#EESPublishes: Prof Vörösmarty on a global delta sediment balance model for sea-level rise

by EES Social Media Fellow

ESS Professor Charles Vörösmarty coauthored a paper entitled “A model of water and sediment balance as determinants of relative sea level rise in contemporary and future deltas” in the Journal of Geomorphology.

Highlights from the article include;

  • A delta sediment balance model is developed for a global selection of deltas.
  • Sediment flux and relative sea-level rise vary under modern and future scenarios.
  • Watershed and coastal sediment processes outweigh sea-level rise in some deltas.
  • Full use of hydro-resources in upstream basins strongly impacts downstream deltas.

Dr. Vörösmarty’s research focuses on the development of computer models and geospatial data sets used in synthesis studies of the interactions among the water cycle, climate, biogeochemistry and anthropogenic activities. His studies are built around local, regional and continental to global-scale modeling of water balance, discharge, constituent fluxes in river systems and the analysis of the impacts of large-scale water engineering on the terrestrial water cycle. His work on human-water interactions includes earth system modeling of the Northeastern United States, development and analysis of databases depicting reservoir construction worldwide and how they generate downstream coastal zone risks, and global threats to human water security and aquatic biodiversity.

Dr. Vörösmarty routinely provides scientific guidance to a variety of U.S. and international water consortia. He is a founding member and current co-Chair of the Global Water System Project that represents the input of several hundred international scientists under the International Council for Science’s Global Environmental Change Programs. He is spearheading efforts to develop global-scale indicators of water stress and is working with chief United Nations delegates who are negotiating the Rio+20 Sustainable Development Goals. He has served on a broad array of national panels, including the U.S. Arctic Research Commission (appointed by Presidents Bush and Obama), the NASA Earth Science Subcommittee, the National Research Council Committee on Hydrologic Science as Chair, a member of the NRC Review Committee on the U.S. Global Change Research Program, the National Science Foundation’s Arctic System Science Program Committee, and the Arctic HYDRA International Polar Year Planning Team. He was a consultant to the 24-agency United Nations World Water Assessment Programme and represented the International Council of Scientific Unions at the UN Commission on Sustainable Development meetings.