Dr Charles is an environmental engineer by training, who leads an interdisciplinary research team on water security. Her work addresses the challenge of providing sustainable water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) services for all, with a focus on risk-based approaches in developing countries to improve health outcomes for all. Her work has been funded by the Department for International Development, World Health Organization, UK Research Councils (NERC/ESRC), and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and includes work in Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, and Uganda. Dr Charles undertook her PhD on a risk-based approach to management of decentralised wastewater treatment systems in Sydney's drinking water catchments in Australia. She joined the University of Oxford in 2013 having previously been a lecturer at the University of Surrey.
Dr Charles' research encompasses a range of cross-disciplinary approaches to understanding and improving water security for the poor. She is active in research in Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa. Dr Charles is the co-director of the REACH: Improving water security for the poor programme, which addresses water security challenges in Kenya, Ethiopia and Bangladesh. Her work addresses two main areas, delivering evidence to challenge current knowledge and improve policy and implementation, which are expanded on below.
How should we monitor water quality, and communicate results, to affect improvements in environmental and drinking water quality?
New technologies are emerging that can help us understand water quality risks in different ways. For that data to generate improvements in water quality, it needs to help provide information to a person who understands the representation of risk presented, and has the will and capacity to implement changes. My work explores how different forms of communication of water quality results to managers at all levels can influence their decision-making.
How can diverse (trans-)disciplinary perspectives of risk inform our development of water security risk science to deliver more appropriate metrics?
The concept of risk is central to public health and water security science, but it is often interpreted through the lens of a single discipline. Through my work I am exploring the interdisciplinary approaches to water security at the basin scale and in urban areas. In the Awash basin, Ethiopia, I am bringing together different disciplinary approaches to risk to support the development of climate and hydrological metrics that integrate the vulnerabilities and capacity of the exposed populations. This draws on collaborations with UNICEF, WHO, government, and community members. This builds on my research on the impact of climatic variability on health, facilitating development of more climate resilient WASH services.
Selected Research Projects
Dr Charles coordinates and teaches the Water and Health module for the MSc in Water Science, Policy and Management with Professor David Bradley. She leads an elective on Health, Environment and Development, in collaboration with Dr Proochista Ariana in the Centre for Tropical Medicine and Global Health. She contributes to the MSc in International Health and Tropical Medicine.
Current Graduate Research Students
Recent Graduate Research Students (since 2006)
Thanti Octavianti
Completed DPhil in 2019 | Achieving water security in a developing-country delta city: Challenges from a waterfront development project in Jakarta Bay |
Julian Kirchherr
Completed DPhil in 2017 | The Anti-Dam Protest Cycle: Evidence from Asia |
Recent Graduate Research Students
Kenan Okurut
Completed DPhil in 2015 | Demand-driven sustainable sanitation improvements in low-income informal settlements: a collective approach for East African cities (University of Surrey) |
Journal Articles
- Bussi, G., Whitehead, P.G., Jin, L., Taye, M.T., Dyer, E., Hirpa, F.A., Yimer, Y.A. and Charles, K.J. (2021) Impacts of Climate Change and Population Growth on River Nutrient Loads in a Data Scarce Region: The Upper Awash River (Ethiopia). Sustainability, 13(3). 1254.
- Dickin, S., Bisung, E., Nansi, J. and Charles, K. (2021) Empowerment in water, sanitation and hygiene index. World Development, 137. 105158.
- Kebede, S., Charles, K., Godfrey, S., MacDonald, A. and Taylor, R.G. (2021) Regional-scale interactions between groundwater and surface water under changing aridity: evidence from the River Awash Basin, Ethiopia. Hydrological Sciences Journal.
- Nowicki, S., deLaurent, Z.R., de Villiers, E.P., Githinji, G. and Charles, K.J. (2021) The utility of Escherichia coli as a contamination indicator for rural drinking water: Evidence from whole genome sequencing. Plos one, 16(1). e0245910.
- Charles, K.J., Nowicki, S. and Bartram, J.K. (2020) A framework for monitoring the safety of water services: from measurements to security. Npj Clean Water, 3. 36.
- Nowicki, S., Koehler, J. and Charles, K.J. (2020) Including water quality monitoring in rural water services: why safe water requires challenging the quantity versus quality dichotomy. npj Clean Water, 3. 14.
- Taye, M.T., Dyer, E., Charles, K.J. and Hirons, L.C. (2020) Potential predictability of the Ethiopian summer rains: understanding local variations and their implications for water management decisions. Science of The Total Environment. 142604.
