Janez Susnik

Before joining IHE Delft, I was a Research Fellow at the Centre for Water Systems, University of Exeter, working on two EU FP7 funded projects (WASSERMed and PREPARED). Before that I was with JBA Consulting (UK). I completed my PhD at the University of East Anglia, Norwich, and gained my BSc from Lancaster University.

I have three main research interests:

1. Using systems thinking and modelling to explore the global water-energy-food nexus. I am interested in assessing long-term water balance projections and scenarios under an uncertain global future. I have recently extended the use of this approach to link projections directly to impacts in food and economic sectors and for assessing reservoir resilience (see publications ). I am exploring ways to expand the scope and scale of this work to include seamless global water-energy-food assessment to explore the viabiltiy of these systems under global development, and to understand the causal links between economic growth and human development.
2. Exploring the future urban water demand, attempting to model this into the future, and investigating technical and social ways for reducing this demand, particularly with a focus on alternative water supply technologies. A particular interest is investigating the extent to which cities can be 'self-reliant' on local water resources by increasing supply (especially through alternative measures), reducing demand, and becoming more water-efficient.
3. Related to the topics above, I have an interest in urban water-energy relationships to assess how cities can become more resource efficient in a time of increasing pressure on natural resources.

I am involved in the following research projects:

1. ONEPlanET – a Horizon Europe funded project running from November 2022 for 3 years. ONEPlanET will investigate the nexus-wide implications of a green energy transition in Africa. IHE plays a prominent role in nexus systems model development, and also coordinates one of the project case studies (Songwe River Basin, Malawi – Tanzania).
2. NEXOGENESIS a Horizon2020 funded project that I coordinate. This major research programme will run from September 2021 for four years and will investigate ways to efficiently streamline policy into the WEF Nexus, including the use of novel reinforcement learning and other artificial intelligence techniques.
3. SIM4NEXUS. Ended June 2020. Funded by the Horizon2020 programme. I worked as Work Package co-leader, and was a member of the Project Coordination Team. I had a major role in the integrative modelling component of the project concerned with amalgamating the outputs from numerous specialised thematic models into one seamless systems analysis.
4. AltWater. Funded under the DUPC2 programme, which is financed by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. I was the project coordinator. This project assesses the potential of alternative water supplies in four cities (Maputo and Beira, Mozambique; Surabaya and Gresik, Indonesia) both now and under future conditions to determine the potential impact of rolling out these technologies to increase water security under changing climatic and socio-economic conditions.
5. Interdepartmental Global Water Hotspot analysis. Led by PBL (Dutch Environment Assessment Agency). Major global assessment of hotspots of critical current and forecoming water issues. My work is focussed on potential water quality issues, and the impact to human health. This work led to the publication "The Geography of Future Water Challenges".
6. Future Water Challenges 2. Led by PBL (Dutch Environment Assessment Agency). This is a follow-on study from the Global Water Hotspot analysis. I co-lead the involvement of IHE Delft, which focusses on the future development pathways of cities.