Membership

Chair
Dr. David Schindler
Killam Memorial Chair and Professor of Ecology
University of Alberta
David Schindler is the Killam Memorial Chair and Professor of Ecology at the University of Alberta. He received his doctorate from Oxford University in England, where he studied as a Rhodes Scholar. From 1968 to 1989, he founded and directed the Experimental Lakes Project of the Canadian Department of Fisheries and Oceans near Kenora, Ontario conducting interdisciplinary research on the effects of eutrophication, acid rain, climate change and other human insults on boreal aquatic ecosystems. Dr. Schindler has served as head of the International Joint Commission's Expert Committee on Ecology and Geochemistry, and the U.S. Academy of Sciences' Committee on the Atmosphere and the Biosphere. He has also served as President of the American Society of Limnology and Oceanography and as a Canadian National Representative to the International Limnological Society. He is a Fellow of the Royal Societies of Canada and London (UK), a member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, an Officer of the Order of Canada, and a member of the Alberta Order of Excellence. Dr. Schindler has received numerous awards, including an Outstanding Achievement Award of the American Institute of Fisheries Biologists, a Frank Rigler Award of the Canadian Limnological Society, the Manning Award of Distinction for Innovation in Science, and the NSERC Gerhard Herzberg Gold Medal for Science and Engineering. In 2009 he received the Sandford Fleming Medal for Public Communication of Science. He has ten honorary doctorates from universities within Canada and the United States and he has authored over 300 scientific publications.

Co-Chair of the Committee
Dr. Alexender J.B. Zehnder
Scientific Director, Alberta Water Research Institute
Zurich, Switzerland
Dr. Alexander Zehnder, Scientific Director of the Alberta Water Research Institute (AWRI), is recognized as one of the world’s leading experts on water and water management. He is the founder and director of triple Z consulting, and is Professor emeritus of ETH Zurich. He is also the former president of the ETH Board -- the governing board of the ETH-system comprising two universities (ETH-Zurich and ETH-Lausanne), and four national laboratories (PSI, EMPA, WSL, EAWAG), which has an annual budget of over $2 billion U.S. Dr. Zehnder is the co-founder and a member of the board of directors of SPG (Sustainable Performance Group), Europe’s largest investment company focusing on sustainable production and manufacturing, member of the industrial advisory board of Zouk Ventures in London, and of the Council STS (Science and Technology in Society) forum Kyoto.

Dr. Zehnder has been on the faculty of Stanford University, Wageningen Agricultural University, the Netherlands, and for 12 years, served as director of the Swiss Water Research Institute, EAWAG. He holds an honorary doctoral degree of the University in Nancy, France, is a Member of the Dutch Royal Academy of Sciences, the Swiss Academy of Engineering Sciences, and a Foreign Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences. He is also an ISI Highly Cited Scientist, one of the “founding fathers” of the concept of the “2000 Watt Society”, and the author of several books and over 200 articles in peer reviewed journals.

Dr. Frank Schaefer III
Senior Scientist
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Frank Schaefer III’s work in environmental microbiology has made him an authority on protozoan waterborne pathogens, which can threaten drinking water supplies and lead to serious and potentially deadly disease outbreaks. As a senior scientist with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for almost 30 years, Dr. Schaefer has supervised a wide range of projects that have resulted in safer, cleaner drinking water and improved wastewater-management practices. In addition to protecting the health of American citizens, Frank has provided his expertise to the American Water Works Association Research Foundation and to international organizations such as the Drinking Water Inspectorate in the U.K., India’s National Institute of Cholera and Enteric Diseases, Australian Cryptosporidium/Giardia Working Group, and the National Association of Testing Authorities, Australia.

Dr. Fred Wrona
Acting Director General, Water Sciences and Technology Directorate (Environment Canada)
Professor in the Department of Geography, University of Victoria
Fred Wrona (B.Sc. Environmental Sciences, University of Calgary; Ph.D. Aquatic Ecology, University of Calgary) is currently the acting Director General, Water Sciences and Technology Directorate (Environment Canada) and is a Professor in the Department of Geography, University of Victoria. Dr. Wrona has conducted and managed inter-disciplinary aquatic ecosystem research for over 25 years focusing on the ecology, hydrology and hydro-ecology of cold-regions aquatic ecosystems. His research interests include understanding and predicting the impacts of climate variability/change on the structure and function of cold-regions aquatic ecosystems, identifying mechanisms responsible for the observed patterns of dynamics in aquatic food webs, and assessing the impacts of resource development on the health and sustainability of aquatic systems. From 1992-1996 he served as the Science Director for the Northern Rivers Basins Study and has been the scientific program lead for numerous federal water research initiatives. He is currently involved with national and international scientific and advisory committees related to the development and implementation of northern hydrological and ecological research programs. He was the lead author of the Freshwater Systems chapter for the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment (ACIA-2005), was a contributing author to the 2007 IPCC WGII Polar Regions Chapter and a contributing author to the 2nd International Conference on Arctic Research Planning. Dr. Wrona also has a strong interest in science-policy linkages and is currently the Head and Chief Delegate for the Canadian National Committee for the UNESCO-International Hydrology Program.

