Date: 14 January 2026Lecture Topic: River Danube, Niger and Mekong – Comparing the Sediment Status of Large Rivers Speaker: Helmut HabersackAffiliation: Institute of Hydraulic Engineering and River Research (IWA-BOKU), University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences Vienna (BOKU), Austria Speaker Profile: Professor Helmut Habersack currently holds the UNESCO Chair in Integrated River Research and Management and coordinates the UNESCO IHP World’s Large Rivers Initiative (WLRI). He is a Full Professor of Hydraulic Engineering and Numerical Simulation in the Department of Water, Atmosphere and Environment at the University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences Vienna (BOKU), Austria. Since 2019, Professor Habersack has served as Director of the Institute of Hydraulic Engineering and River Research and heads the Christian Doppler Laboratory for Advanced Methods in River Monitoring, Modelling and Engineering.With over 30 years of research experience in hydrology, sediment transport, river engineering and morphology, river restoration, flood risk management, eco-hydraulics, hydropower, and navigation, he is a key organizer of multiple UNESCO-co-hosted international conferences titled "On the Status and Future of the World’s Large Rivers". He was awarded the Science2Business Award in 2015 and named Austrian of the Year 2023 (Science Category). Currently, he is coordinating the EU Horizon Europe Mission project DANUBE4all, with a budget of 8.5 million euros. Lecture Overview: This lecture stems from the research vision of the UNESCO IHP World’s Large Rivers Initiative (WLRI). It aims to systematically assess the sediment transport status of global large rivers through unified, standardized, and reproducible methods, thereby deepening the overall understanding of the evolutionary processes, synergistic effects, and key challenges of large river basins.Based on a multi-level analytical framework, the lecture selects the Danube, Niger, and Mekong rivers as typical cases to conduct the first comparable comprehensive assessment. The research shows that:• The Danube has long been affected by flood control, navigation, and hydropower projects, with only about 10% of its river reaches remaining in a state of sediment balance;• The Niger River is highly sensitive to runoff changes, and its discharge has not recovered to the pre-1970s level since 2001, with the impacts of climate change initially manifesting;• Over the past 75 years, the Mekong River has exhibited an increase in dry season discharge (+7%) and a decrease in wet season discharge (–11%).All three rivers share a common trend of a significant reduction in suspended sediment transported to deltas and the ocean, but their spatiotemporal characteristics differ markedly. The lecture concludes that future efforts urgently need to strengthen capacity building for systematic monitoring and comprehensive assessment in several key areas to support sustainable management decisions for large river basins. Lecture Time:Beijing Time: 21:00 on 14 JanuaryUK Time: 13:00 on 14 January Lecture Link: https://events.teams.microsoft.com/event/7a5b0ed3-8585-4128-b924-5af3c23ed1ca@cf264fc0-aeb8-449f-9054-82ce4454084b

Date: 10 December 2025Lecture Topic: Are we ready for the storms ahead? Speaker: Hayley J. FowlerInstitution: Newcastle University, UK Speaker Profile: Professor Hayley J. Fowler is currently Professor of Climate Change Impacts and Director of the Centre for Climate and Environmental Resilience at Newcastle University. Her research aims to advance the understanding of changing weather and extreme precipitation events, and to develop high-resolution climate projections to provide scientific support for adaptation strategies. She is a Member of the Adaptation Committee of the UK Climate Change Committee (UKCCC) and advises the UK Government on climate resilience through the Scientific Expert Panel of the UK Department for Energy Security and Net Zero.As a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union (AGU) and Recipient of the 2024 European Geosciences Union (EGU) Sergey Soloviev Medal, Fowler is internationally recognized for her pioneering downscaling techniques, which effectively bridge climate models and practical applications. She contributed to the IPCC Working Group I (WGI) Sixth Assessment Report (AR6) and has served as Past President of the British Hydrological Society. Professor Fowler also actively promotes interdisciplinary collaboration and public engagement, often inspiring society to collectively address the climate crisis through popular science and academic lectures. Lecture Overview: In a warming climate, the intensification