The 3rd IAHS Panta Rhei Conference will take place in Harare, Zimbabwe from 25-27th October 2018. Abstract submission and registration are now open.

Delegates are invited from the entire global community with interest in sharing experiences on hydrological contribution to societal well-being with particular focus on developing countries. Relevant papers and posters are invited from the entire IAHS community for the conference entitled 'International Conference on Enhanced Hydrological Understanding for a Better Society'.

The Conference has been designed to cover four topical themes – Water secure cities, water-food-energy nexus, adaptive water governance and hydrological uncertainty.

KEY TIMELINES

30 July 2018	First announcement of conference information
21 August 2018	Second announcement of conference information
31 August 2018	Deadline for receiving abstracts Deadline for receiving registration forms
15 September 2018	Last announcement with detailed conference information
25-26 October 2018	Workshop
27 October 2018	Field trip

Conference Information and Registration Form

Dear colleagues,

Thank you for your interest in STAHY-2018 in Adelaide Australia.

As noted on the website, we are planning to hold a Spring School in association with the STAHY workshop.

We plan for the Spring School to take place over 2 days, on the campus of the University of Adelaide (in the Adelaide city centre). The following broad themes will be covered:
Day 1 - Model development and calibration in hydrology
Day 2 - Uncertainty estimation in hydrological modelling

The lectures will be delivered in an informal settings to encourage interaction and discussion, and will be delivered by Mark Thyer, David McInerney and Dmitri Kavetski. 

The technical level will best suit research students (Masters and PhDs), as well as industry colleagues interested in research approaches.

In order to better understand person’s availability / level of interest, and help us optimise the schedule, could you please indicate your broad availability using the following Doodle poll https://doodle.com/poll/vb3crc9dtvxakt4k

Note that the Spring School will have a fee of AUD 100 in order to cover the basic running costs. This fee is separate from the STAHY registration fee, which covers the 3 STAHY workshop days (24-26 Sept).

For more information, or to keep up to date with STAHY 2018, visit https://www.stahy2018.org/

Kind regards,
Dmitri Kavetski and Mark Thyer,
on behalf of the local organising committee

We are thrilled to invite you to the 3rd IAHS Panta Rhei Conference in Harare, Zimbabwe from 25-27th October 2018. Abstract submission and registration are now open.

Delegates are invited from the entire global community with interest in sharing experiences on hydrological contribution to societal well-being with particular focus on developing countries. Relevant papers and posters are invited from the entire IAHS community for the conference entitled 'International Conference on Enhanced Hydrological Understanding for a Better Society'.

The Conference has been designed to cover four topical themes – Water secure cities, water-food-energy nexus, adaptive water governance and hydrological uncertainty.

KEY TIMELINES

30 July 2018	First announcement of conference information
21 August 2018	Second announcement of conference information
31 August 2018	Deadline for receiving abstracts Deadline for receiving registration forms
15 September 2018	Last announcement with detailed conference information
25-26 October 2018	Workshop
27 October 2018	Field trip

Conference Information and Registration Form

A final friendly reminder that the abstract submission deadline is fast approaching for the STAHY 2018 workshop in Adelaide, Australia, on 24-26 September 2018. Please submit by the deadline, 22 July 2018. All abstracts are welcome and should conform to the required format and be uploaded to the online submission system.

STAHY is an international workshop on statistical hydrology under the auspices of the International Association of Hydrological Sciences (IAHS).The themes of the workshop are: 

• Modelling of hydrological and hydro-meteorological events
• Advances in hydrological forecasting and data series analysis
• New insights into flood frequency analysis and risk assessment
• New insights into arid and semi-arid hydrology

We are also pleased to announce a tremendous set of invited speakers:

• Prof George Kuczera, University of Newcastle, Australia
• Prof Andras Bardossy, University of Stuttgart, Germany
• Prof Nagesh Kumar, Indian Institute of Science (IISc), India
• Prof Neil McIntyre, University of Queensland, Australia
• Prof Taha Ouarda, National Institute of Scientific Research (INRS), Canada
• Dr Alan Seed, Australian Bureau of Meteorology, Australia

For more information or to keep up to date with STAHY 2018 please visit https://www.stahy2018.org. 

We look forward to hearing from you!
 
