Melbourne School of Engineering Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering

Consulting: Hydrology

The hydrology group is highly regarded in the land and water industry. The group carries out consulting in specialist areas of water and environmental systems and related disciplines, either as direct consulting, applied research, or as a sub-consultant providing expert advice within a large project.

The group offers specialist consulting services in the following areas:

Specific contacts for each of the areas listed above are provided with the linked information. For general consulting enquiries please contact:

Dr Jeffrey Walker
Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
The University of Melbourne
Victoria 3010 Australia

T: +61 3 8344 5590
F: +61 3 8344 6215 
E:

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Catchment Hydrology and Modelling

The hydrology group has expertise in various areas of catchment modelling, particularly in hydrological modelling and integrated system modelling.

Consultancies that the group has carried out in hydrological modelling include:

  • extension of streamflow data
  • estimation of runoff in ungauged catchments
  • estimation of impact of land use and climate change on hydrological fluxes

Consultancies in integrated system modelling include:

  • developing model suites and modelling frameworks for large systems to estimate runoff, sediment, nutrient and salt loads
  • predicting the impact of land use and management practice on the water and pollutant fluxes

 

Contact

Dr Robert Argent

  catchment modelling
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Environmental Data Analysis and Monitoring

The hydrology group offers services in various areas of environmental data analysis and monitoring. These include:

  • time series data analysis (data acquisition, trend detection, statistical modelling)
  • development of hydrological and water quality monitoring programs
  • development of robust, cost-effective monitoring programs for environmental compliance, monitoring, and evaluation
  • advanced statistical modeling capability

 

Contact

Prof David Fox or Dr Graham Moore

  data
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Environmental Data Acquisition

The hydrology group has wide ranging experience in environmental data acquisition systems for advanced hydrological field studies. The group has a range of specialist facilities available for consulting activities including an all terrain vehicle with position fixing, a variety of hydrological instruments for spatial mapping and a drill rig. We can also offer data interpretation services to complement field measurement exercises. Areas of monitoring expertise and facilities include:

  • spatial hydrological response including soil moisture ñ the ìgreen machineî
  • micrometeorological instrumentation including eddy correlation
  • monitoring water in the soil and deeper unsaturated zone using a range of in-situ techniques and drilling
  • monitoring groundwater
  • water quality monitoring including automated sampling
  • instrumentation and measurement network design for advanced hydrological process studies
  • measurements for ground truthing satellite and airborne remote sensing

Contact

Dr Andrew Western

  green machine
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Environmental Remote Sensing

The hydrology group has wide ranging experience in environmental remote sensing, with a particular strength in soil moisture applications. We have an imaging passive microwave radiometer and thermal imager that is flown on a low-cost light aircraft. The instruments can provide soil moisture and skin temperature data at resolutions from 50m and 1m resolution respectively, depending on flying height. These can be flown together with a range of other instruments available through Airborne Research Australia. The resolution and combination of instruments that can be flown simultaneously from a single platform is unique world-wide. Examples of the other instruments include:

  • land surface fluxes (carbon, moisture, sensible heat, momentum, radiation)
  • trispectral scanner (vegetation indices and RGB)
  • hyperspectral scanner
  • laser scanner (terrain and vegetation height)
  • air chemisty

Contact

Dr Jeffrey Walker or Dr Andrew Western

 
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Hydroclimatology

The hydrology group has expertise in various areas of hydroclimatology. Examples of consultancies that the group has carried out include:

  • assessing climate change impact on runoff
  • probabilistic forecasting of streamflow (from ENSO-streamflow teleconnection and runoff serial correlation)
  • probabilistic water demand forecasting
  • stochastic hydrology
  • drought and flood analysis
  • analysis of system/storage reliability

Contact

Dr Murray Peel

  hydroclimatology
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Water Allocation and Irrigation Systems

The hydrology group has expertise in various areas of water allocation and irrigation system management. Consultancies that the group has carried out include:

  • assessment of water allocation and security
  • water trading analysis and modelling
  • irrigation water management and efficiency
  • modelling of farm and irrigation distribution system modeling

Contact

Assoc Prof Hector Malano

  irrigation