On flow variability and stream ecosystem evolution
Résumé
The key to successful water and river management is the advancement of holistic approaches thatseek to benefit human societies by sustaining the full range of resources created by rivers, including both physicaland ecological services. This report describes the results of discussions held at the University of Birmingham, K,during which participants sought to fill the conceptual gap that exists among water resource planners, flood engineers,and ecologists. Participants, including experts from Europe and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, attemptedto advance and integrate concepts related to reference systems and sustainability and related to fully integrated waterresource management within and between river basins. In a context of increasing pressures on (a) water supplies,wastewater treatment, and needs for flood management, (b) agricultural and forestry production systems, (c) land forurban expansion, and (d) nature conservation, recreation, and landscape restoration, participants discussed the primarychallenge of managing changing rivers (changing flows, mobile sediments, and moving channels) in a diverse,dynamic, and highly connected system.