Alban Kuriqi

• Civil Engineer | PhD in River Restoration and Management
• Lecturer at University for Business and Technology

Increasing demand for renewable energy has led to a massive expansion of the small-scale hydropower plants and particularly those of run-of-river type. Meanwhile, the awareness concerning river conservation and restoration is being continually increasing. This study focuses on the assessment of environmental flows releases and energy production con...

The water-energy-ecosystem nexus represents a complex interlinkage that depends on the flow regime type. Inadequate environmental flows setting may adversely affect the riverine ecosystem and/or hydropower revenue. This issue was addressed quantitatively in this study by considering a run-of-river hydropower plant located in a river of the Tagus ba...

A better understanding of intra/inter-annual streamflow variability and trends enables more effective water resources planning and management for current and future needs. This paper investigates the variability and trends of streamflow data from five stations (i.e. Ashti, Chindnar, Pathgudem, Polavaram, and Tekra) in Godavari river basin, India. T...

The general perception of small run-of-river hydropower plants as renewable energy sources with little or no environmental impacts has led to a global proliferation of this hydropower technology. However, such hydropower schemes may alter the natural flow regime and impair the fluvial ecosystem at different trophic levels. This paper presents a glo...

Inland waters play an important ecological, social, and economic role. However, they are exposed to various types of pollution, mainly from agriculture, industry, and urbanization. Therefore, it is important to take measures to restore their biological balance by supporting the natural processes of bioremediation. One of the methods for such measur...

This study aims to evaluate the spatial and temporal variations of physicochemical parameters at selected small run-of-river hydropower plants along a 126 km section of the Bóbr River in southwestern Poland. The main contribution of this study lies in comparing different water quality classification methods from different regions worldwide. Our res...

Aim of the study: This provides insight into the current and future water situation in the East Nile Delta in Egypt. Additionally, the study aimed to identify gaps in knowledge that require further research and to illustrate the different types of models used to optimize water resources management and maintain food security. Material and methods:...

Groundwater is an important water supply for households, industry, and agriculture: one-third of the world’s drinking water is sourced from groundwater. The main objective of this study is to investigate the effects of groundwater flow directions on the design of drainage plans. The study involved field investigation to measure modeling input param...

The six Western Balkan countries (WB6), which include Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, and Serbia, are in a critical phase of their development and face various economic, political and environmental challenges. Political uncertainties, economic imbalances, and institutional weaknesses have hindered their progres...

This study examines recent energy transition policies and the conceptual framework of energy justice, emphasizing the role of hydropower, in ensuring the equitable distribution of energy services and burdens. The analysis focuses on the EU’s energy mix, highlighting the capacity of hydropower and its impact on energy justice, and examines the relat...

The development of energy prices over time has depended on several factors. Difficulties and disruptions in local and global energy markets caused by climate change, pandemics and wars have accelerated the transition to clean energy. The overview of electricity generation in four countries (e.g. Lithuania, Italy, Iceland and Austria) is examined. T...

It is well known that water management practices can have a significant impact on the climate and hydrology of a region. As a rule, the average flow downstream decreases due to the construction of new hydropower plants and the operation of new dams, as evaporation increases in the upstream dams. However, this is not the case in every situation. Thi...

Knowledge of soil temperature (ST) is important for analysing environmental conditions and climate change. Moreover, ST is a vital element of soil that impacts crop growth as well as the germination of the seeds. In this study, four machine-learning (ML) paradigms including random forest (RF), radial basis neural network (RBNN), multi-layer percept...

In the Wadi Cheliff basin (Algeria), a 48-year (1971–2018) time series of annual maximum daily rainfall was studied to identify and quantify trends observed at 150 rain gauges. Initial trends in annual maximum daily rainfall were determined using the Mann–Kendall test, with a significance level of 95%. The slope or increase/decrease in the annual m...

Flash flood hazard is one of the most frequent hydrological hazards in the Syrian coastal region. The Northern Kabir River Basin (NKRB) is among the most susceptible regions to flooding. Assessing the spatial distribution of flash flood risk presents a significant difficulty in the NKRB. The absence of regular hydrological measurement and common po...