Best regards,
Dmitri Kavetski on behalf of the local organising committee

Data issues were, are, and will remain a core component of the hydrological sciences. Their character and influence on the way the discipline is practiced may vary through time, but their intrinsic role in understanding and managing water resources, as well as in developing sound water policies dictates their continuing importance. Whereas the primary data issues during much of the twentieth century focused on establishing and maintaining in situ observing networks to provide a sound basis for understanding and predicting the quantity and quality of the resource, both on the surface and in the ground, today’s concern encompasses a much broader suite of problems.

To elevate and expand the discussion of the critical role of data in all aspects of the hydrological sciences, a Special Issue of the Hydrological Sciences Journal entitled “Hydrological Data: Opportunities and Barriers” is being planned for publication. Articles are currently being sought on all aspects of data in hydrology; from traditional concerns related to networks to more contemporary thinking about simple, low cost innovations in instrumentation, data management and exchange protocols, and big data, as in large-scale multi-model ensembles spanning long time periods. Numerous emerging activities and topics provide a substantial source of potential contributions.

For example, the assimilation of data from new observation technologies is an expanding issue which has given rise to activities and efforts within the scientific community, the operational services and the facilitating mechanisms of the United Nations towards measurements and observations in the twenty-first century, innovative water monitoring capabilities and data exchange, virtual labs to facilitate observation-modelling progress; as well as an array of efforts involving citizen science, simple and inexpensive instrumentation, remote sensing innovations, and studies involving the comparative assessment of using a limited number of research basins versus a relatively large number of management basins (e.g., PUB and its ongoing follow ups).

Similarly, data assimilation among various system components in the modeling of hydroclimatology and hydrometeorology, and their interfaces with the land surface, ecological and social systems, and others is moving forward – especially within the framework of the Panta Rhei initiative. Moreover, the emerging focus on the water-food-energy nexus reflects not only the increasing demand for data within each sector, but for viable approaches to their integration that ensure water and food security, sustainable agriculture, and energy production worldwide.

The recent discussions of big data and emerging efforts associated with the shaping of "data science" are crucial concerns for the future of hydrology and should be explored. Also, a number of concerns dealing with retrospective investigations are data-dependent, with particular worries related to data archiving and data rescue.

Moreover, hydrological data are typically obtained through a combination of observations and computational algorithms. For example, river discharge is most often estimated from water level via a rating curve; multi-spectrum analysis of satellite data is frequently combined with multiple information sources to produce a variety of Earth observation products; and observed time-series are used to estimate parameters in complex dynamic hydrological models. As a result, the boundary between observed and computed data is often vague and, considering the degree to which such data are shared, re-used and cited, it can be difficult to trace their provenance.

Notably, a strong and vigorous debate on data could be critical to the development of new policy messages regarding observing networks; i.e., their density, quality, sustainability, investment, modernization, etc. Such a debate may also serve as an important contribution to the development of inputs from the hydrological sciences to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals that, at their core, are data dependent, especially along the observation-knowledge-indicator-target value chain.

The data issue is an increasingly import aspect of the publication industry, where inveterate concerns over open access to data have long vexed the community. The emerging interest in providing datasets as supplementary materials to papers is an encouraging sign, and periodicals like the Hydrological Science Journal take this opportunity to develop and promote such policies for their operations. IAHS could use this Special Issue as a basis for developing new and related portals on iahs.info .

Finally, it is critical that corresponding competencies in hydrology be identified for education and capacity building, particularly with respect to data issues. Numerous organizations are working on these issues and contributions reflecting new efforts in this area are of particular interest.

Guest editors

Managing Guest editor: Christophe Cudennec, Agrocampus Ouest, France & IAHS,  ([email protected])
Guest editor: Berit Arheimer, SMHI, Sweden
Guest editor: Harry Lins, WMO Commission for Hydrology, USA
Guest editor: Stefan Uhlenbrook, UNESCO World Water Assessment Programme, Italy

Submission

Submission is welcome by 1st November through the Hydrological Sciences Journal online platform. 

We strongly encourage potential authors to contact first the Managing Guest Editor at [email protected] to inquire about the suitability of their manuscript and about any innovative concept.

Accepted papers will be immediately published along the flow.

INTERNATIONAL UNION OF GEODESY AND GEOPHYSICS
UNION GEODESIQUE ET GEOPHYSIQUE INTERNATIONALE

 5 July 2018

Inaugural General Assembly of the International Science Council (ISC)

Paris, 4 July 2018 - In a historic meeting, the International Council for Science (ICSU) and the International Social Science Council (ISSC) merged today to form the International Science Council, a unique global non-governmental scientific organization representing both the natural and social sciences. The meeting opened with addresses from Catherine Brechignac, Secretaire Perpetuel of the French Academy of Sciences. In her speech, Brechignac, who is a former President of ICSU, emphasised that the “natural sciences should no longer dictate the Earth system sciences research agenda, social sciences should be at least as important.” Prince Albert II of Monaco welcomed the participants of the ISC General Assembly in the “Maison des Océans”.

