Table 2 Selection of urban water assessment tools

City Blueprint

Aims at overall sustainability of Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) in municipalities and regions. A main focus is on the integration of water, waste and climate adaptation in cities. Uses mostly data from International organisations [45,46,47]

Urban Water Blueprint

Defines the watershed conservation potential for 534 cities evaluating five conservation activities: reforestation, agricultural best management practices; Riparian restoration, Forest protection, Forest fuel reduction [48]

Water Sensitive Cities Index

The WSCI is designed to benchmark and rank cities based on water sensitivity performance. It also set targets and inform management responses to improve water-sensitive practices. It is supported by a web platform to enable visualisations of benchmarking results for a range of audiences, including policy makers and service providers [49]

Sustainability index for Urban Water Management System

The sustainability index can be seen as a precursor to the aforementioned City Blue Print. It addresses 74 criteria of urban water management: social, economic, environment and engineering [50]

Sustainable Cities Water Index

The index focuses solely on water through three main factors, each with their own sub-indices: resiliency, efficiency and quality. Each city has been ranked based on these three tenants in order to raise awareness of the role of water management in defining a city. The tools are intended to guide future improvements, investment and water sustainability [51]

Urban Water Utility Sustainability Framework

Initial results of U.S. urban water utility sustainability indicate that many of the preliminary indicators are closely connected to energy. Further study will finalize the set of recommended indicators, but it is clear that energy will play a key role in the “snapshot” assessment of urban water utility sustainability [52]

Water Use and Climate Index (WUCI)

The WUCI analyses and presents data of 142 cities and the re-grouping of them using a hierarchical cluster analyses [53]

Sustainable Development of Energy, Water, and Environment Systems (SDEWES) Index

This tool addresses the sustainable development of energy, water and environment systems through an integrated approach with the goal to foster policy learning, action and cooperation for sustainable development in cities across the globe. The index rates cities based on 7 dimensions, 35 indicators and 20 sub-indicators. It is currently used for 58 cities [54, 55]

Swedish Sustainability Index for Municipal Water and Wastewater Services

Developed by the Swedish Water and Wastewater Association (SWWA), this index is a tool for analysis and decision-making over the short and long term. It aims to prioritise actions and investments, monitor improvements, create a basis for strategic planning, and to analyse the needs of municipalities.

It does not rank municipalities but aims to provide the municipalities with their own results to build a strong and context-based solution to water and wastewater management [no citable reference]