Meet The Team

Research interests comprise hydrological processes at various spatial and temporal scales including unsaturated flow and transport, multiphase flow and remediation, groundwater flow and transport. A current research focus is investigation and modeling of hydrological processes at catchment scale under both temperate and arid conditions including development, calibration and testing of integrated hydrological models. Application of new data types from remote sensing platforms for driving and validating integrated and distributed models as well as hydrological impacts of climate change have been recent research topics. Karsten has been the Director of the Danish Hydrological Observatory HOBE for 14 years and principal supervisor for >110 MSc thesis projects, 43 PhD projects and 15 Postdocs.

Profession: Professor in hydrology and water resources

Highest qualification: PhD in civil engineering/hydrology

Role in project: Project leader

Dr Karen Villholth is Director of Water Cycle Innovation (WCI), a consultancy serving the needs of academic institutions, policy makers, implementers, donors, governments, UN organizations and continental/global institutions, non-governmental institutions (NGOs), and the private sector when it comes to water for international cooperation, water and food security and climate resilience. From 2016-2022, she chaired the Groundwater Solutions Initiative for Policy and Practice (GRIPP), a global partnership of 30 international organizations supporting sustainable development through better science to policy related to groundwater resources. She holds more than 25 years’ experience in research for development.

Profession: Director, Water Cycle Innovation

Highest Qualification: PhD Hydrogeology and Groundwater Quality

Role/ Responsibilities on the Project: Karen is co-PI, providing support to implementation of the ESGUSA Project. She is also providing scientific input, specifically co-supervising two postdocs, one on the implementation of a SafeWater Water kiosk installation and the assessment of performance and impact and one on assessment of a Managed Aquifer Recharge Scheme, both located in the Limpopo Province of South Africa.

Thokozani Kanyerere is a Professor of groundwater hydrology and Integrated Water Resources Management [IWRM] at the University of Western Cape, where he has taught and conducted groundwater management research since 2013. He has 20 years of experience in university academic and research work. He received his MSc from the University of Malawi (2001) and MPhil from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Norway (2004). He obtained his Ph.D. (2012) from the University of Western Cape in South Africa, where he assessed groundwater management practices for domestic use using the IWRM approach. He is involved in direct and developmental applied research work from a capacity-building perspective. His research interests are in surface-groundwater interaction, groundwater recharge-discharge, and groundwater management with a focus on quality which enabled him to coordinate academic and groundwater projects. His passion is on water science to address societal problems and strengthen capacity development via education and research from IWRM perspective. Professor Kanyerere is a reviewer of several peer-reviewed journals and institutes.

Samson Senbore is a young pragmatic geoscientist and environmental scientist with strong passion for research in water resources, climate change and environmental sustainability. Samson holds a MSc in Engineering and Hydrogeology and completed his PhD in Environmental health in 2022 from Central University of Technology. He joined the University of Pretoria as a postdoctoral fellow in 2022 for the ESGUSA-2 project with a focus on the implementation and sustainability of Managed Aquifer Recharge (MAR). His academic background is in groundwater exploration, development, and management. He is also a committed researcher to gearing advances in water security, urbanization, and environmental sustainability. 

Profession: Hydrogeology and Environmental Management.

Highest Qualification: PhD Environmental Health

Role/ Responsibilities on the Project:  Samson’s role on the project is to drive the Managed Aquifer Recharge (MAR) aspect of the project for a sustainable groundwater use and collection of existing operational, hydrogeological and chemical data from the MAR facility in Polokwane. His core responsibilities include defining sampling and analysis program for the selected wells and candidate parameters for analytical analysis include arsenic, organic carbon, heavy metals, nitrate, phosphate, pathogens and contaminants of emerging concern. Identifying issues concerning reductive mineral dissolution mobilizing heavy metals including arsenic from wastewater and surface water to the groundwater.

