KEYNOTE SPEAKER

Sustaining Environmental Flows in Regulated Rivers

Prof. Zhi Feng Yang
Beijing Normal University, China PR

Abstract

Sustaining environmental flows is necessary for maintaining the health of regulated rivers, and it needs to be balanced with human water provision. The tensions between human and ecological water requirements are intensifying due to global population growth and increasing human demands as well as new ‘green' legislation. This paper reviews the advances of methods and technologies related to environmental flow provision. Maintaining natural flow regime and reducing its alteration are key principles for environmental flow management. Methods for assessing the degree of flow regime alteration are evaluated by their effectiveness of reflecting the extent of ecological degradations in rivers. Environmental flow management methods are classified into basic, acceptable and preferred strategies, and they are assessed by their ability to ensure the planned human water supply and maintain the health of river ecosystems. Reasonable environmental flow management methods for rivers depend on the planned amounts of water withdrawal and the protection objectives of the targeted rivers. The reservoir storage capacity, a key design parameter of a reservoir, is also analyzed in terms of their effects on environmental flow and human water provision. At the reservoir design stage, the values of both the minimum required and preferred reservoir storage capacities need to be given to the decision makers for better sustaining environmental flows and ensuring the planned water supply.

Biography of the Keynote Speaker

Professor Yang Zhifeng is an expert of Environmental Sciences. He is the Dean of the School of Environment, Beijing Normal University and the Director of the State Key Laboratory of Water Environment Simulation. He received his doctoral degree from the Department of Hydraulic Engineering, Tsinghua University in 1989. He has long-term been working in the field of Environmental Sciences and specially expertise in Wetland Ecological Processes, Environmental Flow and Urban Ecological Planning and Management. He is the specially-appointed professor of Chang Jiang Scholars Program. He has won over 10 research awards, such as the National Outstanding Youth Science Fund, the Second Prize of National Science and Technology Progress Award by Ministry of Science and Technology(in 2008) as well as the First Prize of Science and Technology Progress three times (in 2003, 2004 and 2005), which is awarded by Ministry of Education, China. Furthermore, Prof. Yang has committed to many key research projects. He is the Chief Scientist of the National Basic Research Program of China (973) Program. He served for times as the chief consultant expert and team leader of many crucial research projects. Besides, he is an outstanding and fruitful scholar who published more than 10 books on water resource management, urban planning, ecological engineering, and nearly 500 peer-reviewed papers, among which over 120 have been selected by SCI (Science Citation Index) system and 100 have been cited by EI (Engineering Index) system. Professor Yang is also active in academic societies. He is a Branch Chairman of International Environmental Informatics Association, an editor of Frontiers of Environmental & Engineering in China. He served for times as Chairman or member of Program Committees for many International Academic conferences in the past decade.