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Energy debate 2022
For Frack’s Sake: How Do We Solve The Energy Crisis?
Battle of Ideas 2022
Precautionary Principle debate
Is It Time To Rethink The Precautionary Principle?
Battle of Ideas 2021
Fossil Fuels debate 2021
Is there a case for fossil fuels?
Battle of Ideas 2021
Water Wars debate 2016
Humanity's Big Challenge: Water Wars
Battle of Ideas 2016
What is ‘new environmentalism’?
What is ‘new environmentalism’?
Battle of Ideas 2013
Water, Water Everywhere
Water, Water Everywhere, not allowed to use it
Battle of Ideas 2012
Flush it (10 min edit)
10 minute edit of WORLDwrite video Flush it 
featuring The Great Debate director Caspar Hewett
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Caspar J M Hewett


Contact Address

School of Engineering
Cassie Building
Newcastle University
Newcastle upon Tyne
United Kingdom
NE1 7RU

tel: +44 (O)191 2O8 595O
mob: +44 (O)779O 47O 846

email:

Curriculum Vitae

Current research
On this site
Other Publications


Caspar Hewett

Caspar Hewett
Caspar J M Hewett
Dr. Caspar Hewett is the Director and Chair of The Great Debate. He has over thirty years of research and management experience in academia, industry and the private sector and has taught and lectured a variety of subjects including mathematics, numerical methods, hydraulics, catchment management, Geographical Information Systems (GIS), market research techniques, engineering ethics, philosophy of science, environmental issues and English as a Foreign language.

Caspar is currently a lecturer in the School of Engineering and is Degree Programme Director for the Euroaquae Masters Programme at Newcastle University. He is an Associate member of Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) Peer Review College.

Caspar was a founder member of the Steering Committee of the North East of England's United Nations Regional Centre of Expertise in Education for Sustainable Development (RCE North East), and was Director of NECTER (North East Centre for for Transformative Education and Research), the co-ordinating body for RCE North East, September 2011 - October 2013; he was a member of the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) Peer Review College July 2005 - 2008 and was a NESTA Crucible Awardee 2006. He has held visiting fellowships at University of Durham's Department of Geography (2015-2018); Newcastle University's Institute for Research on Environment and Sustainability (2006-2008) and Sir Joseph Swan Institute for Energy Research (2008-2010); and Obermann Center for Advanced Studies, University of Iowa, 2007 (see report);

He has received numerous invitations both nationally and internationally to speak and teach on interdisciplinary approaches to water resources research including: keynote speaker at International Workshop on Hydroinformatics and Water Management, Islamabad, Pakistan (2018); keynote speaker at Flood Disaster Management Conference, Manchester (2018); invited Chair of major debates at EGU General Assembly (2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018); invited speaker at Battle of Ideas (2005, 2008, 2012, 2013, 2016, 2018, 2019, 2021); keynote speaker at Consilium in Queensland, Australia 2012; invited representative of the Eden catchment at the United Nations HELP (Hydrology for the Environment, Life and Policy) conference in 2007; workshop on Catchment Area Management in Istanbul, Turkey, 2005; OECD workshop in Honolulu "Improving the Balance Between Economic Agricultural Production and Environmental Quality through Enhanced Decision Making," 2004;

In addition to running participatory courses, workshops, seminars and public discussions for The Great Debate, Caspar's activities have included environmental engineering consultancy, and development of the North East Education for Sustainable Development programme. His research over the years has encompassed various areas including interventions in the landscape to reduce flood hazard and nutrient export from catchments, soil erosion modelling, catchment hydrology, sustainability, computational hydraulics, finite difference methods, the notion of progress and theories of human nature.

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Please note spellings of my names - NOT Casper or Hewitt!


For Frack’s Sake: How Do We Solve The Energy Crisis?
Debate held at Battle of Ideas 2022

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Is It Time To Rethink The Precautionary Principle?
Debate held at Battle of Ideas 2021


Is there a case for fossil fuels?
Debate held at Battle of Ideas 2021


Humanity’s Big Challenge: Water Wars
Debate held at Battle of Ideas 2016


What is 'new environmentalism'?
Debate held at Battle of Ideas 2013


Water, water everywhere, not allowed to use it
Debate held at Battle of Ideas 2012

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Qualifications

BSc. (Hons) Mathematics [1982], MSc. Applicable Mathematics [1990], PhD. Civil Engineering [2003]

Research Interests

  • Catchment Systems Engineering
  • Hydroinformatics
  • Participatory Action Research
  • Interventions in the landscape to reduce nutrient export and flooding
  • Soil erosion and landscape evolution
  • Multi-scale representations of catchments
  • The Decision Support Matrix (DSM) approach
  • The contested notion of Sustainability
  • Changing perceptions of the notion of progress

