News

The Centre for Advancement of Trenchless Technology (CATT) is pleased to publish the results of the first Canadian Buried Infrastructure Survey. The survey highlights the critical issues for municipal water, wastewater and storm water buried infrastructure. It also sheds light on the mechanisms that municipalities contemplate to address budgetary shortfalls. Furthermore, the customers’ satisfaction levels for trenchless service providers are reported.

There are graduate research opportunities (M.Sc. or Ph.D.) available for 2-3 excellent, highly motivated, student candidates interested in plot/hillslope/catchment field research on:
1. Erosional processes linking soil mobilization with sediment transport and fate in streams associated with forest harvesting activity including roads/linear disturbances in mountainous landscapes. 
2. Effects of forest harvestingon evaporatranspiration and soil moisture dynamics in mountain forest environments. 

Ric Soulis, Water Institute member and Professor in the Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering, was awarded a $140,000-two-year contract by the Ontario Ministry of Transportation (MTO) to develop improved means of determining the hydrologic characteristics of a site. 

David Blowes, Water Institute member and Professor in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, has been awarded an NSERC CREATE grant in the amount of $1.65 million. The title of the NSERC CREATE is Training toward Environmentally Responsible Resource Extraction (TERRE).

The video taken of the June 18, 2014 Public Lecture by David Schindler is now available from the Water Institute's YouTube channel. The lecture was titled Canada's Freshwater in the 21st Century and is about one hour in duration.

​Sheree Pagsuyoin, Assistant Professor in Civil & Environmental Engineering, was awarded $122,000 in funding from Grand Challenges Canada, Stars in Global Health (round 6). The project proposed by Pagsuyoin and her co-PIs J.R. Santos (George Washington University) and R.R.

Following submission of the Water Institute's Five-Year Review Report, the university's Senate Graduate and Research Council approved the Water Institute for another five year term at its May 2014 meeting.

Brian Dixon, Biology Professor and Canada Research Chair in Fish and Environmental Immunology, was awarded a Partners in Research National Award for his contributions to the Virtual Researchers on Call (VROC) program. Brian and co-recipient Craig Merrett, Carlton University, were recognized for contributing the highest number of expert hours to the VROC program. 
Brian Dixon also contributed to the VROC program with the video, For the Love of Fish, which he made for the VROC Science Scoop series. 

The video taken of the Water Institute Distinguished Lecture 2014 on May 1st by Peter Gleick is now available from the Water Institute's YouTube channel. The lecture was titledThe Past, Present and Future of the World's Water and is about one hour in duration.

Water Institute member Josh Neufeld, Assoicate Professor in Biology, was recognized by the uWaterloo's Federation of Students for his teaching excellence. The undergraduate students in Biology 240 class nominated Josh for the Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching Award. According to his students, Josh Neufeld engaged his classes with top-notch slides, presentations, animations, and videos. He shared his extreme enthusiasm about the material with students, and it proved to be contagious.