- Grasham, C.F., Korzenevica, M. and Charles, K.J. (2019) On considering climate resilience in urban water security: a review of the vulnerability of the urban poor in sub‐Saharan Africa. WIREs Water.
- Kirchherr, J., Ahrenshop, M.P. and Charles, K. (2019) Resettlement lies: Suggestive evidence from 29 large dam projects. World Development, 114: 208-219.
- Nowicki, S., Lapworth, D.J., Ward, J.S.T., Thomson, P. and Charles, K. (2019) Tryptophan-like fluorescence as a measure of microbial contamination risk in groundwater. Science of The Total Environment, 646: 782-791.
- Octavianti, T. and Charles, K. (2019) De- and re-politicisation of water security as examined through the lens of the hydrosocial cycle: The case of Jakartaʼs sea wall plan. Water Alternatives, 12(3): 1017-1037.
- Borgomeo, E., Vadheim, B., Woldeyes, F.B., Alamirew, R., Tamru, S., Charles, K.J., Kebede, S. and Walker, O. (2018) The Distributional and Multi-Sectoral Impacts of Rainfall Shocks: Evidence From Computable General Equilibrium Modelling for the Awash Basin, Ethiopia. Ecological Economics, April 2018: 621-632.
- Fung, Z., Pomun, T., Charles, K.J. and Kirchherr, J. (2018) Mapping the social impacts of small dams: The case of Thailand’s Ing River basin. Ambio.
- Hylton, E. and Charles, K. (2018) Informal mechanisms to regularize informal settlements: Water services in São Paulo's favelas. Habitat International.
- Kirchherr, J. and Charles, K. (2018) Enhancing the sample diversity of snowball samples: Recommendations from a research project on anti-dam movements in Southeast Asia. PLoS One, 13(8).
- Octavianti, T. and Charles, K. (2018) Disaster Capitalism? Examining the Politicisation of Land Subsidence Crisis in Pushing Jakarta’s Seawall Megaproject. Water Alternatives, 11(2): 394-420.
- Octavianti, T. and Charles, K. (2018) The evolution of Jakarta’s flood policy over the past 400 years: The lock-in of infrastructural solutions. Environment and Planning C: Politics and Space: 1-23.
- Whitehead, P.G., Bussi, G., Hossain, M.A., Dolk, M., Das, P., Comber, S., Peters, R., Charles, K.J., Hope, R., Hossain, S. (2018) Restoring water quality in the polluted Turag-Tongi-Balu river system, Dhaka: Modelling nutrient and total coliform intervention strategies. Science of The Total Environment.
- Kirchherr, J., Charles, K. and Walton, M. (2017) The interplay of activists and dam developers: the case of Myanmar’s mega-dams. International Journal of Water Resources Development, 33(1): 111-131. [Download Pre-Print Manuscript].
- Kirchherr, J., Matthews, N., Charles, K.J. and Walton, M.J. (2017) “Learning it the Hard Way”: Social safeguards norms in Chinese-led dam projects in Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia. Energy Policy, 102: 529-539. [Download Pre-Print Manuscript].
- Kirchherr, J. and Charles, K. (2016) The Social Impacts of Dams: A New Framework for Scholarly Analysis. Environmental Impact Assessment Review, 60: 99-114. [Download Pre-Print Manuscript].
- Kirchherr, J., Charles, K.J. and Walton, M.J. (2016) Multi-causal pathways of public opposition to dam projects in Asia: A fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA). Global Environmental Change, 41: 33-45. [Download Pre-Print Manuscript].
- Kirchherr, J., Disselhoff, T. and Charles, K. (2016) Safeguards, financing and employment in Chinese infrastructure projects in Africa: the case of Ghana’s Bui Dam. Waterlines, 35(1): 37-58. [Download Pre-Print Manuscript].
- Kirchherr, J., Pohlner, H. and Charles, K.J. (2016) Cleaning up the big muddy: A meta-synthesis of the research on the social impact of dams. Environmental Impact Assessment Review, 60: 115-125. [Download Pre-Print Manuscript].
- Okurut, K., Kulabako, R.N., Abbott, P., Adogo, J.M., Chenoweth, J., Pedley, S., Tsinda, A. and Charles, K. (2015) Access to improved sanitation facilities in low-income informal settlements of East African cities. Journal of Water, Sanitation and Hygiene for Development, 5(1): 89-99.
