What Do Engineering Students Need to Know about Water Ethics?

"Water ethics" has been a recognized topic of water policy since Postel identified ethics as a "missing piece" in her book Last Oasis.  A major UNESCO program on "Water and Ethics" (1997-2004) produced 11 publications/books on the topic.  In 2014 UNESCO, the Water-Culture Institute, and several other organizations launched a "Water Ethics Initiative" organized around the development of a global water ethics charter process (waterethics.org).   Choices about water policies, practices, and physical infrastructure apply sets of values and morals which are usually tacit.   Bringing these values into policy awareness to be debated by experts and civil society is emerging as a criteria sustainability strategy with a twofold aim: (1) peer review from a science perspective, and (2) democratic vetting of the options to ensure informed public input and commitment.  Learning to "see" engineering alternatives through an ethics lens can strengthen the science-policy interface, while stimulating innovative technological solutions to the challenges of sustainable water resources management.