Colorado State Student Water Symposium 2000 Highlights Student Research, Policy and Land Use Effects on Water; Dam Removal

Colorado State University students from a variety of academic fields have organized the fourth annual Student Water Symposium for Nov. 8-10.

Undergraduate and graduate students from civil engineering, natural resources, biology, chemistry and sociology will present the results of research into water and related topics, with emphasis on the West.

Two speakers will examine topics of current importance to Western residents. They include:

• Nov. 8, 7 p.m., Cherokee Park Room in Lory Student Center; William Riebsame, general editor of the "Atlas of the New West," will discuss "People, Land and Water in the New West: A Look to the Future." Riebsame, associate professor of geography at the University of Colorado at Boulder, examines how changing land-use patterns affect both cultural and ecological landscapes, especially in areas of rapid development in the Rocky Mountains.
• Nov. 9, noon, Cherokee Park Room; Josh Korman, a systems ecologist and fisheries biologist working as a consultant in Vancouver, B.C., will talk about "Challenges in Adaptive Management of Riparian Ecosystems." Adaptive management refers to changing ecological management practices based on continual feedback from the environment. Korman has worked on a variety of riparian areas, including the Colorado River in the Grand Canyon; the Columbia, Kootenai, Bridge and Upper Mississippi rivers and Florida Bay.

In addition, a panel will meet at 5:30 p.m. Nov. 9 in Room 100 Engineering Building Auditorium to discuss "Dam Removal: Toward and Ecological, Engineering and Societal Balance." Topics will include Elwha River restoration and sediment management (in Olympic National Park, Washington); considerations and approaches in restoring former reservoir sites; rehabilitating downstream channels; potential for ecosystem restoration along rivers; and the intrinsic values of, and changing perspectives on, dam removal.

A second panel slated for noon Nov. 10 in the Cherokee Park Room will examine "Influence of Water Policy on Challenges Faced and Solution Options for Water Resources." The panel will include Elizabeth Rieke, former assistant secretary of the Department of the Interior for Water and Science and director of Arizona’s Department Water Resources. She and co-panelists will discuss a number of resource issues: water conservation and sustainable development; Native Americans water rights challenges; developing and implementing instream flows, or the streamflow characteristics that support fish and their habitat; and how water policy has shaped today’s water resource challenges and whether current policy can help solve problems.

For more information on Colorado State’s Student Water Symposium, visit the Web at www.watersym.colostate.edu or call (970) 491-7620.