- Okurut, K., Kulabako, R.N., Chenoweth, J. and Charles, K. (2015) Assessing demand for improved sustainable sanitation in low-income informal settlements of urban areas: a critical review. International Journal of Environmental Health Research, 25(1): 81-95.
- Okurut, K. and Charles, K.J. (2014) Household demand for sanitation improvements in low-income informal settlements: A case of East African cities. Habitat International, 44: 332-338.
- Ahmed, A.E.S.I., Cavalli, G., Bushell, M.E., Wardell, J.N., Pedley, S., Charles, K. and Hay, J.N. (2013) Straw N-halamines: evaluation in single and multistage filtration systems. Carbohydrate Polymers, 92(2): 1934-1941.
- Tsinda, A., Abbott, P., Pedley, S., Charles, K., Adogo, J., Okurut, K. and Chenoweth, J. (2013) Challenges to achieving sustainable sanitation in informal settlements of Kigali, Rwanda. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 10(12): 6939-6954.
- Bartram, J., Charles, K., Evans, B., O'Hanlon, L. and Pedley, S. (2012) Commentary on community-led total sanitation and human rights: should the right to community-wide health be won at the cost of individual rights? Journal of Water and Health, 10(4): 499-503.
- Ahmed, A., Cavalli, G., Bushell, M., Wardell, J., Pedley, S., Charles, K. and Hay, J. (2011) New approach to produce water free of bacteria, viruses and halogen in a recyclable system. Applied and Environmental Microbiology, 77(3): 847-853.
- Howard, G., Charles, K., Pond, K., Brookshaw, A., Hossain, R. and Bartram, J. (2010) Securing 2020 vision for 2030: climate change and ensuring resilience in water and sanitation services. Journal of Water and Climate Change, 1(1): 2-16.
- Charles, K.J., Shore, J., Sellwood, J., Laverick, M., Hart, A. and Pedley, S. (2009) Assessment of the stability of human viruses and coliphage in groundwater by PCR and infectivity methods. Journal of Applied Microbiology, 106(6): 1827-1837.
- Ferguson, C., Charles, K. and Deere, D. (2009) Quantification of microbial sources in drinking-water catchments. Critical Reviews in Environmental Science and Technology, 39(1): 1-40.
- Charles, K.J., Souter, F.C., Baker, D.L., Davies, C.M., Schijven, J.F., Roser, D.J., Deere, D.A., Priscott, P.K. and Ashbolt, N.J. (2008) Fate and transport of viruses during sewage treatment in a mound system. Water Research, 42(12): 3047-3056.
Book Chapters
- Charles, K.J., Nowicki, S., Thomson, P. and Bradley, D. (2019) Water and Health: A Dynamic, Enduring Challenge. Chapter 6 in, Dadson, S.J., Garrick, D.E., Penning-Rowsell, E.C., Hall, J.W., Hope, R. and Hughes, J. (eds.) Water Science, Policy, and Management: A Global Challenge. John Wiley and Sons Ltd. pp. 97-116. ISBN: 9781119520603.
- Charles, K.J., Octavianti, T., Hylton, E. and Remmington, G. (2019) Equity and Urban Water Security. Chapter 18 in, Dadson, S.J., Garrick, D.E., Penning-Rowsell, E.C., Hall, J.W., Hope, R. and Hughes, J. (eds.) Water Science, Policy, and Management: A Global Challenge. John Wiley and Sons Ltd. pp. 329-343. ISBN: 9781119520603.
- Charles, K. (2015) Climate Change. Chap. 35 in, Bartram, J. (ed.) Routledge Handbook of Water and Health. Routledge. pp. 367-375. ISBN: 9781138910072.
- Charles, K. (2015) Water Safety Plans. Chap. 23 in, Bartram, J. (ed.) Routledge Handbook of Water and Health. Routledge. pp. 245-252. ISBN: 9781138910072.
- Charles, K. and Pond, K. (2015) Drinking Water Quality Regulations. Chap. 44 in, Bartram, J. (ed.) Routledge Handbook of Water and Health. Routledge. pp. 447-454. ISBN: 9781138910072.
Reports
- Charles, K.J., Pond, K. and Pedley, S. (2009) Vision 2030. The resilience of water supply and sanitation in the face of climate change: Technology fact sheets. World Health Organization, Geneva.
- Charles, K.J., Pond, K., Pedley, S., Hossain, R. and Jacot-Guillarmod, F. (2009) Vision 2030. The resilience of water supply and sanitation in the face of climate change: Technology projection study. World Health Organization, Geneva.