The main item of business for the meeting was the election of a Governing Board to lead the Council. Representatives of the Council’s members elected Daya Reddy, a mathematician from South Africa, to be the first President. Peter Gluckman, the former Chief Science Adviser to the Prime Minister of New Zealand, became the President-elect, and will assume the Presidency a the next General Assembly in 2021. The further officers of the Board are Elisa Reis (Brazil) Vice President, Jinghai Li (China: CAST) Vice President, Alik Ismail-Zadeh (Russia/Germany) Secretary, and Renée van Kessel (The Netherlands) Treasurer.

The ordinary members of the Board will be Geoffrey Boulton (UK), Melody Burkins (USA), Saths Cooper (South Africa), Anna Davies (Ireland), Pearl Dykstra (The Netherlands), Sirimali Fernando (Sri Lanka), Ruth Fincher (Australia), James C. Liao (China: Academia Sinica in Taipei), Natalia Tarasova (Russia), and Martin Visbeck (Germany). In his acceptance speech, the incoming president, Daya Reddy, spoke about the importance of inclusiveness, of involving all regions of the world in the work of the new Council. He called for the involvement of early career scientists in partnerships and agenda setting. “We have set ourselves an ambitious goal to be a powerful, visible, credible voice for science. There’s no time to waste. Let’s get to work!”

Participants were also able to vote for the location of the next General Assembly of the Council, choosing between two bids, one from Montreal, Canada, one from Oman. The bid by the city of Muscat, Oman, carried the vote and it will host the 2nd General Assembly in 2021.

(source: ISC Press Release)

A friendly reminder to submit your abstract for STAHY 2018, the submission deadline has been extended until 22 July 2018. We look forward to seeing you in Adelaide, South Australia from 24-26 September 2018.

All abstracts are welcome and should conform to the required format and be uploaded to the online submission system.

Registration is also now open, the portal and information are available here. The Early Bird Registration deadline is 31 July 2018.

For more information or to keep up to date with STAHY 2018 visit https://www.stahy2018.org/

Best Regards,
The local organising committee

The WMO HydroHub is looking for innovative solutions in operational hydrology. Apply to the Innovation Call to make a difference on the ground! Deadline: 20 August 2018

100.000 CHF seed-funding will be provided to sustainable solutions that can be up-scaled around the world.
 
Apply now

Applications to this call must address the following issues:

- Focus on freshwater quantity observation, namely water levels, river discharge, soil moisture and precipitation;
- Innovative observation technologies or monitoring approaches that could be adopted by National Meteorological and Hydrological Services (NMHSs);
- Reduced total cost of ownership, i.e. comprising both direct and indirect costs (such as operations, maintenance, personnel training);
- Especially fit for Least-Developed Countries (LDC) and Small Island Developing States (SIDS);
- Maximizing impact on the ground through the creation of local income from sales and services generated by the awarded solution.

More information is available on the following webpage: http://hydrohub.wmo.int/en/news/first-wmo-hydrohub-innovation-call

Early Career scientists make up a significant amount of our community, creating an opportunity to include a new generation of hydrologists as active contributors to IAHS. 

During its Bureau Meeting in July 2017 IAHS decided to strengthen its Early Career scientist representation to enable more active participation of those members within IAHS Commissions and Working Groups. To achieve this goal IAHS will establish an Early Career Committee (ECC) consisting of the Early Career Representative of each IAHS Commission plus a chair and co-chair. The IAHS definition of Early Career embraces scientists up to 5 years after completion of the PhD (allowing for an extra year per child for parents if they took parental leave).

More information on the Early Career Committee is available on the IAHS website -  https://iahs.info/About-IAHS/Early-Career-Committee-.do

If you are interested in becoming an Early Career Scientist Representative for one of the IAHS Commissions, you can apply by completing the form by 15 August 2018. The ECC embraces equal opportunity for all its members, and strives to have a diverse composition in terms of gender and geography.

Please don’t hesitate to contact us if you have any questions.

Nilay Dogulu ([email protected])
Tim van Emmerik ([email protected])