Dr. Aris P. Georgakakos

Georgia Tech, USA

Biography

Dr. Aris P. Georgakakos holds a civil engineering Diploma from the National Technical University of Athens, Greece, and Masters and Ph. D. degrees in water resources from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dr. Georgakakos is currently a Professor at the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Georgia Tech, Head of the Environmental Fluid Mechanics and Water Resources Program, and Director of the Georgia Water Resources Institute. Dr. Georgakakos’ research and technology transfer activities aim to develop and implement prototypical information and decision support systems for integrated water resources assessment, development, and management. These systems combine data from conventional and remote sources, GIS, and models from various scientific and engineering disciplines (including climate, hydrology, agricultural science, water resources, wetland and river ecology, hydro-thermal power systems, economics, statistics, and operations research). Dr. Georgakakos has been involved in several world regions and his decision support systems are currently used for river basin planning and management in Georgia and the southeast US, California, East Africa, Brazil, Jordan, Greece, and China. His research has been sponsored by U.S. and foreign organizations including the US Geological Survey, US Army Corps of Engineers, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, National Science Foundation, Environmental Protection Agency, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, World Bank, US and European International Development Agencies, and several domestic and foreign electrical utilities. Dr. Georgakakos has published extensively and is currently an Associate Editor for the Advances in Water Resources Journal and the Journal of Hydrology.

Abstract: Water management in an era of climatic and demand changes

Aris P. Georgakakos, Professor, School of Civil and Environmental Eng., Georgia Institute of Technology; Director, Georgia Water Resources Institute

The southeast US has historically enjoyed abundant water resources, but recent decades ushered in rapid population increase, crawling urbanization, unsustainable agricultural expansion, severe droughts with devastating socioeconomic consequences, widespread river pollution, endangered ecosystems, and litigious transboundary water disputes.  These challenges are exemplified in the Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint (ACF) River Basin shared by Alabama, Georgia, and Florida, which provides a wealth of regional water resources, energy, environmental, ecological, and socio-economic benefits.  Much like the ACF, water stresses have been steadily increasing most everywhere else in the world including Northern California (the Sacramento-American-Feather-San Joaquin River Basins) and East Africa (Nile).

This article presents three integrated assessments for the above-mentioned regions and explores common vulnerabilities and mitigation strategies. The assessments include (1) processing all relevant IPCC GCM scenarios for bias correction and downscaling, (2) characterizing watershed response through physically based models, (3) developing water demand projections for all applicable sectors, and (4) incorporating hydro-climatic and demand forecasts (and their uncertainty) within adaptive reservoir and aquifer management models and assessment schemes.

Novel research contributions include new methods for (i) simultaneous temperature-precipitation downscaling; (ii) physically based watershed models with data driven percolation/runoff functional forms; and (iii) improved river basin management methods with full consideration of system uncertainty.

The assessments show that all three regions are most likely to experience (1) increased evapotranspiration and drier runoff trends, (2) more severe drought and flood episodes, (3) declining average lake levels, water supply reliability, energy generation, and ecological flows, and (4) adverse economic consequences and exacerbated regional conflicts. The studies illustrate that (i) climate and demand change assessments are meaningful and decision worthy when they are interdisciplinary, (ii) adaptive management is a particularly effective mitigation strategy, and (iii) there is a critical need for flexible institutional processes to mitigate and adapt to simultaneous climate, demand, and land use change.