Water Resources Graduate Program

John H. Matthews is the Coordinator for the Alliance for Global Water Adaptation. His work integrates climate change adaptation policy and science into sustainable natural resource management, infrastructure operations, and economic development. John has worked on five continents and some twenty-five countries. He has authored or co-authored recent books, papers, and reports on decision-making frameworks for adapting water infrastructure and ecosystems to climate impacts, resilient approaches to environmental flows, integrating ecological and engineering approaches to robust water management, and using new economic tools to support long-term sustainable planning. He has an ongoing research program on climate adaptation strategies for resource management in the North American Great Basin, funded by the USGS as well as an US NSF grant to merge ecological and engineering approaches to long-term sustainable water management and water infrastructure. He is a Senior Water Fellow at Colorado State University.

Previously, John directed the global WWF freshwater climate adaptation program and the Freshwater Climate Change program at Conservation International for four years each. He has PhD in ecology from the University of Texas and held a postdoctoral research position in conservation biology with the US Geological Survey. His undergraduate degree is in cultural anthropology, and he worked as a book editor in the publishing industry for 12 years before entering a PhD program.