of extreme precipitation has been shown in both observations and climate models to roughly follow the theoretical Clausius-Clapeyron scaling relationship. However, studies have indicated that short-duration events are changing at a greater magnitude—and such events often trigger flash floods or landslides, resulting in loss of life. Meanwhile, heatwaves and the resulting droughts and water scarcity are also occurring with increasing frequency. These changes collectively exert cascading impacts on water quality, agricultural production, and other critical societal needs.Continental-scale convection-permitting climate models (CPCMs) and new observational datasets provide state-of-the-art scientific tools for understanding future extreme weather (rainfall, wind, hail, lightning) and their compound effects against the backdrop of global warming. Nevertheless, due to insufficient representation of large-scale circulation changes and dynamic feedbacks from the land, ocean, and cryosphere, climate models are underestimating the real-world warming rate and the magnitude of the increase in associated extreme weather events.This lecture will argue that we need to shift the focus from over-reliance on a single climate model to adopting an interdisciplinary storylines approach that integrates multiple lines of evidence into scenario development. Ultimately, we must engage in cross-sectoral collaboration to address these rapid changes and collectively develop actionable information that can be swiftly integrated into policies and practices—thereby improving early warning systems and risk assessments for extreme weather events to support climate adaptation. Lecture Time:Beijing Time: 20:00 on 10 DecemberUK Time: 13:00 on 10 December Lecture Link: https://www.lboro.ac.uk/departments/abce/unesco-chair/events/webinar-series/2025/10-december-hayley-fowler/

Date: 12 November 2025Lecture Topic: Exploiting Global Variability to Anticipate Hydrologic Extremes Speaker: Thorsten WagenerAffiliation: University of Potsdam, Germany Speaker Profile: Professor Thorsten Wagener is the Alexander von Humboldt Professor for the Analysis of Hydrologic Systems at the University of Potsdam, Germany, and an internationally renowned expert in hydrologic system analysis. His research covers hydrologic systems from watershed to global scales, integrating data-driven and process-based models. He has made pioneering contributions to fields such as watershed classification, Predictions in Ungauged Basins (PUB), and diagnostic evaluation of Earth system models. The uncertainty quantification and attribution methods he developed have been widely applied in mathematical modeling research.Professor Wagener has previously taught at the University of Bristol (UK) and Pennsylvania State University (USA). He holds a PhD from Imperial College London, and is a graduate of Delft University of Technology (Netherlands) and the University of Siegen (Germany). He is a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union (AGU) and has received numerous international honors, including The Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Award, The American Society of Civil Engineers Walter L. Huber Engineering Research Prize, and The Chinese Academy of Sciences International Outstanding Scientist Cooperation Award. Lecture Overview: Floods are among the most common and devastating natural hazards globally, yet our ability to predict the location, magnitude, and potential losses of extreme flood events remains limited. This lecture conducts stress tests on global human-environment systems to analyze the inundation sensitivity of floodplains and population exposure risks under different flood event intensities. The research first reveals that current large-scale hydrologic models still struggle to accurately simulate flood peak processes. Furthermore, based on 1.2 million river reaches worldwide, it explores the impacts of factors such as topography, catchment area, and social behavior on flood sensitivity.The results show that residents in areas sensitive to frequent floods are relatively evenly distributed, reflecting a certain level of risk adaptation capacity. In contrast, in areas only sensitive to extreme floods, populations are often concentrated in regions that are rarely inundated under normal circumstances but pose potential high risks—these areas will face greater threats as climate change intensifies flood extremeness. The research emphasizes that even under current data conditions, information highly insightful for future disaster prevention and mitigation decision-making can still be uncovered. Lecture Time:Beijing Time: 21:00 on 12 NovemberUK Time: 13:00 on 12 November Lecture Link: https://www.lboro.ac.uk/departments/abce/unesco-chair/events/webinar-series/2025/12-november-thorsten-wagener/