The models used in this study make it possible to make more accurate predictions about river discharge. These results can influence flood protection strategies, water resource management, and hydropower generation. Due to their ability to capture the underlying temporal relationships in the data, time series forecasts have become increasingly popul...

This study evaluates and enhances machine learning models for predicting pan evaporation under diverse climatic conditions. Five fundamental machine learning models were employed and tested across four different stations. Subsequent comparisons were made with advanced techniques, including long short-term memory (LSTM) networks. An innovative appro...

A thorough literature review was conducted on the effects of free surface oscillation in open channels, highlighting the risks of the occurrence of positive and negative surge waves that can lead to overtopping. Experimental analyses were developed to focus on the instability of the flow due to constrictions, gate blockages, and the start-up and sh...

The Kashmir Himalayas, a region of immense ecological importance, have experienced profound degradation by land-use changes, raising concerns about sustainability. This degradation carries significant global implications, including carbon loss, soil quality deterioration, habitat destruction, and loss of biodiversity. This study investigates variou...

Soil erosion represents a significant environmental challenge in semiarid regions, exemplified by the Cheliff Basin in Alge ria. This study applies the Revised Universal Soil Loss Equation (RUSLE) model to investigate the complex interactions among rainfall, soil type, topography, and land use/land cover, utilizing satellite data to assess their i...

This research mainly sought to evaluate the sediments of the Urmia lake bed at three different locations on the lake. Identification tests, organic content, specific gravity tests, saturated hydraulic conductivity, and hydraulic gradient tests were performed to assess the geotechnical properties of soil at three different areas along Lake Urmia nam...

Integrating renewable energy sources into the power system is essential for rapid and cost-effective decarbonization. This study evaluates the potential of a wind farm by analyzing three turbine models – VESTAS, GAMESA, and W2E – with power capacities from 2.5 MW to 8 MW. The analysis focuses on Region III, characterized by wind speeds below 7.5 m/...

This study investigates the replacement of traditional surface irrigation methods with modern irrigation systems (MIS) including horizontal sprinkler, central pivot, surface drip, and subsurface drip aimed at improving water efficiency in the Nile Delta, Egypt. The primary objectives were to determine the optimal agricultural area for implementing...

Infiltration plays a key role in stormwater management and irrigation scheduling. A review of previous studies reveals that the effectiveness of infiltration models varies significantly depending on soil characteristics and field conditions. Accurate predictions depend on selecting appropriate models for specific sites because of soil spatial varia...

This study introduces an optimized hybrid deep learning approach that leverages meteorological data to improve short-term wind energy forecasting in desert regions. Over a year, various machine learning and deep learning models have been tested across different wind speed categories, with multiple performance metrics used for evaluation. Hyperparam...

The evaluation of slope stability is of crucial importance in geotechnical engineering and has significant implications for infrastructure safety, natural hazard mitigation, and environmental protection. This study aimed to identify the most influential factors affecting slope stability and evaluate the performance of various machine learning model...

Droughts, stemming from prolonged periods of scarce precipitation, lead to significant economic and societal consequences. Iraq has recurrently experienced the impact of severe droughts. This study assessed meteorological drought over Iraq, employing the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) on 12-month time scales from 2000 to 2022. The SPI value...

This study evaluates the applicability of multicriteria decision-making (MCDM) methods, including SAW, VIKOR, TOPSIS, and Condorcet algorithm based on game theory and machine learning algorithms (MLAs) including K-nearest neighbor, Naïve Bayes, Random Forest (RF), simple linear regression and support vector machine in spatial mapping of sediment fo...

The intrusion of salt water into coastal regions threatens water resources, especially in arid and semi-arid regions. It damages large quantities of fresh water in these regions, and the productivity of the freshwater abstraction wells declines. Management of seawater intrusion (SWI) is therefore needed to improve fresh groundwater in these regions...

Soil quality is a globally important issue from the point of view of food production, maintenance of appropriate environmental quality and ecological balance. Assessing its quality and fertility using indices is one of the methods that make it possible to formulate recommendations for good soil management. The aim of the study was, therefore, to de...