Dr. Ginger Gibson
Northern resident, canoeist, consultant and researcher
Yellowknife, Northwest Territories
Dr. Ginger Gibson works as a researcher in northern Canada and Latin America, providing analysis of the issues that surface through the lifecycle of the extractive industries for communities and governments. With a PhD in Mining Engineering and graduate degrees in anthropology, Gibson focuses on consent, communication, capacity building, negotiation, and benefits distribution with communities. Gibson currently works with the Tlicho Nation focusing on issues of social, mining and mineral policy. She is currently completing a manual for indigenous negotiators, “Negotiation of Impact and Benefit Agreements,” with Professor Ciaran O’Faircheallaigh. Her background in mining engineering and anthropology combines the expertise to analyze corporations and their mining deposits, with the ability to design and implement agreements sensitive to community structures and needs. She is an Adjunct Professor in Mining Engineering at the University of British Columbia.

Dr. Helen Ingram
Research Fellow, Southwest Centre at the University of Arizona
Professor Emeritus at the University of Arizona and University of California Irvine
Helen Ingram is a Research Fellow, Southwest Centre at the University of Arizona and Professor Emeritus at the University of Arizona and University of California Irvine. With a Ph.D in Public Law and Government from Columbia University (1967), Dr. Ingram is a recognized leader in public policy issues related to science and society, environmental policy, trans boundary environmental policy, and water resources policy. From 1995 to 20007, she served as the Warmington Endowed Chair, University of California at Irvine, with a joint appointments in Department of Political Science, Planning, Policy and Design and Criminology, Law and Society. She received the Aaron Wildavsky Award for Enduring Contributions for “Policy Design for Democracy” Public Policy Section of the American Political Science Association, and Policy Studies Organization 2008 and is the author of over an hundred articles and book chapters as well as thirteen books including most recently the 2008 co-edited volume Water, Place and Equity Cambridge, MIT Press.

Dr. Jan Hopmans
Professor of Vadose Zone Hydrology
University of California, Davis
Jan Hopmans is Professor of Vadose Zone Hydrology at the University of California, Davis. He graduate with a Master degree in Hydrology at Wageningen Agricultural University in 1981 and received his Ph.D in 1985 at Auburn University (USA) in soil physics. He accepted a faculty position at the University of California, Davis in 1988. His research and teaching activities focus on the development of experimental and mathematical methods to better understand the fundamental processes controlling soil water flow and transport in the vadose zone across spatial scales, and include interests in soil water-plant relationships, irrigation water management, and soil moisture monitoring techniques and instrumentation. His current research on the development, application and deployment of environmental sensors is funded by NSF. He has authored over 150 scientific publications. Dr. Hopmans is a fellow of the Soil Science Society of America and the American Geophysical Union, and he received the 2003 Soil Physics Don and Betty Kirkham Award. He is currently Chair of the Department of Land, Air and Water Resources and Editor-in-Chief of Vadose Zone Journal.

Dr. Joseph Rasmussen
Professor and Canada Research Council Tier I chair in Aquatic Ecosystems
University of Lethbridge
Joseph Rasmussen is a professor and Canada Research Council Tier I chair in Aquatic Ecosystems at the University of Lethbridge, where he has been since 2003. He received his Ph.D in Aquatic Ecology at the University of Calgary in 1983, and spent 20 years in the Department of Biology at McGill University, where he became a full professor. Dr. Rasmussen teaches ecology, aquatic ecosystems, and aquatic biology. He has served on a wide range of advisory panels across Canada dealing with water management issues ranging from in-stream flow to water quality criteria. He has done ground breaking research in a number of key areas relating to the management of water and aquatic resources. These include: the impacts of heavy metals, mining practices, and sewage disposal on aquatic ecosystem function, biomagnification of PCBs, mercury and radioisotopes and mutagenic pollutants, isotopic tracer techniques for studying energy flow through food webs, the impacts of exotic invaders on ecosystem structure and function, the decline of freshwater biodiversity, conservation and habitat requirements of salmonids, eutrophication, thermal pollution and other key issues. Papers that he has authored or co-authored have appeared in internationally renowned scientific journals including Nature, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Ecology, Ecology Letters, Ecological Monographs, Ecological Applications, Limnology and Oceanography, Journal of Animal Ecology and the Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences. Dr. Rasmussen has supervised 10 Ph.D’s, who work as university professors or environmental scientists in government or the private sector. In recognition of his contributions to Canadian aquatic science he was selected to give the Millenial Stevenson Lecture at the Canadian Conference for Fisheries Research. Dr. Rasmussen has served as Associate Editor of the Water Air and Soil Pollution, an international journal that covers a broad range of pollution related topics, and presently serves on the editorial board of the Journal of Animal Ecology.