Date: 2 September 2025 Lecture Topic: Climate change impact on extreme natural hazards Speaker: Nobuhito Mori Institution: Disaster Prevention Research Institute of Kyoto University   Speaker Profile: Professor Nobuhito Mori is a Distinguished Professor at the Disaster Prevention Research Institute of Kyoto University, Technical Advisor to the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) of Japan, and Honorary Professor at Swansea University in the United Kingdom. His research interests include Air-Sea Interface Physics, Climate Change, Geophysics and Environmental Fluid Mechanics, and Nonlinear Wave Dynamics. As applications of these basic research areas, his research aims to understand the mechanisms of extreme events, including extreme ocean waves, storm surges, and tsunamis. Lecture Overview: Tropical Cyclones (TCs) can cause severe coastal flooding in mid-latitudes. While the IPCC Fifth Assessment Report (AR5, 2013) mainly focused on mean sea level rise, recent studies (e.g., IPCC Sixth Assessment Report AR6, 2021) have emphasized the important role of changes in storm surges and waves in extreme water levels and coastal flooding. Changes in storm surge and wave climates are not only affected by tropical cyclone intensity but also closely related to their track changes. This lecture will briefly review the historical and future long-term changes in extreme water levels, the contribution of increased storm surges and wave heights in observational data and climate projections, and present several case studies of impact assessments on changes in storm surges and extreme waves. Lecture Time: Beijing Time: 20:00 on 2 September UK Time: 13:00 on 2 September Lecture Link: https://events.teams.microsoft.com/event/85a254a6-e748-4e4e-90ec-503c3ed8327a@cf264fc0-aeb8-449f-9054-82ce4454084b

Date: 11 June 2025Lecture Topic: Integrating the Role of Nature-Based Solutions in Indicator-Based Risk Assessments Speaker: Fabrice Renaud Affiliation: University of Glasgow Speaker Profile: Professor Fabrice Renaud is Head of the School of Social & Environmental Sustainability and Professor of Environmental Risk and Community Resilience at the University of Glasgow, as well as Director of the National Centre for Resilience in Scotland. His research focuses on vulnerability and risk assessment under natural hazards, and the multiple roles of ecosystems in Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) and climate change adaptation, with a particular focus on communities in coastal areas and estuarine deltas. He has extensive international research experience in South Asia, Southeast Asia, East Asia, the United Kingdom, Europe, and Africa. Lecture Overview: This lecture will explore the role of Nature-Based Solutions (NbS) in indicator-based risk assessments. Despite the growing global attention to the role of NbS in reducing natural disaster risks, their integration into risk assessments remains limited, especially in indicator-based assessments. Traditional risk assessments mainly focus on social and economic indicators, often neglecting environmental variables. This lecture will introduce new frameworks developed in recent years that better integrate social, economic, and environmental indicators to more comprehensively capture the risks faced by social-ecological systems. These advancements include recognizing the role of ecosystems in DRR within the frameworks and capturing the links between society and ecosystems through the concept of ecosystem services.These new frameworks and their applications help to: Provide actionable recommendations for Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR);Enhance the confidence of stakeholders, particularly at-risk communities, in the effectiveness of NbS in DRR.   Lecture Time: Beijing Time: 20:00 on 11 June UK Time: 13:00 on 11 June Lecture Link: https://events.teams.microsoft.com/event/b76b5e3e-b136-4533-8764-b12e991c41ee@cf264fc0-aeb8-449f-9054-82ce4454084b

