Renowned socio-hydrologist Prof. Murugesu Sivapalan, Chester & Helen Siess Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, will be at the University of Waterloo on September 26 to deliver a Water Institute WaterTalk entitled “Imagineering” Not Just Engineering Needed to Solve Water Security Challenges”.
Murugesu
Sivapalan
holds
a
B.S.
Civil
Engineering
(University
of
Ceylon),
M.Eng
in
Water
Resources
Engineering
(AIT,
Thailand),
and
obtained
his
Ph.D
from
Princeton
University
in
1986.
He
was
Professor
of
Environmental
Engineering
at
the
University
of
Western
Australia
for
17
years,
before
joining
University
of
Illinois
in
2005.
Prof.
Sivapalan
has
published
on
a
wide
range
of
topics,
including
effects
of
heterogeneity
and
scale,
flood
frequency,
ecohydrology
and
water
balance
and
water
quality
modeling.
He
was
Executive
Editor
of
the
Hydrology
and
Earth
System
Sciences
journal,
and
was
founding
chair
of
the
International
Association
of
Hydrological
Sciences’
Decade
on
Predictions
in
Ungauged
Basins
initiative.
Prof.
Sivapalan
has
received
several
awards
for
his
research
contributions,
including
the
John
Dalton
and
Alfred
Wegener
Medals
of
the
European
Geosciences
Union
and
the
Robert
Horton
Medal
of
the
American
Geophysical
Union.
He
was
joint
recipient
of
the
Prince
Sultan
Bin
Abdulaziz
International
Prize
for
Water
awarded
in
recognition
of
his
role
in
developing
and
leading
the
new
field
of
sociohydrology.
Many parts of the world are facing severe water crises. Historically engineers and domain experts are tasked with design and implementation of technological solutions to water problems, such as the building of dams, pipelines and desalination plants. These work well in the short term, but non-involvement of the beneficiaries of the water works, the people themselves, in conceptualization and execution of otherwise well-intentioned and well-designed solutions often leads to unintended, even adverse, consequences due to issues not considered in the designs and due to non-acceptance by society. Prof. Sivapalan will illustrate this through examples of water management problems in Sri Lanka, Australia, USA, China and Europe, which prompted the launch and growth of the field of sociohydrology. He will put these in the context of UN Sustainable Development Goals related to water, which provide renewed motivation for engineers, social scientists and humanists to come together and work towards developing imaginative solutions for many water security challenges faced by communities around the world.
Join us and register for the talk here.
