Blog by Caroline van den Berg, World Bank Group
If time travel were possible, and an engineer from the 1860s could travel in time to 2019, he (the first female engineer had not graduated yet) would not recognize much of the technology we have today. Personal computers, cell phones, cars, planes, and antibiotics would probably be unfathomable to him. But he would definitely recognize our current piped water and sanitation (WSS) infrastructure, as it looks and operates almost exactly the same as it did 150 years ago. Certainly, there have been significant improvements in the sector, especially in water and wastewater treatment, but the principles on which the piped WSS technology is based have not seen any fundamental changes since the 1860s, when it was (re)introduced on a large scale.
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