TR: Postdoc modélisation hydro-économique

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POST-DOCTORAL POSITION
Hydro-economic modeling for sustainable groundwater management
(Aquitaine, France)
Duration: 2 years
Start: January 2021
Location: Bordeaux (ENSEGID institute), with field trips and trips to Montpellier BRGM center
Application deadline: November 15th 2020

Scientific issue
A hydro-economic model (HEM) is an integrated model combining a representation of economic processes and a representation of hydro(geo)logical processes (Harou et al., 2009). It accounts for the complexity of the interactions between human activities and water resources in a given territory. This type of model can be used to investigate the impacts on water resources and on economic agents of various scenarios: climatic or socio-economic changes, different strategies for water management, demand-side management, etc. In this sense, it constitutes a tool to inform decision-making. HEMs are often based on global and linear
hydro(geo)logic models. The HEM developed in this post-doctoral project will use a distributed physicallybased groundwater flow model.
This post-doctoral project is part of the Eaux-SCARS project, a large research and development program in hydrogeology, focusing on strategic aquifers in the north of the Aquitaine Basin, for which a concerted interdepartmental management is necessary to ensure their sustainability over the long term. This ambitious 6-year action program should improve the understanding of the dynamics of these deep aquifers.
The applicant will be in charge of (i) developing a hydro-economic model with the MARTHE flow model (Thiery, 2015), then (ii) implementing the coupled model to the Agenais-Périgord territory (Figure 1), which experiences quantitative water management issues. The developed HEM will ultimately provide a tool for exploring scenarios and potential
management/adaptation measures, assessing their environmental and economic impacts.

Programme
The post-doctoral project will include 3 main tasks:
Task 1: Development of the economic model for the study area.

The first part of the post-doc will consist in building the economic model for the Agenais-Périgord territory. It will be built so as to address local water management issues. The first step will be the construction of the conceptual model, in parallel with the data collection necessary for the implementation. In collaboration with members of the Eaux-SCARS project, it will be necessary to characterize the different water uses (agriculture, drinking water, etc.), their dependence to water resources, as well as their dynamics, in order to be able to represent them appropriately in the model. This will include projecting the evolution of water demand for different uses in the future, characterizing the economic value of water in its different uses, and representing their adaptation dynamics to different levels of water supply. It will also be necessary to define the management objectives to be optimized. In a second step, this conceptual model will be implemented in a programming software.

Task 2: Coupling the MARTHE hydrogeological model with the economic model
The second task will be the coupling of the two models. It is a matter of interfacing the MARTHE model with the developed economic model at each time step, so that they can exchange information (Figure 2).
This interface will allow i) to retrieve information related to the state of the hydrosystem from MARTHE, and pass it to the economic model; ii) run the economic model for this time step to perform an economic optimization; iii) retrieve the results in terms of optimal abstractions and pass them to MARTHE; and iv) (re)run MARTHE to reassess the state of the hydrosystem
for these abstraction levels for this same time step. These
steps will be iterated until convergence.

Task 3: Application of the coupled model to the Agenais-Périgord territory
The hydro-economic model built in the previous tasks will be used to explore different scenarios of the evolution of water resources, water uses and water management in this territory, in collaboration with the
Eaux-SCARS project team.
This case study will be based on a local extraction (whose extension is to be defined) of the North-Aquitaine hydrogeological model (MONA, Buscarlet et al., 2019) based on the MARTHE calculation code.
The post-doctoral project will lead to at least one scientific publication in an international journal.

Required profile:

  • Experience in modeling
  • Experience in optimization
  • Strong foundations in Python, Fortran, GAMS, MATLAB desired
  • Economic skills desired
  • Skills in environmental sciences (hydrogeology) and / or agronomy will be appreciated
  • Ability to work interdisciplinarily

Contact:
Noémie Neverre (Brgm) – n.neverre@brgm.fr
Olivier Cabaret (Brgm) – o.cabaret@brgm.fr
Alexandre Pryet (Laboratoire G&E, Bordeaux INP – ENSEGID) – alexandre.pryet@ensegid.fr

 

 

 

Postdoc – Modelling of freshwater food webs under climate change and food web manipulation

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http://www.hbu.cas.cz/en/homepage/

Help us reveal underwater secrets!

