On November 24-26, 2023, the Sponge City Construction Exchange Conference was successfully held in Kunshan City, Jiangsu Province. This conference is jointly guided by the China Urban Water Association, the Jiangsu Provincial Department of Housing and Urban Rural Development, and the Suzhou Municipal People's Government. It is jointly organized by the Sponge City Construction Professional Committee of the China Urban Water Association, the Jiangsu Provincial Urban Water Supply Safety Guarantee Center, and the Kunshan Municipal People's Government. The conference, with the theme of "Ten Years of forge ahead determinedly, Creating a New Sponge Chapter Together", summarized the achievements of sponge city construction in China over the past decade, discussed and exchanged experiences, practices, and successful cases of pilot and demonstration projects for sponge city construction, helped to enhance urban drainage and flood prevention capabilities and resilience, and promoted high-quality development of sponge city construction.

More than 600 representatives from the competent departments for sponge city construction, member units of the China Urban Water Association, provincial local water association, enterprises and institutions in the urban water supply and drainage industry, and sponge city construction related units participated in this meeting. They jointly summarized the construction achievements, exchanged work experience, and looked forward to new development stages to promote urban waterlogging control, improve urban water environment, and restore urban water ecology.

At the sub-forum on "Sponge City Facility Operation, Maintenance and Industrialization"jointly chaired by Li Junqi, Deputy Director of the Sponge City Construction Professional Committee of the China Urban Water Association and Vice President of Beijing University of Civil Engineering and Architecture, and Pan Xiaojun, Deputy Director of the Sponge City Construction Professional Committee of the China Urban Water Association and Chairman of Zhongguancun Sponge City Engineering Research Institute Co., Ltd, Cai Junwen, Chief Engineer of GuHong (Shanghai) Environmental Engineering Equipment Co., Ltd., believes that pipe network control and overflow pollution removal technology have good effects in sponge cities and can be combined with the development of resilient cities to meet future development needs.