Dr Homero A Paltán

Homero is interested in understanding the intersections of climate and water risks with infrastructure and socio-economic systems. His work has focused in the feedbacks between processes of global change and water and energy security. He maps and characterises natural and socio-economic processes, climate risks, and their relationships with water and inter-dependent systems. His work also explores the way that infrastructure and human systems respond and adapt to conditions of climate change, environmental and policy change, and global shocks. He addresses complexity via deep-uncertainty principles to inform the design of resilient investments and decision making.

Homero is interested in using a variety of tools to spatially characterise interrelations across physical and human systems and develop scenarios to describe water and climate risks.  The tools include geospatial and system models, earth observation, stress testing approaches, climate, hydrological, water systems, and integrated models, as well as semi-quantitative approaches. His primary regional focus is on Latin America and developing countries, while also maintaining an interest in global-level analyses.

In addition, Homero works for the World Bank integrating climate, risk and water science into operations and policy guidance. He has also provided scientific advice in topics of climate risk, adaptation strategies, Nature-based Solutions, and systemic strategies for water-energy-food-environment systems for institutions such as UNOPS, the Inter-American Development Bank, WWF, and other private firms. He co-leads the Initiative for Resilient Interdependent Systems at the Universidad San Francisco de Quito and the Galapagos Science Centre, in Ecuador.

Homero completed his DPhil in 2018 at the School of Geography and the Environment working on sensitives of global water to climate risks and variations with Professor Simon Dadson. His DPhil counted with the collaboration of NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

His work has been featured by The Washington Post, Die Welt, Science & Vie, Financial Times, Bloomberg, and others.

Homero is part of the teaching staff at the MSc in Water Science, Policy and Management where he delivers lectures and workshops on managing risks and uncertainties in water and interconnected systems; Spatial data science for climate and water; and others in the modules of Climate and Catchment Processes and Water Policy. He also coordinates the annual study fieldtrip to the Ebro catchment, in Spain.

In addition, Homero supervises MSc students working on climate risks to the water and interconnected systems, resilience of water-dependent systems, alternative strategies for water security under uncertainty and conditions of change, mapping and geospatial analysis of water and dependent systems, and others.
 

Book Chapters

• Paltán, H.A. (2021) Transitioning to Adaptive and Resilient Infrastructure in Latin America and the Caribbean. In: Brears, R.C. (eds.) The Palgrave Handbook of Climate Resilient Societies. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-32811-5_124-1 
• Mena, C.F., Paltán, H.A., Benitez, F.L., Sampedro, C. and Valverde, M. (2020) Threats of Climate Change in Small Oceanic Islands: The Case of Climate and Agriculture in the Galapagos Islands, Ecuador. In: Walsh, S., Riveros-Iregui, D., Arce-Nazario, J. and Page, P. (eds.) Social and Ecological Interactions in the Galapagos Islands. Springer, Cham.
• Sampedro, C., Paltán, H.A., Benitez, F.L., Valverde, M. and Mena, C.F. (2020) Threats of Climate Change to Food Security in Small Oceanic Islands: Modelling the Case of the Galapagos Islands, Ecuador. In: Social-Ecological Drivers of Land Cover/Land Use Change on Islands: A Synthesis of the Patterns and Processes of Change.
• Dadson, S., Paltan, H., Peng, J. (2019) Hydroclimatic Risks and Climate Change. In: Water Science Policy and Management: The Global Challenge. Chichester: Wiley.
• Mena, C.F., Sampedro, C., Martinez, P.E., Paltan, H. and Zambrano, D. (2016) Remote Sensing of Oil Spills: Linking Community Monitoring and Satellite Image Processing in the Ecuadorian Amazon in Comprehensive Remote Sensing: Societal Benefits. Elsevier.

