Mark Thyer

Dr Mark Thyer

Associate Professor

School of Architecture and Civil Engineering

Faculty of Sciences, Engineering and Technology

Eligible to supervise Masters and PhD - email supervisor to discuss availability.


Mark Thyer is an Associate Professor in Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Adelaide. He has over 17 years research experience in developing physical-statistical models to enhance predictions for hydrological, environmental and water resource models.

His research interests include flood/drought risk assessment; long-term climate variability, quantifying predictive uncertainty in hydrological models and behavourial water use modelling for integrated urban water management. He is an internationally recognised expert on use approaches to quantify of uncertainty in hydrological predictions. He has published numerous journal papers in top international water resources which are highly cited and is co-investigator on research grants worth over $5 million.

Mark has undertaken consultancy projects for many water supply authorities and regularly collaborates with local, national and international institutions, such as CSIRO and the Australian Bureau of Meteorology and the South Australian Goyder Institute for Water Research.

Research Interests

Developing innovative physical-statistical approaches to enhance predictions for water modelling in three focus areas:

Climate variability and rainfall/streamflow simulation for flood/drought risk assessment
  • Incorporating climate processes into stochastic models to enhance drought risk assessment.
  • Bayesian approaches to assess predictive uncertainty
  • Incorporating spatial-temporal rainfall variability to enhance flood risk assessment
Streamflow simulation using hydrological models
  • Improving probabilistic predictions of streamflow simulation for catchment models 
  • Using innovate diagnostics/auxiliary data to evaluate hydrological models
Behavioural water use simulation for Integrated Urban Water Management
  • Development of approaches for modelling household water use that capture the temporal and spatial behavioural dynamics.
Career Highlights
  • Over 17 years research experience in developing physical-statistical models to enhance predictions for hydrological/environmental/water resources models
  • Internationally recognised expert on use of Bayesian approaches to quantify impact of uncertainty (input/parameter/data) in stochastic hydrological models
  • 30 journal papers in the top international water resources journals (Water Resources Research and Journal of Hydrology)
  • Co-Investigator on Research Grants worth over $5 million dollars
  • Undertaken consultancy projects on stochastic modelling and drought risk assessment for Hunter Water Corporation, Gosford-Wyong Water Supply Authority, Sydney Catchment Authority, and Wimmera Mallee Pipeline Project
  • Associate Editor for Australian Journal of Water Resources.
  • Regularly review ARC grant applications and journal papers for top international journals
  • Invited by CRC for Catchment Hydrology to contribute models to the stochastic climate library of the catchment modelling toolkit
  • Research leader for eWater CRC project on development of behavioural end-use stochastic simulator (BESS) for household water use simulation, incorporated into eWater’s Urban Developer tool. 
  • Appointments

    Date Position Institution name
    2016 - ongoing Associate Professor University of Adelaide
    2010 - 2015 Senior Lecturer University of Adelaide
    2009 - 2009 Senior Lecturer University of Newcastle
    2004 - 2008 Lecturer University of Newcastle
    2003 - 2004 Water Resource Engineer Tonkin Consulting
    2001 - 2002 Postdoctoral Researcher University of British Columbia
  • Awards and Achievements

    Date Type Title Institution Name Country Amount
    2015 Award Ministers Award for Excellence in Water Sustainability for "SA Climate Ready Project" South Australian Water Industry Alliance Australia -
    2014 Award Research Spotlight Award from American Geophysical Union (top 5% of papers in AGU) for Westra et al (2014) American Geophysical Union United States -
    2014 Award Research Spotlight Award from American Geophysical Union (top 5% of Papers in AGU) for Evin et al (2014) American Geophysical Union United States -
    2014 Award Editors Highlight Award from Water Resources Research (top 5% of papers in WRR) for Evin et al (2014) Water Resources Research United States -
    2007 Research Award Pro-Vice Chancellor’s Award for Research Excellence University of Newcastle Australia -
    1999 Award Best Student Presentation Award Water 99 Joint Congress Australia -
  • Education

    Date Institution name Country Title
    2004 - 2006 University of Newcastle Australia Australia Graduate Certificate in Tertiary Teaching
    2001 University of Newcastle Australia Australia PhD, Doctor of Philosophy in Civil Engineering
    1993 - 1996 University of Adelaide Australia Bachelor Degree (1st Class Honours) in Civil Engineering
  • Research Interests

