Keith John Beven (born 23 July 1950) is a British

hydrologist Hydrology () is the scientific study of the movement, distribution, and management of water on Earth and other planets, including the water cycle, water resources, and drainage basin sustainability. A practitioner of hydrology is called a hydro ...

and distinguished

emeritus ''Emeritus/Emerita'' () is an honorary title granted to someone who retires from a position of distinction, most commonly an academic faculty position, but is allowed to continue using the previous title, as in "professor emeritus". In some c ...

professor in hydrology at

Lancaster University Lancaster University (officially The University of Lancaster) is a collegiate public university, public research university in Lancaster, Lancashire, England. The university was established in 1964 by royal charter, as one of several new univer ...

. According to Lancaster University he is the most highly cited hydrologist. In 2017, Beven was elected a member of the

National Academy of Engineering The National Academy of Engineering (NAE) is an American Nonprofit organization, nonprofit, NGO, non-governmental organization. It is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM), along with the National Academ ...

for contributions to the understanding of hydrological processes and development of the foundations of modern hydrological modeling.

Education

Beven was educated at

Chislehurst and Sidcup Grammar School Chislehurst and Sidcup Grammar School is a mixed sex education#UK, mixed-sex grammar school with Academy (English school), academy status located in Hurst Road (A222 road, A222), Sidcup in the London Borough of Bexley, England. It is located a ...

, graduated with a

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, B.S., B.Sc., SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree that is awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Scienc ...

degree in geography from the

University of Bristol The University of Bristol is a public university, public research university in Bristol, England. It received its royal charter in 1909, although it can trace its roots to a Merchant Venturers' school founded in 1595 and University College, Br ...

in 1971 and was awarded a

PhD A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, DPhil; or ) is a terminal degree that usually denotes the highest level of academic achievement in a given discipline and is awarded following a course of graduate study and original research. The name of the deg ...

from the

University of East Anglia The University of East Anglia (UEA) is a Public university, public research university in Norwich, England. Established in 1963 on a campus university, campus west of the city centre, the university has four faculties and twenty-six schools of ...

(UEA) in 1975 for research on catchment hydrology supervised by Keith Clayton.

Career and research

Beven worked at the

University of Leeds The University of Leeds is a public research university in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England. It was established in 1874 as the Yorkshire College of Science. In 1884, it merged with the Leeds School of Medicine (established 1831) and was renamed Y ...

(1974–1977) and the Institute of Hydrology, Wallingford (1977–1979 and 1982–1985). He was an assistant professor at the

University of Virginia The University of Virginia (UVA) is a Public university#United States, public research university in Charlottesville, Virginia, United States. It was founded in 1819 by Thomas Jefferson and contains his The Lawn, Academical Village, a World H ...

from 1979 to 1982 and joined

in 1985. He has held visiting positions at the

University of California, Santa Barbara The University of California, Santa Barbara (UC Santa Barbara or UCSB) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Santa Barbara County, California, United States. Tracing its roots back to 1891 as an ...

(1996) and

École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne The École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (, EPFL) is a public university, public research university in Lausanne, Switzerland, founded in 1969 with the mission to "train talented engineers in Switzerland". Like its sister institution E ...

(EPFL), Lausanne, Switzerland (1997);

KU Leuven KU Leuven (Katholieke Universiteit Leuven) is a Catholic research university in the city of Leuven, Leuven, Belgium. Founded in 1425, it is the oldest university in Belgium and the oldest university in the Low Countries. In addition to its mai ...

, Belgium (1999–2000) and

Uppsala University Uppsala University (UU) () is a public university, public research university in Uppsala, Sweden. Founded in 1477, it is the List of universities in Sweden, oldest university in Sweden and the Nordic countries still in operation. Initially fou ...

and the

Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences The Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, or Swedish Agricultural University (, SLU) is a public research university in Sweden. Although its main campus and head office is located in Ultuna, Uppsala, the university has several campuses ...

(SLU) Uppsala, Sweden as Konung Carl XVI Gustafs Gästprofessor i Miljövetenskap in 2006–2007. His main research interests are in hydrological modelling and understanding the prediction uncertainties associated with environmental models. He was the originator with Mike Kirkby of the TOPMODEL Concepts and the originator of the Generalised Likelihood Uncertainty Estimation (GLUE) methodology. GLUE has been applied to a wide variety of fields including rainfall-runoff modelling, flood inundation, water quality modelling, sediment transport, recharge and groundwater modelling, vegetation growth models, aphid populations, forest fire and tree death modelling. He is working on novel modelling of flow and transport on hillslopes and in catchments, modelling the impacts of climate and land management on flood runoff and flood frequency, nonparametric estimation of the rainfall-flow nonlinearity, and flood forecasting. He has published 10 books and over 350

peer review Peer review is the evaluation of work by one or more people with similar competencies as the producers of the work (:wiktionary:peer#Etymology 2, peers). It functions as a form of self-regulation by qualified members of a profession within the ...

ed papers.

