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School of Civil, Environmental
and Mining Engineering

Engineering North N136,
North Terrace Campus
THE UNIVERSITY OF ADELAIDE
SA 5005
AUSTRALIA
Email

Telephone: +61 8 8303 5451
Facsimile: +61 8 8303 4359


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Welcome to the Water & Environmental Engineering Research Group

Introduction

The Water and Environmental Engineering Research Group includes seven tenured full-time academic staff.  The staffing profile reflects the strength of the group, with 1 Professor, 4 Associate Professors and 2 Senior Lecturers.  The research carried out by this research group is innovative and covers areas of sustainable water resources and infrastructure modelling and management ranging from hydrology to hydraulics, open channels to pipelines, hidden Markov models to Artificial Neural Networks and the modelling and management of water supply infrastructure to that of natural water resources. Significant achievements and highlights of the group in the development and application of innovative techniques for sustainable water resources and infrastructure modelling and management include:

  1. Development of Genetic Algorithm optimisation for water distribution system design (Simpson and Dandy). This has resulted in highly cited publications and a spin-off company called Optimatics.

  2. Development of pipeline condition assessment techniques (Simpson and Lambert). A PhD student in this area was awarded the Lorenz G. Straub Award for the best hydraulics PhD thesis internationally. This research has produced a substantial number of publications in top international journals and the research team has been successful in obtaining multiple discovery and industry linkage ARC grants. There is considerable commercial potential for this research and the research group is credited with the development of several new diagnostic techniques.

  3. Development and application of Artificial Neural Networks in hydrology and water resources management (Maier and Dandy).  A large number of highly cited and innovative international journal publications have emerged from this group.  ARC Discovery grants and linkage grants have also been obtained.

  4. Development of innovative techniques for the modelling of bottom roughness and morphological changes in coastal environments (Walker and Lambert). The work of one PhD student in this area has recently been published in the prestigious Journal of Geophysical Research and another PhD student has recently been offered a Post-doctoral position at Kings College, London.

  5. A national award, the Warren Medal, was recently awarded to two papers by Associate Professor Trevor Daniell on innovative research on new thinking in the development of sustainable systems.

  6. Development of the non-parametric hidden Markov method to identify climate states (Lambert and Metcalfe). This novel approach overcomes many of the current drawbacks with the use of hidden Markov models in climate state identification.

Members of the Water and Environmental Engineering group currently supervise 23 PhD students. The group is a solid performer nationally, with a strong publication record and grant income.  The research strengths of this group are distinctive and unique in Australia. Internationally we are recognised as a strong research group in

  1. The development and application of evolutionary algorithm and artificial neural network techniques to water and environmental engineering

  2. Pipe system condition assessment and monitoring using fluid transients

All the academics involved in this group have new research areas to explore and see a need to

  1. Improve our scale and focus in the area of sustainable management of water resources, such as water re-use, water recycling, dual reticulation systems, rainwater use, efficient water use practices, efficient pumping of water, stormwater treatment and reuse and wetlands. This is a substantial research growth area.
  2. Build additional research capacity in the research areas of nominated strength using post-doctoral and early career researchers.

Aims and Objectives

  1. To develop and apply innovative techniques for sustainable water resources and infrastructure modelling and management.
  2. To be world leaders in our areas of research.
  3. To communicate research findings in high quality books, journals and appropriate major thematic conferences.
  4. To grow the number of research staff and HDR students in the group.
  5. To provide an exciting, world-class research training environment.
  6. To increase the staff profile in identified strategic and growth areas.
  7. To develop strong research collaborations with other researchers and industry partners.
  8. To promote and facilitate the adoption of research outcomes by industry and the profession.

Group Members

Contact

Water & Environmental Engineering Research Group
THE UNIVERSITY OF ADELAIDE
SA 5005
AUSTRALIA
Email
Tel:  +61 8 8303 5451
Fax: +61 8 8303 4359