Decision Support Tools

  • CAVERTI: Communicating and Visualizing Erosion-Associated Risks to Infrastructure
  • Arable FARM (Floods and Agriculture Risk Matrix)
  • Animal FARM (Floods and Agriculture Risk Matrix)
  • The PERM (Phosphorus Export Risk Matrix)
  • The NO3RM (Nitrate Export Risk Matrix)

Recent Teaching Activities

  • Thermofluids (UG stage 1) (2020/21, 2021/22)
    School of Engineering, Newcastle University
  • Hydrosystems Processes and Data Analysis (stage 4 MEng/MSc) (2020/21, 2021/22) [Module leader]
    School of Engineering, Newcastle University
  • Computational Hydraulics (stage 4 MEng/MSc) (2015-2022) [Module leader]
    School of Engineering, Newcastle University
  • Hydrosystems Modelling (stage 4 MEng/MSc) (2015-2021)
    School of Engineering, Newcastle University
  • Fluid Mechanics (UG stage 1) (2015-2020) [Module leader]
    School of Engineering, Newcastle University
  • Quantitative Methods for Engineering (stage 4 MEng/MSc) (2015-18) [Module leader]
    School of Civil Engineering and Geosciences, Newcastle University
  • Sustainable Water Resource Management (2012-2018)
    School of Geography, Politics and Sociology, Newcastle University
  • Computational Engineering Analysis (stage 3) (2015-18)
    School of Civil Engineering and Geosciences, Newcastle University
  • Modelling and Forecasting of Floods (stage 4 MEng/MSc) (2015/16)
    School of Civil Engineering and Geosciences, Newcastle University
  • Design of Sustainable Engineering Systems (stage 3) (2015/16)
    School of Civil Engineering and Geosciences, Newcastle University
  • Putting a Social Science Degree into Practice (2013)
    School of Geography, Politics and Sociology, Newcastle University
  • The Science of Humanity (2013)
    North East Centre for Lifelong Learning , Sunderland University

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On this site by Caspar Hewett

Why I Want Out of the European Union. Opinion piece by Caspar Hewett, June 2016

What Has The European Convention on Human Rights Ever Done For Us? by Caspar Hewett, May 2015

Making the Case for Geo-engineering by Caspar J M Hewett, September 2012

Sketch of Condorcet's Sketch for an Historical Picture of the Progress of the Human Mind by Caspar Hewett, September 2008

Henri de Saint-Simon: The Great Synthesist, Essay by Caspar Hewett, September 2008

Auguste Comte – High Priest of Positivism Essay by Caspar Hewett, September 2008

Water Resources and the Future by Caspar Hewett. Proceedings of a debate held as part of Development, Sustainability and Environment 3, March 2007

Thinking Big by Caspar Hewett. Proceedings of a debate held as part of Development, Sustainability and Environment 3, March 2007

Energy Generation in the New Millennium by Caspar Hewett. Proceedings of a debate held as part of Development, Sustainability and Environment 3, March 2007

To Build or Not to Build Proceedings by Caspar Hewett and Mo Lovatt

John Locke’s Theory of Knowledge (An Essay Concerning Human Understanding) by C J M Hewett, November 2006

Life of Voltaire, Essay by C J M Hewett, August 2006

The Three Cs and the Notion of Progress: Copernicus, Condorcet, Comte Selected notes from the day school Science and the Human Potential held as part of Newcastle Science Festival 2006

Tilting at Windmills by Caspar Hewett. Proceedings of the Energy Futures debate held as part of Development, Sustainability and Environment II, October 2005

The Nature of Being Human Proceedings of a discussion held in March 2005

Sex, Intention and Intelligence Selected notes from the day school The Great Debate: Being Human held as part of Newcastle Science Festival 2005

Of Blank Slates and Zombies Notes from a day school held as part of Newcastle Science Festival 2004

The Floods and Agriculture Risk Matrix (FARM) Decision support tool to allow farmers and land use planners to assess the risk of increased runoff from their land and to explore options to reduce that risk whilst maintaining farmer income. Created by Caspar J M Hewett and Paul Quinn

Development, Sustainability and Environment Proceedings of conference held at Newcastle Civic Centre, 27th September 2003, based on the notes of John Theaker, edited by Caspar Hewett

Reflections on Policy in Republic of South Africa Outline of talk given at the WORLDwrite event Raising Horizons to Raise Water on Saturday 7th June 2003

Newcastle Science Festival 2003: An overview

The Life of Science and the Science of Life
Review of discussion held as part of the first Newcastle Science Festival at Centre for Life, 17 April 2003.