Awards and honours

Beven has received several awards and honours including: * Elected a

Fellow of the Royal Society Fellowship of the Royal Society (FRS, ForMemRS and HonFRS) is an award granted by the Fellows of the Royal Society of London to individuals who have made a "substantial contribution to the improvement of natural science, natural knowledge, incl ...

in 2017, the first hydrologist elected since

Charles Pereira Sir Herbert Charles Pereira FRS (12 May 1913 – 19 December 2004) was a British hydrologist. He was born in London but spent his early years in Saskatchewan on an Indian Reservation. He was educated there, then at St Albans School and the U ...

in 1969 *Foreign member of the US

(2017) *Horton Award of the

American Geophysical Union The American Geophysical Union (AGU) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization of Earth, Atmospheric science, atmospheric, Oceanography, ocean, Hydrology, hydrologic, Astronomy, space, and Planetary science, planetary scientists and enthusiasts that ...

(1991) *Fellow of the

(1995) *John Dalton Medal of the European Geophysical Society (2001) *Linnaeus Lecture Award at

(2002) *Langbein Lecture Award of the

(2004) * King Carl XVI Gustaf Professorship in Environmental Science (2006) *

International Association of Hydrological Sciences The International Association of Hydrological Sciences (IAHS) is a non-profit, non-governmental scientific organization committed to serving the science of hydrology and the worldwide community of hydrologists. The IAHS was established in 1922, ...

(IAHS)/

World Meteorological Organization The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations responsible for promoting international cooperation on atmospheric science, climatology, hydrology an ...

(WMO) /

UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO ) is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) with the aim of promoting world peace and International secur ...

International Hydrology Prize (2009) * Robert E. Horton Medal of the

(2012) *President's Prize of the British Hydrological Society (2013) *Honorary DSc,

(2015)

Publications

*K.J. Beven and P. Carling (Eds.). 1989. ''Floods: hydrological sedimentological and geomorphological implications''. Wiley, Chichester (). *K.J. Beven and I.D. Moore (Eds.). 1992. ''Terrain Analysis and Distributed Modelling in Hydrology''. Wiley, Chichester () *K.J. Beven and M.J. Kirkby (Eds.). 1993. ''Channel Network Hydrology''. Wiley, Chichester. () *K.J. Beven, P.C. Chatwin and J.H. Millbank (Eds.). 1994. ''Mixing and Transport in the Environment''. Wiley, Chichester. () *K.J. Beven. (Ed.), 1997. ''Distributed Modelling in Hydrology: Applications of TOPMODEL''. Wiley, Chichester. () *K.J. Beven. 2001. ''Rainfall-Runoff Modelling: The Primer''. Wiley, Chichester ( *K.J. Beven. 2006. ''Benchmark papers in Streamflow Generation Processes''. IAHS Press, Wallingford, UK (with selection, introduction and commentaries on papers) () *K.J. Beven, 2009. ''Environmental Modelling: An Uncertain Future?'' Routledge: London () http://www.uncertain-future.org.uk *E.M. Shaw, K.J. Beven, N.A. Chappell and R. Lamb. 2010. '' Hydrology in Practice'', 4th Edition, Spon: London. () *K.J. Beven. 2011. ''Mallerstang Magic: Images of the Mallerstang Valley''. Blurb Books, 36pp small format o
large format
*K.J. Beven. 2012. ''Mallerstang in Panorama: Panoramic Images of the Mallerstang Valley''. Blurb Books, 42pp small format o
large format
*K.J. Beven. 2012. ''Mallerstang in Mono: Black and White Images of the Mallerstang Valley''. Blurb Books. 50pp small format o
large format
*K.J. Beven. 2012. ''Rainfall-Runoff Modelling: The Primer'' (2nd Edition). Wiley-Blackwell: Chichester, UK. *K.J. Beven and J.W. Hall (Eds.). 2014. ''Applied Uncertainty Analysis for Flood Risk Management''. World Scientific: Singapore.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Beven, Keith 1950 births Living people People educated at Chislehurst and Sidcup Grammar School Alumni of the University of Bristol Alumni of the University of East Anglia Academics of Lancaster University University of Virginia faculty Fellows of the American Geophysical Union Fellows of the Royal Society British hydrologists Foreign associates of the National Academy of Engineering