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Contact the Freshwater Quality Champions

Professors Pippa Chapman and Joseph Holden are the Freshwater Quality Champions for the UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) Understanding changes in quality of UK freshwaters Programme.

Contact them at freshwater@leeds.ac.uk

Address: School of Geography, University of Leeds, LS2 9JT

More about the Programme Champions

Professor Pippa Chapman and Professor Joseph Holden expertise will help to bring together researchers, practitioners and policymakers to deliver research to understand the major sources, pathways, transformations and interactions of pollutants in freshwater ecosystems.

Pippa is a soil scientist and Chair of Biogeochemistry, with research activities focused on effects of land-use change and agricultural management practices on soil functions, nutrient cycling, greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and water quality. She was recently invited to present research carried out in collaboration with Welsh Water, Yorkshire Water, Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA) and the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs, Northern Ireland, at the inaugural UK Agriculture Partnership launch, which focussed on improving water quality across the farming landscape. She is also a member of the northeast England Lowland Agricultural Peat Task Force and Defra’s Environmental Land Management Expertise Group.

Joseph is founding Director of water@leeds, one of the largest interdisciplinary university-based water research centres in the world. The research centre brings together expertise from across the physical, biological, chemical, social and economic sciences and engineering as well as the arts, to tackle water challenges. He sits on the Government’s expert water advisory board and a number of other panels including SSE’s Viking Windfarm Environmental Advisory Group, and MS Amlin’s (International reinsurance company) Science Advisory Board.

Currently they work together as leaders of the £6M NERC Integrated Catchment Solutions Programme (iCASP) which brings together academics and experts from organisations active in catchment management to find ways to use existing environmental science more effectively – including coming up with solutions to water-related problems – to deliver impact to maximise resilient growth and social benefit.