Research Funding

Year Project Co-Investigators
Funding Body
Amount
2022-2023 Smart Detention Tank Storage – A Solution to Catchment Scale Flood Risk Thyer, Maier Stormwater Management Authority, City of Mitcham, City of Norwood Payneham and St. Peters $220k
2018-2020 Stochastic Climate Data Generation for Drought Risk Westra, Leonard, Bennett, Thyer NSW Department of Primary Industry $308k
2019-2022 Delivering robust hydrological predictions for Australia’s water challenges Thyer, Kavetski, Maier, Westra, Simmons, Jakeman, Gupta ARC DP $381k
2019 Smart Storage Optimisation to reduce Flooding Thyer, Maier City of Unley & City of Mitcham $150k
2019 Hydrological Model Improvement Thyer, McInerney, Kavetski SA Dept of Environment and Water (DEW) $100k
2018-2020 Subseasonal Streamflow Forecasting Research Project Thyer, Kavetski Bureau of Meteorology $460k
2015-2017 A Robust Integrated Streamflow Forecasting Framework for Australian Water Information Agencies Kavetski, Thyer, Kuczera, Tuteja, Shin, Seed, Lerat, Tibaldi, Clark, Wood

ARC LinkageBureau of MeteorologySEQ WaterNCAR(US) 

$270k
2014 Evaluation of Postprocessing Techniques for Rainfall and Streamflow Forecasts Thyer, Kavetski, Kuczera, McInerney Bureau of Meteorology $125k
2012-2014 Optimal Water Resource Mix for Metropolitan Adelaide Thyer, Lambert, Dandy, Maier

Goyder Institute for Water ResearchSA Water

$384k
2011-2014 Development of an agreed set of climate projects for South Australia Thyer, Lambert, Green Goyder Institute for Water Research $505k
2010-2012 Inferring hydrologic model structure using Bayesian Total Error Analysis Kavetski, Kuczera, Thyer, Franks ARC Discovery $240k
2010-2011 UoA eWater Project Dandy, Maier, Thyer eWater CRC $254k
2010-2013 An integrated modelling approach for the efficient management of irrigated landscapes Thyer, Kavetski, Kuczera, Franks, Selle, Githui, Thayalakumaran ARC LinkageDEPI(Vic) $185k
2010-2012 Adapting Bayesian Total Error Analysis to River Systems Modelling Kuczera, Thyer, Kavetski CSIRO - Land and Water $200k
2010-2011 Supply of Bayesian Total Error Analysis Kuczera, Thyer, Kavetski Bureau of Meteorology $185k
2010-2012 A new flood design methodology for a variable and changing climate Lambert, Kuczera, Thyer, Metcalfe ARC Discovery $325k
2010-2011 Improving flood forecasting via robust handling of data and model uncertainties in hydrologic predictions Thyer, Kavetski, Kuczera, Franks, Renard, Andreassian, Perrin, Lang, Sauquet International Science Linkages $20k
2008-2010 Urban Water Systems Project Kuczera, Thyer, Rodriguez, Kavetski eWater CRC $1,124k
2007-2009 A stochastic space-time model of rainfall fields in large heterogeneous regions Lambert, Metcalfe, Kuczera, Thyer ARC Discovery $345k
2007-2009 Efficient and Robust Prediction at Ungauged Catchments Kuczera, Thyer, Franks ARC Discovery $180k
2006-2007 Innovative WSUD intervention strategies Coombes, Thyer, Kuczera, Rodriguez eWater CRC $321k
2006-2007 Total error framework for model calibration Kuczera, Thyer, Coombes eWater CRC $562k
2006-2009 A Bayesian Hierarchical Approach for Simulating Multi-time scale Hydrological Variability for Water Resources Planning Thyer, Kuczera, Franks, Lambert, Metcalfe and Berghout. ARC LinkageHunter Water Corporation $117k
                         Total $7.0 million
  • Current Higher Degree by Research Supervision (University of Adelaide)

    Date Role Research Topic Program Degree Type Student Load Student Name
    2019 Principal Supervisor Improving the value of subseasonal streamflow forecasts for water resource management decisions Doctor of Philosophy Doctorate Part Time Mr Richard Mark Laugesen
  • Past Higher Degree by Research Supervision (University of Adelaide)

    Date Role Research Topic Program Degree Type Student Load Student Name
    2019 - 2023 Co-Supervisor Real-time Control of Stormwater Storages to Improve Performance of Urban Stormwater Systems Doctor of Philosophy Doctorate Full Time Mr Ruijie Liang
    2013 - 2017 Principal Supervisor Influence Diagnostics in Hydrological Modeling Doctor of Philosophy Doctorate Full Time David Peter Wright
    2011 - 2016 Co-Supervisor Stochastic Spatial Rainfall Modelling for Hydrological Design: Development of a Parsimonious Simulation Approach and Virtual Hydrological Evaluation Framework Doctor of Philosophy Doctorate Full Time APrf Bree Sarah Bennett
  • Position: Associate Professor
  • Phone: 83130770
  • Email: mark.thyer@adelaide.edu.au
  • Fax: 83134359
  • Campus: North Terrace
  • Building: Engineering North, floor First Floor
  • Room: N107A
  • Org Unit: Environmental Engineering

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