Water Resources Management, Groundwater Management, and Contaminant Transport

Protecting aquatic environments and ecosystems is essential to ensuring a sustainable future. The goal of this research is to understand how contaminants are transported in surface and ground water systems, including rivers, lakes, coastal waters and aquifers, how they spread and are diluted as they are transported, as well as their fate in these environments. The research includes laboratory experiments and the development of simplified as well as complex three-dimensional models. Prediction of contamination extent and dilution is of significant importance in engineering applications related to water quality modelling and prediction. It is also important in the design of wastewater treatment plants and industrial outfalls, as well as the modelling of spills for emergency response planning and management purposes.

Water resources can be seen as a vital resource that is used for municipal and industrial supply, irrigation, transportation, transportation, and ecosystem preservation. It is also the vector of the most devastating natural disasters such as floods and droughts. The research can be used to ensure that humans’ and ecosystems’ need for water are optimally allocated in periods of scarcity, that usages are ethically prioritized, and the environment is preserved whenever possible. It can be used to sustainably manage water resource systems and build infrastructures that are resilient to climate change.

Groundwater resources also serve as a valuable resource for drinking water and many industrial processes. Past practices have led to the contamination of this resource and research is needed to improve our understanding of the fate and transport of these contaminants in the subsurface and to develop remediation technologies to restore the water quality of these resources. Leakage of methane, carbon dioxide and hydrogen around energy wells and storage sites or through caprock above carbon sequestration facilities, are potential sources of greenhouse gas emissions and research is needed to understand the transport and fate of greenhouse gases in the subsurface and their eventual emission rates to the atmosphere.