The University of Nebraska-Lincoln's annual public water and natural resources seminar begins Jan. 11, 2012 and continues weekly through April 25. The lecture series continues its tradition of offering a wide range of water-related topics, including several on surface water and groundwater modeling.
Beginning Jan. 11, the UNL Water Center-sponsored lectures are each Wednesday, except Feb. 15 and March 14 and 21, from 3:30 to 4:30 p.m. in the first floor auditorium of Hardin Hall, northeast corner of North 33rd and Holdrege streets, UNL East Campus, Lincoln. In addition, three lectures will be on Fridays as part of a series hosted by Environmental and Water Resources Engineering and the UNL Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences.
The lectures begin with an introduction to hydrological models, including how they are created and applied, by William Woessner of the University of Montana. This is also the first of eight lectures comprising the modeling series, five of which are containing in the Water Center series and three of which will be delivered on separate Fridays.
"Modeling may not immediately come to mind when you think about water, but it is an increasingly critical tool used for water management, both for quantity and quality. UNL is increasingly interested in modeling and this series is designed to help explore the different aspects of modeling UNL could get more involved with. The speakers for these lectures are tops in their fields, with many known internationally for their modeling work," said Water Center assistant director and seminar organizer Lorrie Benson.
"After Jan. 11, subsequent lectures will give everyone a better understanding of the different types of models being developed and used, ranging from large, global, theoretical models to very applied models for specific uses, such as predicting water quality in agriculturally dominated landscapes. One lecture will explore how human dimensions aspects, such as economics, are incorporated into models," she said.
Many of the modeling lectures will be part of the Water Center series on Wednesday afternoons; others will be included in other series organized by the entities mentioned above.
Modeling lecture partners include UNL's School of Natural Resources, Environmental and Water Resources Engineering and Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences. A partner for the Wednesday afternoon lectures is the UNL Norman and Bernice Harris Center for Judaic Studies. The Water Center is affiliated with the Robert B. Daugherty Water for Food Institute.
Other lectures in the series delve into topics such as managing Africa's water, valuing freshwater ecosystem goods and services, lessons learned from the 2011 Missouri River flood, in-stream flows and climate change impacts.
The final lecture in the series is a panel discussion on moving large amounts of water from where they are to where they may be needed. Panelists are Mark Pifher, Aurora Water; Don Blankenau, Blankenau Wilmoth LLP; and Terry McArthur, HDR Engineering Inc. Pifher will talk about his experiences buying water and building pipelines on the Front Range in Colorado, Blankenau will consider legal and political realities of moving water in Nebraska, and McArther will address engineering. The discussion is scheduled for 90 minutes, extending the lecture to 5 p.m.
No lecture is scheduled Feb. 15, when Benson urges people to attend the E.N. Thompson Forum on World Affairs lecture at 7 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 16, where Mogens Bay and E. Robert Meaney will discuss whether a global water crisis is avoidable. That lecture is at Lincoln's downtown Lied Center for Performing Arts and is free to the public, but tickets are required. For more information on the lecture and E.N. Thompson Forum, go to enthompson.unl.edu.
There also are no lectures on March 14 or 21 (UNL’s spring break).
A complete lecture schedule is online at watercenter.unl.edu. Videos of most lectures, along with speaker PowerPoint presentations, will be posted on that website within a few days of the lectures.
Spring 2012 Water Seminar Series (3:30-4:30 p.m., UNL Hardin Hall unless noted):
Jan. 11: Formulating, Applying and Constraining Hydrological Models: Modeling 101, William Woessner, University of Montana (modeling subset)
Jan. 18: Using Hydrologic Models to Estimate the Impact of Climate Change on River Flows, Water Supply Reliability and Ecosystem Responses, Richard Palmer, University of Massachusetts Amherst (modeling subset)
Jan. 25: The Future of Hydroinformatics for Managing Water, David Maidment, University of Texas-Austin (modeling subset)
Feb. 1: Managing Africa's Water, Marc Andreini, University of Nebraska
Feb. 8: Ecohydrology: Coupling, Connectivity, and Challenges in Forested Catchments, Holly Barnard, University of Colorado at Boulder
Feb. 15: No seminar. Please attend E. N. Thompson Forum on World Affairs lecture, 7 p.m., Thursday, Feb. 16, Lied Center for Performing Arts Mogens C. Bay and E. Robert Meaney: Is a Global Water Crisis Avoidable? Tickets free but required. enthompson.unl.edu
Feb. 22: Can Technological Optimism Trump the Politics of Scarcity? Water Resource Management in the Middle East, Alon Tal, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev
Feb. 29: Valuation of Freshwater Ecosystem Goods and Services, Walter Dodds, Kansas State University
March 2: Review of Water Quantity and Quality Applications of the SWAT Model in the USA, Raghaven Srinivasan, Texas A&M University, 11-12 p.m., Scott Engineering Center 111
March 7: Missouri River Mainstem Reservoir System – Lessons Learned from 2011 Flood of Record, Kevin Grode, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
March 14: No seminar
March 21: No seminar (UNL Spring Break)
March 28: Integrating Hydrology and Economics: The Challenge of Practical Modeling, Richard Howitt, University of California, Davis (modeling subset)
April 4: Environmental Flows in an Arid Landscape, Shannon Brewer, Oklahoma State University
April 11: Modeling and Forecasting a Groundwater-Dominated Ecosystem, David Steward, Kansas State University (modeling subset)
April 13: Hydroinformatics: Optimization and Uncertainties of Integrating Data, Models and Decisions, Dimitri Solomatine, UNESCO Institute for Water Education, 11-12 p.m., Scott Engineering Center 111
April 18: Assessing the Ecohydrological Effects of Land Use Change Across Multiple Scales: From Leaves to Watersheds, Heidi Asbjornsen, University of New Hampshire
April 20: A Physically-Based Approach to Assess the Impact of Climate Change on Canadian Water Resources, Ed Sudicky, University of Waterloo, 3:30-4:30 p.m., Bessey Hall Room 117
April 25: Economics, Engineering and Law: The Realities of Moving Large Quantities of Water Long Distances – Mark Pifher, Aurora Water; Don Blankenau, Blankenau Wilmoth LLP; Terry McArthur, HDR Engineering, Inc; 3:30-5 p.m.
More details at: http://go.unl.edu/sqd