Details
The University of Sheffield, Sheffield Water Centre in collaboration with Severn Trent Water and the EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Water Infrastructure and Resilience.
PhD Studentship in: Measuring the environmental benefits and social impact of large scale Sustainable Drainage Systems (SuDS)
Stipend: This post will fully cover university tuition and provide a tax-free stipend for a Home student of £24,000 per year.
Closing Date for Applications: 31 July 2024
Start Date: 30th September 2024 (contract duration 4 years)
Flood risk is one of the most significant threats to urban areas. The growing population, climate change and urbanisation will increase the frequency and impact of flooding events in our urban centres, leading to adverse outcomes for the environment and society.
Urban drainage engineers increasingly understand that using Sustainable Drainage Systems (SuDS) to manage water close to where it falls offers a wide range of benefits to the environment and society, including increasing biodiversity and boosting wellbeing.
The Water Industry has used a range of methodologies and measures to demonstrate these wider benefits. However, these approaches fall short of providing a comprehensive understanding of the environmental and social impacts of SuDS interventions, thereby limiting their effectiveness in evidence-based policy making. A robust wider benefits assessment toolkit of cost-effective measurement techniques will bring greater certainty to the cost benefit assessment and funding models for SuDS.
Severn Trent Water’s ambitious programme for town-scale SuDS retrofitting in Mansfield provides a unique – and timely – opportunity to collect key evidence on how SuDS deliver wider environmental and social benefits in practice. The successful candidate will work closely with the water industry as it develops its AMP8 SuDS programmes and have the opportunity to develop an influential network of leading practitioners across the sector.
The student will identify, develop and test a range of physical, data engineering and social science assessment techniques to establish changes in the natural capital and social impact of an area secured through the delivery of a town-scale SuDS programme. The lessons learned will be transferable to all UK water utilities, as the need to identify cost-effective, sustainable and resilient alternatives to conventional urban drainage infrastructure is universal.
The research programme to be completed in this project will be undertaken as part of the EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Water Infrastructure and Resilience (CDT WIRe). WIRe is a collaboration between the three leading UK Universities in water resilient infrastructure. Students will benefit from a bespoke training scheme delivered by world leading experts from academia and industry, access to world leading experimental and computational facilities as well as close and regular contact with industry and end user partners. WIRe is committed to promoting a diverse and inclusive community, and offers a range of family friendly, inclusive employment policies. For further information on the WIRe scheme visit the web site at: https://cdtwire.com/
The project will be supervised by Professor Virginia Stovin and Dr Jingxia Wang in collaboration with partners from Severn Trent Water. There will be generous opportunities to travel to visit our academic and industry partners in both the UK and overseas.
Eligibility Criteria
This studentship is subject to standard RCUK eligibility criteria. It is only open to students with Home residency.
The selection criteria for the position are:
• A good honours degree (or equivalent experience) in Geography, Planning, Engineering, Physical Science, Computer Science or a related subject.
• Enthusiasm for research, and in particular for the development of new quantitative evaluation techniques.
• Good level of written and oral communication skills, as appropriate for disseminating research and communicating with project partners.
• Willingness to collaborate with other researchers, industry and end-users.
• Aptitude for research in a relevant area (e.g. experimental design, quantitative analysis, numerical modelling) as evidenced by previous experience.
How to apply
Interested candidates should email a covering letter and their Curriculum Vitae to Miss Lindsay Hopcroft (cdtwireapps@sheffield.ac.uk). For information and informal enquiries please contact: Professor Virginia Stovin, v.stovin@sheffield.ac.uk.
Funding Notes
Stipend: This post will fully cover university tuition and provide a tax-free stipend for a Home student of £24,000 per year.
This studentship is subject to standard RCUK eligibility criteria. It is only open to students with Home residency.