Date: May 14, 2025Lecture Topic: Simulating 2D Hydrodynamics at 30 m Resolution for the Entire Planet Speaker: Paul BatesAffiliation: University of Bristol, UK Speaker Profile: Professor Paul Bates is Professor of Hydrology at the University of Bristol, UK, and Chair of the flood risk analytics company Fathom (www.fathom.global). He has long been engaged in the development of numerical solutions to the shallow water equations and in integrating satellite and airborne remote sensing data for global flood modeling, helping to extend hydrodynamic research from local to planetary scales. His work has been widely applied in flood risk management by research institutions, non-governmental organizations, multinational corporations, and the insurance industry.Previously, Professor Bates served as Dean of the School of Geographical Sciences at the University of Bristol and held visiting research positions at the Laboratoire National d’Hydraulique et Environnement (LNHE) in Paris, Princeton University, and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society and the American Geophysical Union, and has received major awards from the UK insurance industry, the European Geosciences Union, and the American Society of Civil Engineers. Lecture Overview: Over the past fifteen years, advances in hydrodynamic modeling have expanded the scope of simulations from individual river reaches to the global terrestrial scale. By adopting models with a spatial resolution of approximately 30 meters, it is now possible to construct and run high-precision two-dimensional hydrodynamic simulations across the entire planet. This breakthrough has not only greatly expanded the frontiers of scientific research, but has also enabled the investigation of practical questions that were previously difficult to address, such as quantifying global-scale hydrological and biogeochemical cycles, improving flood risk management decisions, assessing the resilience of insured assets under extreme climate conditions, and predicting the impacts of climate change on flood hazards.The lecture will introduce the scientific breakthroughs that enabled the transition from local to global modeling, discuss current challenges in global flood modeling—such as boundary condition treatment, flood defense data availability, and model validation—and explore how upcoming satellite missions, including SWOT and NISAR, can be leveraged to further enhance predictive capabilities. Lecture Time:Beijing Time: May 14, 20:00UK Time: May 14, 13:00Lecture Link:https://events.teams.microsoft.com/event/361b6a66-8204-4c3d-8b16-fbc72b04945d@cf264fc0-aeb8-449f-9054-82ce4454084b

Date: April 9, 2025Lecture Topic: Navigating the Challenge of Sequential Hazards: Evolving Building Design for Earthquakes and Tsunamis Speaker: Tiziana RossettoAffiliation: University College London (UCL) Speaker Profile: Professor Tiziana Rossetto is Professor of Earthquake Engineering at University College London (UCL) and a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering (FREng). She is also the Founding Director of the Extreme Events and Engineering Resilience Centre (EPICentre, www.ucl.ac.uk/epicentre). Her research focuses on the assessment of the resilience of buildings and infrastructure under natural hazards, with particular emphasis on the safety and performance of structures subjected to sequential hazards such as earthquakes and tsunamis. Her work has had a broad impact on the fields of earthquake engineering and tsunami mitigation. Lecture Overview: This lecture will examine the challenges posed by compound and sequential hazards—particularly earthquakes and tsunamis—to building design, as well as strategies to address them.On December 26, 2004, a magnitude 9.1 earthquake along the Sunda Trench triggered the Indian Ocean Tsunami (IOT), affecting 12 countries and causing more than 225,000 fatalities. Subsequently, the 2010 magnitude 8.8 Maule earthquake in Chile and the 2011 magnitude 9.1 Tohoku earthquake in Japan further highlighted the severe threat posed by sequential earthquake–tsunami hazards to coastal buildings and infrastructure. In these regions, even where stringent seismic design codes were in place, the effectiveness of buildings in resisting tsunami loading has been called into question.The lecture will review research advances over the past 20 years since the Indian Ocean Tsunami on tsunami inundation processes and their interaction with buildings. It will assess the current capabilities and limitations of building design and performance evaluation under tsunami loading. In addition, the lecture will explore potential conflicts between seismic design and tsunami-resistant design, and discuss how building design strategies can be optimized to address the dual threats of earthquakes and tsunamis. Lecture Time:Beijing Time: April 9, 2025, 20:00UK Time: April 9, 2025, 13:00Lecture Link: （Please register for the lecture via the link below.）https://events.teams.microsoft.com/event/9ee8cbb9-74eb-4de9-954d-1ed119dfa668@cf264fc0-aeb8-449f-9054-82ce4454084b