Raphael is an Environmental Engineer educated at Technical University of Munich (TUM) and Technical University of Denmark (DTU). In 2017, he obtained his PhD at DTU studying the use of satellite altimetry in informing river models. Since then, he is working at the Department of Hydrology at the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland (GEUS). His research focusses on large-scale hydrologic modelling, impacts of climate change on hydrology, and the fusion of hydrologic models with machine-learning approaches.

Profession:  Researcher, Dept. of Hydrology, GEUS
Highest Qualification:  PhD
Role on the project:  Contributing with knowledge on hydrologic modelling (model calibration, evaluation, etc)
 

Søren Jessen is a hydrogeologist engaged broadly with nutrient and element cycling in freshwater/estuarine/marine environments, reactive transport modelling, stable isotopes of water, and in teaching field methods and the use of water isotopes and major chemistry as tracers in hydrogeology. He has experience with tracing and modelling water movement and water quality changes during bank infiltration which is a type of managed aquifer recharge (MAR) of relevance to the current project.

Profession: Associate Professor in hydrogeochemistry at University of Copenhagen

Highest Qualification: PhD in inorganic groundwater geochemistry

Role/Responsibilities on the Project:  Søren’s role is to support and supervise the project postdocs in charge of the MAR project component and of the water kiosk development.

Tshelane Piet joined the Department of Water and Sanitation as a student technician in 1999. He completed his Diploma in Geology with the the Technikon Pretoria in 2002. He completed his B-Tech studies in Geology with Tshwane University of Technology In 2018. Piet is a Control  Scientific Technician in DWS and has registered with SACNASP as a Scientist.

Profession: Groundwater Technician

Highest Qualification: B-Tech: Geology

Role/ Responsibilities on the Project:  Piet collects groundwater level data from loggers in the field installed in boreholes. He interprets, processes and archives geohydrological data in the region into the database (Hydstra).  The data is collected quarterly from the field.

Matthys joined the University of Pretoria in 2007 after six years in the industry. He completed his MSc in 2010 and PhD in 2014 and became an associate professor in 2020. He is an engineering geologist and hydrogeologist with his research focussed on vadose zone hydrology, looking specifically into variable unsaturated flow through soil, fractured rock, karst, the soil-rock interface, altered and made ground, and applications. Socioeconomic and environmental considerations are part of his research, and all projects include MSc and/ or PhD students who publish as part of their outcomes.

Profession: Associate Professor in Hydrogeology and Engineering Geology

Highest Qualification: PhD Hydrogeology

Role/ Responsibilities on the Project:  Matthys is a hydrogeologist on the project and the two postdoctoral candidates are registered at the University of Pretoria.
 

Dr. Barnett has a B.S. in Chemical Engineering and an M.S. in Environmental Engineering from the University of Tennessee and a Ph.D. in Environmental Sciences and Engineering from the University of North Carolina. Dr. Barnett has over thirty years of national and international environmental engineering and science experience in industry, government, and academia ranging from water supply and sanitation in rural communities to nuclear waste disposal. His technical research focuses on the chemical processes controlling water quality and contaminant behavior in natural and engineered systems. He has been a principal or co-principal investigator on seventeen grants totaling over U.S. $12 million, and he has published over fifty peer-reviewed journal articles, several book chapters, and a book that collectively have received almost three-thousand citations (h-index=29). He is a licensed professional engineer and a board certified member of the American Academy of Environmental Engineers and Scientists with technical experience in water and wastewater treatment; site assessment and remediation; soil and groundwater contamination; human-health risk assessments; contaminant bioavailability; environmental forensics; environmental and aquatic chemistry; low-level radioactive and hazardous waste management; and nuclear environmental engineering. Dr. Barnett has taught fundamental and applied courses in environmental and aquatic chemistry; water and wastewater treatment; environmental engineering principles and design; and sustainable design and development. His work has been supported by industry, the National Science Foundation, the Department of Energy, the Department of Defense, the Department of Agriculture, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the Water Research Foundation. After being promoted to full professor, Dr. Barnett began to switch his professional focus to areas of broader societal impact, and his current interests are in environmental policy; sustainable development; and water, sanitation, and health in underserved communities, both in the U.S. and abroad.

