Science & maths My Research

Water resource management

* NAME: Dr Julia Piantadosi, Research Fellow * LOCATION: UniSA's School of Mathematics and Statistics

* BACKGROUND: For the past 10 years I have worked in the area of water management. My PhD thesis was titled Optimal Policies for Storage of Urban Stormwater. It's important to encourage more students to study mathematics and science at school and university so we have young professionals with the skills to respond to climate change by developing sustainable solutions.

* RESEARCH: My research focus is water resource management. This research addresses a national research priority. All major metropolitan water supply systems are under extreme stress. Our projects have attracted much interest from the mathematical community as well as from water managers and water policy makers.

This research continues to provide leadership and training of national importance for postgraduate students, five of whom I co-supervise.

* TECHNOLOGY: A major practical outcome from my PhD was a scalar vector graphics simulation of the City of Salisbury's Parafield stormwater harvesting scheme. The simulation has been used to help water managers understand the effects of various water management policies with a view to further improving them. We are currently working on a simulation of the Murray-Darling system, which will provide an effective showcase of our water management policies.

* RESULTS: My research has been published in international journals of mathematics, optimisation, environmental modelling, water management and hydrology and I present regularly at major international conferences. My PhD student and I presented papers at the ALIO-INFORMS, Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences, joint international meeting in Buenos Aires, Argentina, this month.