Date: March 12, 2025Lecture Title: Quantifying the Coastal Defense Value of Coastal Ecosystems Speaker: Heidi Nepf Affiliation: Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Speaker: Ernie I. H. LeeAffiliation: Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Speaker Profiles:Heidi Nepf is the Donald and Martha Harleman Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). She received her PhD from Stanford University in 1992 and completed her postdoctoral research at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. She has been on the faculty at MIT since 1993. Her research focuses on fluid–vegetation interactions, sediment transport, and wave attenuation, and has had broad impact in the field of estuarine and coastal hydrodynamics. Her honors include the Schoemaker Best Paper Award (2012), the ASCE Hunter Rouse Award (2019), the IAHR M. Selim Yalin Lifetime Achievement Award (2023), and election as a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union (AGU) in 2018. Ernie I. H. Lee is a PhD candidate in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. His research focuses on physics-based wave modeling and the application of benefit–cost ratio (BCR) analysis to evaluate nature-based coastal defense solutions, with particular emphasis on the economic feasibility of marsh-fronted seawalls. He is currently using machine learning and computer vision techniques to study salt marsh vegetation characteristics, combined with unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) remote sensing for data acquisition. Lecture Overview:This lecture will provide an in-depth exploration of the role of coastal ecosystems in coastal defense. Seagrass meadows and salt marshes play a critical role in reducing storm surge impacts, and their protective value must be quantitatively assessed through hydrodynamic modeling and economic analysis. Professor Heidi Nepf will introduce scaling laws for vegetation drag and wave energy attenuation, and extend these concepts to predict wave attenuation by seagrass meadows and salt marshes, thereby optimizing nature-based solutions (NBS) for coastal protection.In addition, through case studies, the lecture will examine how marsh-fronted seawalls can function as hybrid nature-based solutions and how their performance can be evaluated using economic benefit–cost ratio (BCR) analysis. This lecture will help participants gain deeper insight into ecosystem-based coastal protection strategies and provide data-driven support for future flood risk reduction and coastal management policies. Lecture Time: Beijing Time: March 12, 21:00 UK Time: March 12, 13:00 Lecture Link:(Please register for the lecture via the link below)https://events.teams.microsoft.com/event/6b57e100-0d93-47d8-95dd-76940fdd40f0@cf264fc0-aeb8-449f-9054-82ce4454084b

Date: February 12, 2025Lecture Topic: Flash Floods: Challenges and Needs for Mitigation and Adaptation Speaker: Philippe GourbesvilleAffiliation: Université Côte d’Azur; International Association for Hydro-Environment Engineering and Research (IAHR) Speaker Profile:Professor Philippe Gourbesville is currently Professor of Hydrological Informatics at the School of Engineering of Université Côte d’Azur, France, and President of the International Association for Hydro-Environment Engineering and Research (IAHR).An internationally experienced water resources expert, his career began in a leading French consultancy, where he participated in water engineering projects across Europe, Asia, and Africa. Since joining Université Côte d’Azur in 1997, he has led 16 European Union research programs. Between 2004 and 2022, he coordinated five top European universities, nine international organizations, and more than 60 companies to successfully establish the EuroAquae international joint master’s program in hydrological informatics, which has trained water management professionals worldwide.In 2012, he founded the Tianjin International Engineering Institute in China and served as the French Dean, establishing China’s first French engineering degree accreditation system.As Co-founder and Vice President of the Asia Water Council, Professor Gourbesville has long been committed to developing innovative solutions to water-related challenges in Asia. He has also frequently served as a legal expert witness for major flood disasters and provided professional consultancy to United Nations agencies, government authorities, and multinational corporations. His academic leadership and practical experience are deeply integrated, continuously contributing to the advancement of global water security. Lecture Overview:This lecture will focus on the global phenomenon of flash floods, offering an in-depth discussion of the increasingly severe global trends associated with these events. In recent years, flash floods have become a major natural hazard faced by countries worldwide and, under