Peer-Reviewed Papers

• Portal, M. and Paltan, H. (2024) Result-Based Financing for Rainwater Harvesting in Megacities: the case of Mexico City. Environmental Research Letter.
• Paltán, H.A., Benítez, F.L., Narvaez, M., Mateus, C. and Mena, C.F. (2023) Water security and agricultural systems in the Galapagos Islands: vulnerabilities under uncertain future climate and land use pathways. Frontiers.
• Becher, O., Pant, R., Verschuur, J., Mandal, A., Paltan, H., Lawless, M., ... & Hall, J. A Multi‐Hazard Risk Framework to Stress‐Test Water Supply Systems to Climate‐Related Disruptions. Earth's Future, (2023)
• Becher, O., Pant, R., Verschuur, J., Mandal, A., Paltan, H., Lawless, M., ... and Hall, J. (2023) A Multi‐Hazard Risk Framework to Stress‐Test Water Supply Systems to Climate‐Related Disruptions. Earth's Future.
• Rodríguez, D.J., Paltán, H.A., García, L.E., Ray, P. and St. George Freeman, S. (2021) Water-related infrastructure investments in a changing environment: a perspective from the World Bank. Water Policy.
• Rodriguez, D.J., Bonzanigo, L., Paltan, H. and Rozenberg, J. (2022) Coping with Floods Under Future Changing Conditions. Water Economics and Policy.
• Paltan, H., Plummer, J., Pant, R. and Dadson, S. (2021) Global Hydropower Risks at 1.5 and 2.0C warmer worlds. Journal of Hydrology.
• Paltan, H., Benitez, F., Rosero, P. and Mena, C. (2021) Historical and Future Climatic Trends of the Galapagos Islands. Nature Scientific Reports.
• De Boer, T., Paltan, H., Sternberg, T. and Wheeler, K. (2021) Evaluating Vulnerability of Central Asian Water Resources under Uncertain Climate and Development Conditions: The Case of the Ili-Balkhash Basin. Water.
• Paltan, H., Bassani, M., Minaya, V. and Rezzano, N. (2020) Servicios de agua potable y saneamiento resilientes en America Latina y el Caribe. Inter-American Development Bank.
• Liao, X., Hall, J.W., Hanasaki, N., Lim, W. and Paltan, H. (2020) Water shortage risks for China’s coal power plants under climate change. Environmental Research Letters.
• Kumary, S., Haustein, K., Javid, H., Burton, C.A., Allen, M., Paltan, H., Dadson, S. and Otto, F.E. (2019) Return period of extreme rainfall substantially decreases under 1.5C and 2.0C warming: a case study for Uttarakhand, India. Environmental Research Letters.
• Paltan, H., Allen, M., Haustein, K., Fuldauer, L. and Dadson, S. (2018) Global Implications of 1.5C and 2C Warmer Worlds on Extreme River Flows. Environmental Research Letters.
• Bennett, A., Ravikumar, A. and Paltan, H. (2018) The Political Ecology of Oil Palm Company-Community partnerships in the Peruvian Amazon. World Development.
• Coloredo, R., Ordonez, A., Paltan, H., Quick, J., Williams, J. and Quiroga, D. (2018) Conflicts, communities and the making of jurisdictions on an expanding tourist frontier in Quilotoa, Ecuador. World Development.
• Paltan, H., Waliser, D., Lim, W.H., Guan, B., Yamazaki, D., Pant, R. and Dadson, S. (2017) Global floods and water availability driven by atmospheric rivers. Geophysical Research Letters.
• Paltan, H., Dash, J. and Edwards, M.E. (2015) A refined mapping of Arctic lakes using Landsat Imagery. International Journal of Remote Sensing.

Policy Reports & Flagship Publications

• Paltan, H., Elmahdi, A. and Badawy, A., (2022) Addressing the water challenges in the agriculture sector in Near East and North Africa. State of Land and Water Resources for Food and Agriculture (SOLAW) in the Near East and North Africa Region. FAO. Rome.
• Pant, R., Hall, J.W., Koks, E.E., Paltan, H., Hu, X., Zorn, C. and Russell, T. (2022) From Local to Global Scales - Quantifying Climate Risks and Adaptation Opportunities for Networked Infrastructure Systems. GAR2022 Contributing Paper. Geneva: United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction.
• Kesete, Y.Y., Raffo, V., Pant, R., Koks, E.E., Paltan, H., Russell, T. and Hall, J.W. (2021) Climate Change Risk Analysis of Argentina’s Land Transport Network.