Global warming and climate change are causing temperatures to rise, which is having a negative impact on water resources. Climate change is a worldwide problem that affects and will continue to affect the frequency and intensity of natural disasters in many regions of the world. Tunceli region in Turkey, which until 10 years ago was known as an env...

This study breaks new ground by developing a multi-hazard vulnerability map for the Tensift watershed and the Haouz plain in the Moroccan High Atlas area. The unique juxtaposition of flat and mountainous terrain in this area increases sensitivity to natural hazards, making it an ideal location for this research. Previous extreme events in this regi...

In light of population growth and climate change, groundwater is one of the most important water resources globally. Groundwater is crucial for sustaining many vital sectors in Syria, including industrial and agricultural sectors. However, groundwater exploitation has significantly escalated to meet different water needs especially in the postwar p...

Purpose Particle size distribution (PSD) assessment, which affects all physical, chemical, biological, mineralogical, and geological properties of soil, is crucial for maintaining soil sustainability. It plays a vital role in ensuring appropriate land use, fertilizer management, crop selection, and conservation practices, especially in fragile soil...

Global warming and climate change are causing temperatures to rise, which is having a negative impact on water resources. Climate change is a worldwide problem that affects and will continue to affect the frequency and intensity of natural disasters in many regions of the world. Tunceli region in Turkey, which until ten years ago was known as an en...

The eco-physical health assessment of watersheds is crucial for sustainable water resource management and ecosystem services. This study quantifies the eco-physical health of the Talar watershed in Iran using the geometric mean method (GMM), game-theoretic algorithm (GTA), and machine learning algorithms including Random Forest (RF), Support Vector...

Accurate prediction of reference evapotranspiration (ETo) is crucial for many water-related fields, including crop modelling, hydrologic simulations, irrigation scheduling and sustainable water management. This study compares the performance of different soft computing models such as artificial neural network (ANN), wavelet-coupled ANN (WANN), adap...

Groundwater plays a crucial role in achieving sustainable development across various dimensions. Groundwater resources comprise of two integral aspects namely quality and quantity which are interconnected and important to comprehend and manage efficiently. The groundwater quality in the semi critical blocks of Chhattisgarh State is deteriorating, c...

Investigating the repercussions of climate change and irrigation timing on groundwater contamination necessitates thorough examination of the fluctuations in seawater and groundwater recharge temperature. This study introduces an innovative numerical approach to analyze groundwater salinity and temperature dynamics across three distinct scenarios u...

Anthropogenic factors such as over-pumping and natural events such as earthquakes impact coastal aquifers by reducing freshwater recharge, aquifer water budgets, and increasing saltwater intrusion (SWI). This study investigates the impact of hydrodynamic forces induced by earthquakes on SWI in one hypothetical case, namely, the Henry problem, and a...

Climate change in desert areas and semi-arid watersheds may offer a promising solution for the water scarcity problem that Bedouins and local inhabitants face. This study investigated the integrated water resources management in arid and semi-arid regions using rainwater harvesting in combination with the managed aquifer recharge (RWH-MAR) techniqu...

Estimating groundwater level (GWL) is an important issue for planning and managing available water resources. This study uses monthly data from 86 observation wells from Mashhad Plain in Iran. A principled hierarchy method was used for the first time. In this regard, the K-means-GA method was used for clustering the considered wells. In each cluste...

Diffuse horizontal irradiance (DHI) forecasts are critical for adopting solar photovoltaic technology. Yet, they can lack reliability given the limited and uncertain meteorological data available for desert areas. This research develops a new sine cosine dipper throated optimization (SCDTO) technique, targeting DHI prediction even given such data c...

Over the years, the coupling of various variable renewable energy sources has emerged as a convenient way to partially or fully overcome their highly intermittent nature and low-capacity factors. In literature as well as in practical implementations, the coupling of solar and wind power systems is gaining special attention thanks to their advantage...