Institute of Hydrobiology (http://www.hbu.cas.cz/en/homepage/), Biology Centre of the Czech Academy of Sciences, Czech Republic, is seeking to appoint an outstanding postdoctoral researcher in the field of aquatic food webs.
Institute of Hydrobiology owns multiple decades of detailed quantitative limnological data from nutrients to fish for a number of lakes and reservoirs. The successful candidate is expected to use these extensive data and construct and apply food-web models to investigate ecosystem dynamics of lakes and reservoirs, link modelling activities to ongoing research projects including models of water quality management and reservoir operation, initiate new research projects and supervise young researchers in these projects.
The successful candidate will work in an experienced and dynamic team of aquatic ecologists at the Institute. She/he will develop and parametrize food web models with the aim of predicting community dynamics under scenarios of extensive experimental biomanipulations or climate change. The ultimate goal of the community dynamic models will be to cover seasonal changes of all main functional groups (protists, phytoplankton, zooplankton, fish) and to take into account the size structure of the communities and longitudinal gradients of the reservoirs.
This work will improve our understanding of ecosystem functioning and mitigation of climate change impacts. The models should inform on future water quality and fisheries management of freshwater lakes and reservoirs and generate hypotheses for further empirical research at the Institute. The successful candidate is encouraged to establish new research directions and attract third-party funded projects to foster her/his own research career. Creating a research group aimed on modelling of freshwater ecosystems and cooperation with the universities and other research institutions will be strongly supported.
The project will be linked to internationally funded, multi-group research projects (ClimeFish, MacFish) and utilize extensive, multi-level data currently available at the Institute of Hydrobiology. Additional modelling expertise will be provided by Assoc. Prof. Pavel Kratina, Queen Mary University of London (http://www.sbcs.qmul.ac.uk/staff/pavelkratina.html) and Assoc. Prof. David Boukal, University of South Bohemia, Ceske Budejovice (http://kbe.prf.jcu.cz/en/david-boukal).

DESIRED SKILLS AND EXPERIENCE
– PhD in ecology, limnology, environmental modelling, physical oceanography, computer science, applied mathematics or related fields
– Post-doctoral experience with models of population or food web dynamics
– Proven ability to pursue scientifically demanding questions, high motivation and a vision for creative research
– Good knowledge of programming languages such as R, Matlab, C/C++, or Mathematica
– Interest in modelling individual life histories, population dynamics and food webs
– Prior knowledge in data treatment and analysis of large and complex datasets, multispecies size-spectra, or size-/stage-structured modelling tools is highly desired
– Excellent written and spoken English
– Promising publication record commensurate with the career stage
– Good knowledge of aquatic ecosystem processes and past work in multidisciplinary environment will be preferred
POSITION DETAILS
Target start date is January 2021 (negotiable). Initial appointment will be for 24 months, with an extension for up to 5 more years based on initial performance. We offer a highly competitive salary in local standards (up to ca. 2500 EUR monthly with additional performance bonuses for every published paper and supervised project) commensurate with the applicant’s experience and skills. Successful applicant will be encouraged to develop his/her own research agenda compatible with the mission of the Institute.
HOW TO APPLY
Applicants should email the following documents to Prof. Jan Kube?ka (kubecka@hbu.cas.cz) by 15 October 2020.
1) Cover letter outlining main research interests
2) CV including full publication list
3) Copy of PhD (postdoc position) diploma
4) Copies of 2–3 relevant publications
5) Contact details for 3 (postdoc position) references.
Preliminary enquiries are welcome.
BACKGROUND
Ceske Budejovice is a medium-sized town ca. 150 km south of Prague with 100,000 inhabitants, a relaxed atmosphere, and a growing expat community at the Biology Centre and the University. Both the town and the surrounding countryside provide numerous opportunities for research and leisure activities.
Living costs are low by international standards. Foreign applicants will receive support in transferring to the Czech Republic. The Institute can also help secure non-commercial accommodation at the campus shared by the Biology Centre and the University. Czech courses are available for foreign staff and students to reach a basic level of proficiency in everyday situations. Position includes standard health and social security benefits, support for barding, leisure and holiday activities, coverage of required travel and SW/HW, and help with moving family members. Biology Centre AS CR has been awarded a ‘Human Resources Excellence in Research’ Award of EU.