Prince Sultan Prize recognizes UK professor's 25 years of hydrological efforts

June 14, 2007 -- Integrated and sustainable management of water resources requires two main capabilities: appropriate scientific understanding of the hydrology that determines the availability of surface and groundwater resources; and use of appropriate modeling tools to support assessment of water resource sustainability and the development and evaluation of strategies for integrated management.

The ability to manage water resources effectively in arid and semi-arid areas has been severely limited by poor knowledge and understanding of the special hydrological characteristics of these areas, and the lack of modeling tools to represent these special characteristics adequately.

One man's work to remedy these deficiencies has won him the Prince Sultan International Water Prize for 2004-2006. Professor Howard Wheater is Professor of Hydrology at Imperial College in London, UK, and has been working for 25 years to improve the understanding of the hydrology of these areas.

Water resources modeling
Professor Wheater has sought to develop suitable modeling tools for management, to apply these in practice for improved water resources management, and to disseminate state-of-the-art information to students and practitioners. This has particular application in arid and semi-arid areas, which brought him particular favor with the Prince Sultan Prize, which rewards research to improve water resources in these regions (see panel).

His latest endeavor, in June 2007, was to organize an International Workshop on Groundwater Modeling for Arid and Semi-Arid Areas in Lanzhou, China. The Lanzhou workshop brings together the world's leading experts and an invited set of participants from the world's arid regions, to provide information on state-of-the-art groundwater methods and modeling tools, and to provide training material and case studies.

To read further about Professor Wheater and the Prince Sultan Prize, go to www.psipw.org.

---
Also see:
-- "The Prince's Prize will exhibit at ACE 07"

###