Climate change poses an urgent global challenge in water resource management, with drought emerging as a pervasive threat worldwide. Over the past two decades, Iraq has faced severe droughts, categorized into meteorological , agricultural, hydrological, and socioeconomic types. Agricultural drought, marked by prolonged soil moisture deficits due to...

With growing gas and oil prices, electricity generation based on these fossil fuels is becoming increasingly expensive. Furthermore, the vision of natural gas as a transition fuel is subject to many constraints and uncertainties of economic, environmental, and geopolitical nature. Consequently, renewable energies such as solar and wind power are ex...

Fresh groundwater in arid and highly populated regions is limited. In coastal aquifers, the deterioration of fresh groundwater is accelerated by saltwater intrusion, primarily occurring through lateral encroachment and vertical movements in the proximity of discharging wells. Coastal regions have high salinity due to saline intrusion, where many ab...

Water erosion creates adverse impacts on agricultural production, infrastructure, and water quality across the world, especially in hilly areas. Regional-scale water erosion assessment is essential, but existing models could have been more efficient in predicting the suspended sediment load. Further, data scarcity is a common problem in predicting...

Pan evaporation modeling and forecasting are needed to provide timely, continuous, and valuable information to support water management. This study aimed to overcome the constraints identified in traditional regression techniques and less explored machine learning models—the CatBoost, to enhance the precision and comprehensiveness of pan evaporatio...

The world’s water infrastructures suffer from inefficiencies, such as high energy consumption and water losses due to inadequate management practices and feeble pressure regulation, leading to frequent water and energy losses. This strains vital water and energy resources, especially in the face of the worsening challenges of climate change and pop...

The port of Tangier Med is essential due to its strategic location, as it is an important trading center linking Europe, North America, and Africa. However, the increased rates of downstream sediment transportation put pressure on the sustainable future of the port. Thus, assessing the existing erosion rates and future improvement scenarios is impe...

Two different arrangements of the weir (i.e., straight weir and rectangular labyrinth weir) were used to evaluate the effects of geometric parameters such as weir shape, weir spacing, presence of an orifice at the weir, and bed slope on the flow regime and the relationship between discharge and depth, variation and distribution of depth-averaged ve...

Study region The Nile Delta region consists of flat, low-lying areas, where most areas are used for agriculture. It covers an area of 22,000 km2, which is 2.20% of the total area of Egypt. Study focus This study evaluates the water budget and the salinity due to the Sea Level Rise (SLR) and the reduction in the river water flow caused by the Grand...

Since reservoirs perform many important functions, they are exposed to various types of unfavorable phenomena, e.g., eutrophication which leads to a rapid growth of algae (blooms) that degrade water quality. One of the solutions to combat phytoplankton blooms are effective microorganisms (EM). The study aims to evaluate the potential of EM in impro...

This study explores the advantages of combining variable renewable energy sources like solar and wind with a pumped storage hydroelectric (PSH) system for grid integration. The hybrid modeling systems considered in this study consist of four distinct schemes and seasons to ensure their adaptability to real-world conditions. Each scheme is defined b...

Increasing global energy consumption has become an urgent problem as natural energy sources such as oil, gas, and uranium are rapidly running out. Research into renewable energy sources such as solar energy is being pursued to counter this. Solar energy is one of the most promising renewable energy sources, as it has the potential to meet the world...

Increasing global energy consumption has become an urgent problem as natural energy sources such as oil, gas, and uranium are rapidly running out. Research into renewable energy sources such as solar energy is being pursued to counter this. Solar energy is one of the most promising renewable energy sources, as it has the potential to meet the world...

Given the variable nature of wind speed and the importance of accurately determining the energy that can be generated at a given site, understanding the wind speed at different time scales is crucial. In addition to differences within a very short period (i.e., hourly and daily), these changes are also pronounced throughout the seasons. They are af...

The indiscriminate use of groundwater and its overexploitation has led to a significant decline in groundwater resources in India, making it essential to identify potential recharge zones for aquifer recharge. A study was conducted to determine such potential recharge zones in the Nandhour-Kailash River watershed. The study area included 1481 strea...