the influence of climate change, have shown increasing frequency and intensity driven by severe convective storms (SCS). According to insurance industry data, the economic losses and casualties caused by flash floods have risen to become one of the most critical disaster risks of global concern. To reduce population vulnerability in exposed regions, it is essential to strengthen mitigation measures for flash flood impacts and to develop appropriate adaptation strategies.Professor Gourbesville will review several recent catastrophic flash flood events around the world, distill key lessons learned, emphasize the importance of early warning procedures, and assess the various modeling approaches available for predicting major events and their effectiveness. Through these discussions, participants will gain a better understanding of how to take more effective actions in early warning and disaster loss reduction. Lecture Time: Beijing Time: February 12, 21:00 UK Time: February 12, 13:00 Lecture Links:https://events.teams.microsoft.com/event/df49b6e9-0f9d-4e32-90e5-680aadcd2a3a@cf264fc0-aeb8-449f-9054-82ce4454084b  

Date: January 8, 2025Lecture Topic: Digital Twin Empowered Urban Flood and Landslide Emergency Management Speaker: Liming ZhangAffiliation: The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology Speaker Profile:Professor Liming Zhang is currently Head of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Director of the Digital Cities and Smart Hazard Mitigation Laboratory at The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. An internationally renowned scholar, he serves as Chair of Technical Committee TC210 on Dams of the International Society for Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering (ISSMGE), and formerly served as Chair of the Risk Assessment and Management Committee of the Geo-Institute of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE). He also holds key editorial positions, including Editor-in-Chief of Georisk, Guest Editor of Geodata and AI, and Associate Editor of the Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering.Professor Zhang has received numerous prestigious international awards, including the ASCE Ralph Peck Award, the National Engineering Award of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, the ISSMGE Lacasse Lecture Award, and the GEOSNet Wilson Tang Lecture Award. His outstanding contributions to risk assessment in dams, slopes, and geotechnical engineering are widely recognized worldwide. Lecture Overview:In this lecture, Professor Liming Zhang from HKUST will present pioneering applications of city-scale digital twin technology. By integrating real-time monitoring, simulation, and visualization of hazard processes and societal responses, this innovative platform enables integrated management of landslide and flood disasters, significantly enhancing urban emergency management efficiency. Its implementation has substantially improved Hong Kong’s risk management capacity and public safety, accelerated smart city development, and opened new avenues for public education. Lecture Time: Beijing Time: January 8, 21:00 UK Time: January 8, 13:00 Lecture Link:https://events.teams.microsoft.com/event/fda20afb-d41d-4e8a-ae0e-0d01c896688a@cf264fc0-aeb8-449f-9054-82ce4454084b   

Date: December 4, 2024 Lecture Topic: An Intelligent Urban Flood Control Decision Support System: A Case Study of Taipei City Speaker: Fi-John ChangAffiliation: National Taiwan University Speaker Profile:Professor Fi-John Chang is an internationally renowned expert in hydrological informatics and artificial intelligence–based big data analytics. He has published more than 180 SCI-indexed papers (h-index = 53). His research team has pioneered the integration of artificial intelligence and big data analytics into flood forecasting and emergency management, making significant contributions to the field of intelligent flood control. Professor Chang is currently the founding President of the Taiwan Hydrological Informatics Society and serves as an Associate Editor of leading international journals, including the Journal of Hydrology.Lecture Overview:This lecture will share the successful experience of intelligent flood management in Taipei City, providing an in-depth analysis of how AI and big data analytics are used to achieve accurate urban flood early warning. It will also demonstrate how advanced intelligent decision support systems can effectively address the challenges of urban flood control. Lecture Time: Beijing Time: December 4, 21:00 UK Time: December 4, 13:00 Lecture Link:https://www.lboro.ac.uk/departments/abce/unesco-chair/events/webinar-series/2024/4-december-24