Water Resources Engineering and Science Seminars

Abstract
Urban water use reflects the footprints of human activity, shaped by societal changes, economic development, behavioral adaptation, and their interactions with environmental factors. As cities grow and economies expand, water demand typically increases; however, shifts in societal priorities, such as growing environmental awareness, sustainability goals, and water management policies, such as conservation mandates, often lead to reduced water use. These human factors are tightly coupled with environmental factors, including water availability, precipitation, temperature, as well as extreme events, which can trigger both short- and long-term changes in water-use dynamics. These interactions suggest that urban water has evolved from relatively simple, near-linear dynamics to nonlinear and potentially chaotic dynamics within coupled natural–human systems (CNHS). Using multi-decadal urban water-use records from U.S. cities, we demonstrate a transition from predominantly deterministic trends to more complex dynamical regimes. We introduce a novel CNHS-based system dynamics model to capture these evolving behaviors. The model insights are compared with previously conducted spatial analyses using explainable AI/ML methods, providing interpretations of the underlying mechanisms and informing future projections.

Bio
Hari Dave is a fourth-year doctoral candidate working with Prof. Ximing Cai in the Water Resources Engineering and Science (WRES) area within the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Illinois Urbana–Champaign. His research focuses on understanding and modeling urban water-use dynamics across the contiguous United States. Prior to joining the U of I, Hari earned a bachelor’s degree in Civil Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology Gandhinagar, India, in 2022.