Profession: Professor of Environmental Engineering at Auburn University

Highest Qualification: PhD Environmental Science and Engineering

Role/Responsibilities on the Project: Monitored Aquifer Recharge.

Julian is an expert in hydrological modelling and applies hydrological models to study the impact of climate change and water resources management on the hydrological system. His research focus lies on the integration of satellite remote sensing data into model building. Furthermore, he peruses research on environmental big data for the advancement of machine learning in hydrology.  He has pioneered the development of machine learning models for subsurface redox conditions, rainfall-runoff modelling and groundwater levels.

Profession: Senior Researcher, Department of Hydrology

Highest Qualification: Geology, University of Copenhagen, Faculty of Science. Obtained November 2016.

Role/ Responsibilities on the Project:  contributing to the hydrological modelling, satellite remote sensing analysis and capacity building.

Jason has been a practicing hydrologist since 1998. He has participated in a broad range of projects with interdisciplinary teams. Work experience includes, IWRM, hydrological and hydraulic modelling, Flood modelling, River Basin Studies, Risk based hydrological assessments, Application development, GIS, Fortran and VB programming, Project management and Research.  He has a background in the application of numerous hydrological, hydraulic and water resource system analysis models in both data rich and data poor areas in South, Southern and central Africa. This knowledge has been applied to the assessment of drought and flood risks analysis, improvements in operational water resources management and in short and long term risk mitigation on real time platforms.

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Profession: Hydrological Science and Water Resource Management

Highest Qualification: MSc Hydrology

Role/ Responsibilities on the Project:  Technical inputs into modelling components and support to model conceptualisation.

Elisa obtained her PhD in hydrogeology from the University of Copenhagen in 2022 and continues her work as a postdoc. She completed her MSc in Environmental Engineering from the Technical University of Denmark in 2017. Elisa is a researcher in water resources focused on hydrological modelling in humid and arid environments. Her research combines hydrological modeling, remote sensing, time series analysis, machine learning and stakeholder involvement for improved water resources management.

Profession: Postdoc in Hydrogeology

Highest Qualification: PhD Hydrogeology

Role/ Responsibilities on the Project:  Elisa is working on i) numerical modelling of the Hout-Sand river catchment, 2) developing data-driven methods for understanding recharge controls and 3) using machine learning methods for downscaling.

Olma T Makonto is a PhD student in Environmental and Water Science (Geohydrology specialization) at the University of Western Cape. Olma has 13 years of working experience in the field of geohydrology. She received her Honors Degree in Bachelor of Earth Science in Hydrology and Water Resources at the University of Venda in 2009. She also received her Masters Degree in Engineering and Environmental Geology (Specializing in Hydrogeology) at the University of Pretoria in 2013. She is currently employed as a Scientific Manager for Geohydrological Services by the Department of Water and Sanitation Limpopo Region. As part of her academic program, she is part of the esgusa-2 project, researching on Managed Aquifer Recharge in urban groundwater system for water supply.

Profession: PhD Student Environmental and Water Science

Highest Qualification: MSc Engineering and Environmental Geology

Role/ Responsibilities on the Project: Researcher

Jaqui has a strong academic and extensive empirical background. She has conducted numerous household poverty surveys and worked in small and large community projects covering a wide range of development topics.  She is dedicated to participatory research and has worked extensively on human development and well-being and the interconnections between humans and their environment,  where she makes a strong connection between science and feelings.  Her passion is citizen science with the aim of achieving a more just society through the democratisation of knowledge. She uses art to emphasise new ways of learning and communicating science. 

Profession:  Professor,  Extra-Ordinary Associate Professor of Anthropology and Water Sciences
Centre of UNESCO Chair in Groundwater, University of Utrecht, Visiting Professor

International Development Studies

Highest Qualification: PhD Earth Sciences

Role/ Responsibilities on the Project:  Social input into stakeholder processes and running a parallel citizen science project on water quality monitoring.