.

Going abroad while studying?

If students have questions about stays abroad, the International Office of the TU Dresden provides information and advice, and is also the contact point for foreign students who want to study at the TU Dresden: tu-dresden.de/international

Author Iris Weiße