The purpose of this research work was to examine the hydroelectric potential of wastewater treatment plants by harnessing the kinetic and/or potential energy of treated wastewater for electricity generation. Such a concept encapsulates the essence of renewable energy and resonates with international sustainable development mandates and climate chan...

This study compares four data-driven methods, Gaussian process regression (GPR), multivariate adaptive regression spline (MARS), M5 model tree (M5Tree), and multilinear regression (MLR), in estimating mean velocity upstream and downstream of bridges. Data were obtained through multiple experiments in a rectangular laboratory flume with glass walls...

The design and selection of ideal emitter discharge rates can be aided by accurate information regarding the wetted soil pattern under surface drip irrigation. The current field investigation was conducted in an apple orchard in SKUAST- Kashmir, Jammu and Kashmir, a Union Territory of India, during 2017–2019. The objective of the experiment was to...

The design and selection of ideal emitter discharge rates can be aided by accurate information regarding the wetted soil pattern under surface drip irrigation. The current feld investigation was conducted in an apple orchard in SKUAST- Kashmir, Jammu and Kashmir, a Union Territory of India, during 2017–2019. The objective of the experiment was to e...

Global energy consumption has increased significantly in recent decades due to changes in the industrial and economic sectors. Accurate demand estimates are critical for decision-makers to save operation and maintenance costs, improve energy reliability, and make informed decisions for future development. This study evaluates a newly proposed soft...

All over the world, students are doing relevant research as part of their education. However, most of this work is not disseminated to a wider audience and remains buried in college archives. We recognize that this may be because many students find peer review daunting. This Research Topic was inspired primarily by these findings and a related effo...

This study investigates the effects of gate openings and different sill widths on the sluice gate’s energy dissipation and discharge coefficient (Cd). The physical model of the sills includes rectangular sills of different dimensions. The results show that the gate opening size is inversely related to the Cd for a gate without a sill. In addition,...

Membrane Capacitive Deionization (MCDI) is characterized by low energy consumption, making this technology suitable to be powered by renewable energies. This study experimentally evaluated performance of a photovoltaic-powered MCDI system (PV-MCDI) in three main steps. In the first step, the effect of the charging current of the MCDI module and the...

Groundwater quality (GWQ) monitoring is one of the best environmental objectives due to recent droughts and urban and rural development. Therefore, this study aimed to map GWQ in the central plateau of Iran by validating machine learning algorithms (MLAs) using game theory (GT). On this basis, chemical parameters related to water quality, including...

Water is important to the planet’s long-term sustainability since it affects where and how inhabitants may survive. Rainfall is the main element of the hydrological cycle and directly impacts agriculture sectors; a regular pattern of rainfall results in healthy crop production, extreme events such as floods and drought, and industrial and domestic...

Rainfall and runoff are important characteristics that determine the water sources for harvesting and recharging the watershed. This study focused on estimating the AHP-based runoff potential zones and spatial distribution of surface runoff of the Mand catchment as it had undergone major landuse changes and deforestation due to extensive mining. Th...

Reliable information on the horizontal and vertical dimensions of the wetted soil beneath a point source is critical for designing accurate, cost-effective, and efficient surface and subsurface drip irrigation systems. Several factors, including soil properties, initial soil conditions, dripper flow rate, number of drippers, spacing between dripper...

This study examined the influence of thermal forcing on saltwater intrusion into nearshore aquifers (SWI) in the context of sea level rise due to climate change and continued groundwater withdrawal due to increasing demand. The study used the SEAWAT code to test two case studies: the Henry problem as a benchmark and the Biscayne Aquifer, Florida, U...

Aim of the study: This study aims to quantify uncertainty in climate change impact assessment on crop production by using all available climate models (GCMs) under both harsh and mild emission scenarios from 2020 to 2095, which has not yet been done in the study region. Material and methods: In this regard, a comparative study was carried out for...

Addressing climate change and energy crises is considered one of the world's greatest energy challenges. The presence of proven and reliable energy storage is fundamental to addressing climate change, which is needed to support intermittent renewable energy for a rapid transition of the energy sector from conventional fossil fuels to decarbonized e...