The Panta Rhei session at AGU: a success

The Panta Rhei session at the AGU Fall meeting was a success in terms of attendance and scientific content. More than 50 presentations were given as oral talks and posters. Finally, the session was closed by a memorable dinner that was an unusual and exciting opportunities to share ideas. The dinner took place at the Panta Rei (yes, a "h" is missing in the spelling of "Rhei", but the quality of the dinner did not suffer) restaurant in Columbus Aveneu and was attended by some 30 presenters and conveners. We are pleased to make available for download the presentations that were used to deliver the oral invited talks in the three themes that were treated during the sessions. We would like to thank very much the speakers for making the documents available.

The Panta Rhei dinner at the Panta Rei restaurant

For the theme "Reservoir operation and control", Nick van de Giesen delivered the talk Small reservoirs in the West African savanna: Usage, monitoring and impact. The same topic was discussed by Trent Biggs who delivered the talk Are small reservoirs important? The regional sociohydrology and climatic sensitivity of irrigation systems in southern India. Moreover, Christopher T. Robinson delivered the talk Adaptive Flow Management of Regulated Rivers: Successes and Challenges. Finally, Christopher P. Konrad delivered the talk Are large-scale manipulations of streamflow for ecological outcomes effective either as experiments or management actions?.
For the theme "Peatland and Wetlands", Irina Creed delivered the talk Diversification of farmers markets to include carbon markets: Slowing the rate of loss of mineral wetlands on human dominated landscapes. Moreover, Charles Lane delivered the talk Ecological Processes of Isolated Wetlands: Ecosystem Services and the Significant Nexus.
For the theme "Sociohydrology and change", Alberto Viglione delivered the talk Socio-hydrology modelling and flood risk: roles of collective memory, risk-taking attitude and trust. Furthermore, Upmanu Lall delivered the talk From hydroclimatic prediction to negotiated and risk managed water allocation and reservoir operation.
The talks by Viglione and Lall directly addressed the integrated interpretation and modelling of water and societal systems. It is particularly interesting to summarise the conclusions by Lall: (1) The challenge is to understand, (predict) and manage processes that define the redistribution of the resource. (2) Climate change is just one element of significant structural changes in the offing. (3) Gaining experience with new instruments is essential to provide social balance and resource investment incentives. (4) Emergence of new needs for hydrologic information. (5) We need soft and hard technologies, but most of all understanding of the changing context in which we operate.
More details are given in the above presentations.

Alberto Montanari