Category: General

Flooding in Pakistan

Posted on by mmd2172 in Climate Change and its Social Consequences, Disasters and Conflict, General, Water Resource Management

Project by James Rising (with Prof. John Mutter):

This research has two complementary directions: studying the projected evolution of flood variability in the Himalayan floodplain with respect to glacier melt. What portion of the current flooding along Himalayan rivers is attributable to glacier melt, and how will that change as the glaciers retreat?  Second, I’m focusing on the economic consequences of floods for Pakistan, using an inter-sectoral model of their economy.  When floods hit agriculture, for example, how does that trickle down to other sectors, and what sectors are most likely to be unaffected?

Rural Household Residential Water Use Behavior in Northern China

Posted on by mmd2172 in General, Water Resource Management

Project by Xiaojia Bao:

This paper modeled household water use in a water-scarce rural village in Northern China using household level data. Several household characteristics were identified to impact water use significantly. Household size shows a scale-economy effect, with a coefficient close to 0.25. Gender structure and characteristics of household head don’t show a significant effect. In addition, households adjust their water use as a response to weather variability.  The increase of average monthly precipitation by 1mm corresponds to 0.1-0.2% decrease in per capita water use . And the increase of average monthly temperature by 1 degree corresponds to 2-5% increase in per capita water use. The response of households’ water use to weather is state-dependent. Generally, smaller and younger households increase water use more as a response to temperature increase, but decrease water use less as a response to precipitation increase.

The Flood in the Desert

Posted on by mmd2172 in General, Water Resource Management

Dealing with spatial and temporal variation
in water availability in a data-sparse environment
Project by Anna Tompsett
The project focuses on an area of the Niger Inland Delta near
Tombouctou, Mali, where there is very little data available for water
and agricultural management. Both traditional and modern agricultural
systems are however extremely dependent on the spatial and temporal
extent of the annual flood. The project aims to use landsat images to
generate maps of the area flooded with given probability at a given
time of the year.

The Economics of Energy Resource Development and Grid Interconnection

Posted on by mmd2172 in Energy Systems, General

Project by Aly Sanoh

This paper analysis the optimal options to supply electricity to national economies from both domestic as well as distant resources using transmissions systems across the huge renewable energy resources of Africa. The overarching questions are: How to model continent wide energy development as it affects regional economies? How to model demand growth and how to evaluate the potential and costs of energy supply? What drive long transmission costs?