News

Flanders UNESCO Trustfund is offering sponsorships for participants from developing countries to attend the SWAT+ Advanced Workshop taking place in January 2025 with the lead of Texas A&M AgriLife Research. At least five applicants will have their registration fees fully covered.

Texas A&M AgriLife Research collaborated with the IBM Sustainability Accelerator to create the SWAT Virtual Extension Assistant, an interactive Gen AI virtual assistant that provides user-friendly soil and water information to support agricultural and natural resource decision-making. For help, contact: eco.web@tamu.edu

Competition Details

We invite participants to create original and innovative crop management Decision Tables using SWAT+ Toolbox v2 and win prizes.

This competition is open to all individuals interested in agricultural management and modeling, including but not limited to:

• Researchers
• Agricultural professionals
• Students
• Environmental scientists
• Enthusiasts and innovators in the field

The following prizes are up for grabs.

• 1st Place: SWAT Branded Cap, Polo, Jacket, and Mug
• 2nd Place: SWAT Branded Cap, Jacket, and Mug
• 3rd Place: SWAT Branded Jacket and Mug
• Honorable Mentions: SWAT Branded Mug

All winners will receive recognition on the SWAT Website.

Find more details by following this link: https://swat.tamu.edu/decision-table-challenge-2024/

During the ISIMIP (InterSectoral Impact Model Intercomparison Project) Workshop in April 2024 we agreed on a new topic for future research of the Water-Regional sector of ISIMIP: "Climate change induced threats to water security", which could be related to floods, droughts, water scarcity, etc. We hope that research on this topic will result in the next (fourth!) Special Issue of Water-Regional international team. The third SI (called Topical Collection) is published recently in Climatic Change.

After the Workshop we did a quick search for Water Security indicators, and found some suitable formulas, which could be applied: please see four examples in the attached file. There are also several reviews on tools/approaches for measuring water security:

• Thanti Octavianti et al., A review of 80 assessment tools measuring water security, Wiley, doi.org/10.1002/wat2.1516
• Juliana Marcal et al., Addressing Water Security: An Overview, MDPI Sustainability, 2021, doi.org/10.3390/su132413702
• Mukand Babel et al., A framework for water security assessment at basin scale, APN Science Bulletin 8 (1), www.apn-gcr.org/bulletin

In our opinion, there is no sense to choose just one Water Security Indicator to be used in all regions and river basins. Besides, water security related to floods needs a special approach, where indices related to water scarcity are not suitable. So, potential authors have a freedom to choose, which approach/indicator is most suitable for their case study area and research problem.

Those who would be potentially interested in this topic and are willing to do research and contribute a paper to our next SI have to respond by 15.10 about:

1. their general interest to the topic and publication of a paper,
2. possible case study region or river basin(s),
3. problems related to floods, droughts and water scarcity in this region.

After getting responses we intend to organise a virtual Workshop to discuss further steps with potential authors.

Looking forward to hearing from you,
Valentina Krysanova and Fred Hattermann

We are happy to inform you all that our SWAT model-focused special issue with the EMS journal is online and accepting research and review articles. Please consider this special issue for your next article. Our editorial team will expedite the peer review process. We will also be reaching out to you for article reviews based on your expertise.

Link to special issue: EMS special issue- SWAT-ML-RS

Special issue title:  Innovations in Ecosystem Modeling: Integrating SWAT with Cutting-Edge Remote Sensing and Machine Learning Techniques

Journal: Environmental Modelling & Software (IF- 4.8, cite score: 9.3)

Guest Editors: Arun Bawa, Kyung Hwa Cho, Jong Cheol Pyo, Paul Wagner, Monireh Faramarzi

Scope: Integrating remote sensing and machine learning with SWAT have potential to enhance predictive capabilities, providing actionable insights for sustainable management. This special issue invites collaborative research to demonstrate the integration of these technologies with SWAT, improving performance and broadening its applicability. Topics include data assimilation, predictive modeling, scalability, interdisciplinary applications, decision support systems, uncertainty analysis, and improving data quality [not limited to these topics only]. The focus is on enhancing SWAT tools through significant modeling advancements or developing new tools. Please avoid submitting simple SWAT based case studies.

Submission deadline: Oct 31, 2025

Note: When submitting your manuscript please select the article type “VSI: SWAT-ML-RS”

Both SWAT and SWAT+ model related research articles are considered.

For additional information, please contact arun.bawa@ag.tamu.edu.

Session ID: 223561 
Session Title: H002: Advancement in Watershed Modeling: Agricultural Systems, Nutrient Balance, Carbon Cycling and Regulatory 
Science Section: Hydrology

Since 2016, this modeling session has served as a forum for extensive discussions among international scientists spanning various disciplines. We aspire to foster collaborative efforts in this session, advocating for advanced insights to drive future investigations into modeling development and associated management strategies. See you in Washington, D.C.~!

Submit an abstract
Submission Deadline: July 31 (Wed), 2024

Water is complicated, especially in complex watersheds developed to meet municipal, agricultural, industrial, and flood control needs. It can come from stream channels, reservoirs, and aquifers, and it can be used to serve the needs of cities, industries, agricultural irrigation, transportation, a biodiverse environment, and flood control.

In recent months Dr. Jeff Arnold has been enhancing the water allocation components of SWAT+ to help users easily specify from where, to where, and how much water moves between these many potential sources and destinations. SWAT+ users can now use the model’s water allocation table to specify sources, destinations, anticipated amounts, and limits of water (and contaminant) movement between water sources and destinations. This will allow users to more easily and realistically simulate alternative scenarios of water allocation in complex watersheds with multiple water sources and uses.

The enhanced version of SWAT+ is currently being evaluated by several users in Europe, India, and the United States, and we anticipate that it will soon be available on the SWAT+ website.

For several years Dr. Phil Gassman of Iowa State University has led an effort to continuously update and maintain the database of SWAT-related publications found on the SWAT website. He has just informed us that in October the number of peer-reviewed publications in the database has exceeded 6,000! Dr. Gassman’s team, which includes an undergraduate student at ISU, is still updating the database for 2022 and 2023. He anticipates that the final count for 2022 will exceed 600, which reflects an ongoing trend that began almost a decade ago of SWAT publications exceeding “one per day”. Also, it is quite likely that some SWAT-related publications from earlier years have been missed, especially if they were not published in English. In addition, Dr. Gassman reports that almost 900 journals are currently represented in the database! What a record! Congratulations and thanks to all SWAT users and developers for helping make SWAT the most widely used model of its kind worldwide! 

Please consider uploading citation data from published, peer-reviewed articles that you have co-authored, after confirming that the article has not already been indexed in the database. There is an increasing need for members of the global user community to participate in the process of uploading citation data, to maintain the long-term viability of the database.

Congratulations and thanks to all SWAT users and developers for helping make SWAT the most widely used model of its kind worldwide!

UNGA 78 | MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 2023 – 1:00 – 3:15 PM | NEW YORK

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