Dr. Mary E. Power
Member , Board of Directors, California Nature Conservancy and the executive committee of the National Science Foundation’s National Center for Earth-Surface Dynamics Faculty Manager, Angelo Coast Range Reserve (a component of the University of California Natural Reserve System)
Founding Director, California Biodiversity Center
Mary E. Power studies spatial scales and controls of food-web interactions and ecosystem fluxes throughout river drainage networks. She and her fellow researchers examine cross-habitat fluxes, specifically, the use of river-derived insect production by terrestrial consumers (such as spiders, lizards and bats) in watersheds and the population and ecosystem consequences of this subsidy. Dr. Power shares her wide-ranging expertise as a member of the board of directors for the California Nature Conservancy and the executive committee of the National Science Foundation’s National Center for Earth-Surface Dynamics. She is also the faculty manager of the Angelo Coast Range Reserve (a component of the University of California Natural Reserve System) and the founding director of the California Biodiversity Center

Dr. Mike Young
Ecological economist
Sydney, Australia
As an ecological economist, Mike Young has put much of his energy into the always challenging task of translating scientific results into resource-management policies with practical applications. Dr. Young’s development of water-policy options in Australia and the use of incentive instruments to conserve biodiversity have successfully bridged the gap between science and policy. As the worldwide need for water increases, water policies and guidelines will have to be adapted quickly to meet the demand. Among other pressing topics, Dr. Young is currently researching water trading and entitlement arrangements, water accounting options, pricing for urban and rural water use, and institutional options associated with water reform.

Dr. Paul Bishop
Environmental engineer and a professor of environmental health
Dr. Paul L. Bishop is currently serving as Environmental Engineering Program Director for the National Science Foundation. He is also the Associate Vice President for Research and Professor of Environmental Engineering at the University of Cincinnati. He has also held a secondary appointment as Professor of Environmental Health in the College of Medicine. He joined the University of Cincinnati in 1988 after 16 years as Professor and Head of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of New Hampshire. Dr. Bishop received his B.S. in Civil Engineering from Northeastern University and his M.S. and Ph.D. from Purdue University in environmental engineering. He has previously served as department head at the University of Cincinnati, and was the Associate Dean for Graduate Studies and Research for six years. He was also the Director of the NIH-funded University of Cincinnati Superfund Basic Research Program. He has directed over $16 million of environmental research and is the author or co-author of five textbooks and over 400 technical publications. He is also an associate editor of several international research journals. He is a Past President of the Association of Environmental Engineering and Science Professors (AEESP), is a Registered Professional Engineer, a Fellow of the American Society of Civil Engineers, and is a Board Certified Environmental Engineer (BCEE) by the American Academy of Environmental Engineers (AAEE). Currently, he is Chair of the U.S.A. National Committee of the International Water Association (IWA), is a member of both the IWA Strategic Council and Governing Board, and has completed two terms on the Board of Trustees of AAEE. Recently, he was appointed a Director of the Engineering Accreditation Board of ABET. Dr. Bishop’s research interests include biological treatment of water and hazardous wastes using biofilms, contaminated soil bioremediation, development of environmental microsensors, solidification/stabilization of hazardous wastes, and pollution prevention technologies. He is the inventor or co-inventor of a number of environmental microelectrodes that he is currently using to study biofilm development and pathogen survival in drinking water distribution pipes, and is a co-holder of four patents. In 2005, he was awarded the Frontiers in Research Award by AEESP and in 2006 received the Outstanding Service Award from the International Water Association. In 2007, he received the College of Engineering Distinguished Research Award. Dr. Bishop has mentored 27 PhD recipients, of whom 14 now hold tenured faculty positions, and 70 Masters graduates.

Dr. Peter Fritz
Chairman of the Board, BDZ Training and Demonstration Centre for Decentralized Sewage Treatment Leipzig, Germany
Peter Fritz began his academic career in the hotbed of isotope hydrology as a doctoral student in the world’s first environmental isotope laboratory at the University of Pisa in 1962. He has since done extensive research into environmental isotopes, conducting studies in isotope hydrology and paleoclimatology and developing methodology for radiocarbon dating of groundwater. Dr. Fritz has been called as an expert by the International Atomic Energy Agency, and he has been a key participant in the development of safe and effective nuclear waste disposal concepts in Canada and Europe. Currently, he is chairman of the board of the BDZ Training and Demonstration Centre for Decentralized Sewage Treatment in Leipzig, Germany.