Alma López Avilés

Alma López Avilés, Dr. López-Avilés holds a PhD in hydrology /fluvial geomorphology from Leeds University, United Kingdom (UK) and a Licentiate (5 years) degree in Geography, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Spain. Her PhD Research was in fluvial geomorphology and hydrology, focused on floods in the Bergantes-Guadalope Basin, in Aragón, Spain.  Alma has studied and worked in the UK since 1993, except for a period between 2010 and 2013 when she lived and worked in Ethiopia as a full-time Associate Professor at Addis Ababa University, and as a consultant for UNICEF and UNDP (United Nations –UN) in climate change adaptation and capacity-building projects; she still collaborates with the UN, e.g. leading a recent chapter on sustainability in Ethiopia in an online open-access book edited by UNESCO (2019). 

In the UK, Alma has worked in the public sector at the Environment Agency (England & Wales) as a Development Control Engineer in areas at risk of flooding, and as a Policy Advisor in national Climate Change Adaptation policy. In Academia, besides Addis Ababa University, she has taught and researched at Leeds, Roehampton, Kingston and Surrey universities in environment, sustainability, climate change and water management subjects, and in projects on the circular economy, water resource efficiency, management and policy, water quality, and the nexus water-energy-food, including stake-holder engagement, quantitative and qualitative analysis, outlining of indicators and policies definition.

In the private sector, Alma has worked as a Principal and Senior Consultant and Project Manager in varied hydrology, geomorphology, flood risk modelling and mapping, climate change adaptation, and water resource projects at different scales. Alma is a senior Visiting Research Fellow at the University of Surrey where she has worked in various European Union and UK Research Council projects. She has participated and led numerous national and international research proposals in the academic and private sectors, and has obtained funding from various public institutions, the UN, and private entities. Alma has recently (2020-21) developed a project with the University of Zaragoza for Aragón’s regional Government, producing Climate Change Vulnerability and Resilience Indicators and Maps for Aragón.

Alma is a chartered project manager by the UK’s Chartered Institution of Water and Environmental Management (2005), and a chartered scientist by the Science Council (2006).