Freshwater scarcity is increasingly perceived as a global systemic risk. Europe is experiencing growing pressure on water resources due to urban expansion, climate change and increasing demand. These drivers affect cities in different ways, depending on local climatic, demographic, and infrastructural conditions. Although household water use represents a relatively small fraction of total water abstraction, nevertheless it is often the focus of public interest, as it corresponds to the water directly used by the population. Looking forward to the next few decades, further investments in urban water infrastructures are expected to address rising demand and supply variability. Owing to their strategic societal role, local communities and institutions as universities can influence behavioral changes and support decision-making by individuals, private and public organizations, and businesses. For this purpose, the proposed research topic intends to focus on water footprint accounting of direct water use in urban areas by studying innovative sustainable and multifaceted measures like rainwater harvesting, both at the household and the community level. This approach aims to support urban water managers by incorporating factors often overlooked in previous city-scale water footprint assessments, such as the current and future temporal variability of water demand, user behavior patterns, and the interaction between household- and community-scale solutions.

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The ideal candidate should have a strong background in civil and environmental studies, specifically in the field of sustainable urban drainage and water supply systems, applied hydrology and hydraulics. Familiarity with programming languages such as MATLAB, R, Phyton and commercial software as EPA-SWMM, EPANET, as experiences in statistics, data analysis and socio-economic modelling will be an added value. Fluency in English, both written and spoken is recommended. Finally, the candidate should be strongly motivated to work in a collaborative environment, with an inter-disciplinary approach. Finally, willingness to international mobility is required.

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The research activity will take place at the Department of Engineering within the Research Group of Water Engineering and Hydrology coordinated by Prof. Giuseppe T. Aronica. The Group includes an Associate Professor, Brunella Bonaccorso, post-doc researchers and PhD students; the research activities cover research topics related to water resources management, sustainable urban drainage systems, water supply systems, hydrology and hydraulics. These activities are supported by many national and international research projects, consultancies for Public Agencies and Private Companies. The Research Group have strong collaborations with Italian and international Universities.

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