The IAHR webinar on “Decision Support Modelling and PEST” sponsored by IWHR was successfully convened on May 20, 2021 to share progressive ideas and technologies in groundwater research.

Prof. John Doherty, a leading scholar in groundwater research and the author of PEST, a software package widely used for groundwater model calibration and uncertainty analysis, reported on the importance of numerical simulation in environmental management, groundwater model calibration and uncertainty analysis. He also shared experiences of PEST and PEST++ practices.

Prof. Alberto Guadagnini, Chair of Committee on Groundwater Hydraulics and Management of IAHR, chaired the webinar and made an opening introduction. In the Q&A session, experts discussed the role of numerical simulation in supporting environmental management and elaborated why data assimilation and uncertainty analysis are fundamental to decision-support modelling. Experts concluded that numerical simulation should be undertaken in direct support of the whole process, and that’s why numerical models need to be stable and fast-running. In fact, excessive complexity of a model can actually erode its ability to support environmental management rather than help it.

Examples of linear and nonlinear uncertainty analysis conducted by members of the PEST and PEST++ suites in practice were also included in the discussion.

Webinar recording is available here.