The Great Debate: Should we censor the Internet?
Report on the proceedings of a discussion held in November 2002 at Gateshead Civic Centre

Reflections on the Blank Slate
Report on a talk by John Dupre at the Café Scientifique and on Steven Pinker in conversation with Matt Ridley, International Centre for Life

Modern Theory and the Human Mind
Course notes from a day school held in January 2002

Sexual Selection: The Human Mind and the Peacock's Tale
Selected notes from the day school Sexual Selection and Questions of Human Nature held in January 2001

The Great Debate: Darwinism Today
Selected notes from the ten week course of the same name

Minds, Genes and Consciousness
Course notes from a day school held in May 2001

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Selected Other Publications

Leakey, S., V. Glenis & C.J.M. Hewett. 2022. A novel Godunov-type scheme for free-surface flows with artificial compressibility, Comp. Meth. Applied Mechanics & Eng., 393, doi: 10.1016/j.cma.2022.114763

Quinn, P.F., C.J.M. Hewett, M.E. Wilkinson & R. Adams. 2022. The Role of Runoff Attenuation Features (RAFs) in Natural Flood Management. Water, 14, 3807. doi: 10.3390/w14233807

Leakey, S., V. Glenis & C.J.M. Hewett. 2022. Artificial Compressibility with Riemann Solvers: Convergence of Limiters on Unstructured Meshes, OpenFOAM® Journal, 2, pp.31-47. doi: 10.51560/ofj.v2.49

Hewett, C.J.M., M.E. Wilkinson, J. Jonczyk & P.F. Quinn. 2020. Catchment Systems Engineering: An Holistic Approach to Catchment Management. WIREs Water. doi: 10.1002/wat2.1417

Leakey, S., C.J.M. Hewett, V. Glenis & P.F. Quinn. 2020. Modelling the Impact of Leaky Barriers with a 1D Godunov-Type Scheme for the Shallow Water Equations. Water 12(2), 371; doi:10.3390/w12020371

Why is water-rich Britain predicting water shortages? by Caspar Hewett, spiked-online, April 2019

Kitchener, B.G.B., S.D. Dixon, K.O. Howarth, A.J. Parsons, J. Wainwright, M.D. Bateman, J.R. Cooper, G.K. Hargrave, E.J. Long & C.J.M Hewett. 2019. A low-cost bench-top research device for turbidity measurement by radially distributed illumination intensity sensing at multiple wavelengths, HardwareX, 5, e00052, ISSN 2468-0672, doi: 10.1016/j.ohx.2019.e00052

Hewett, C.J.M., C. Simpson, J. Wainwright and S. Hudson. 2018. Communicating risks to infrastructure due to soil erosion: a bottom up approach. Land Degrad Dev., 29, pp.1282–1294. doi:10.1002/ldr.2900

Hewett, C.J.M., P.F Quinn and M.E. Wilkinson. 2016. The Decision Support Matrix (DSM) Approach to Flood and Water Pollution Risk Reduction in Farmed Landscapes. Agricultural Water Management, 172, pp.74–82. doi:10.1016/j.agwat.2016.03.008

Long, E.J., G.K. Hargrave, J.R. Cooper, B.G.B. Kitchener, A.J. Parsons, C.J.M. Hewett & J. Wainwright. 2014. Experimental Investigation of a Liquid Droplet onto a Granular Bed Using 3D, Time-resolved, Particle Tracking. Physical Review E 89 032201 doi: 10.1103/PhysRevE.89.032201

Wilkinson, M.E., P.F. Quinn & C.J.M. Hewett. 2013. The Floods and Agriculture Risk Matrix: a decision support tool for effectively communicating flood risk from farmed landscapes. Int. J. River Basin Management 11(3), pp.237-252 doi:10.1080/15715124.2013.794145

More to equality than income differentials by Caspar J M Hewett. Review of Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett's The Spirit Level: Why Equality is Better for Everyone (2010), Culture Wars, Oct 2012

Hewett, C.J.M., A. Doyle and P.F. Quinn. 2010. Towards a Hydroinformatics Framework to Aid Decision Making. J. Hydroinformatics, 12(2), pp.119-138 (Available online 21 November 2009) doi:10.2166/hydro.2009.022

Quinn, P.F., C.J.M. Hewett, M. Muste and I. Popescu. 2010. Towards New Types of Water-centric Collaboration: Instigating the Upper Mississippi River Basin Observatory Process. Proc. ICE, Water Management, 163(1), pp.39 –51 doi:10.1680/wama.2010.163.1.39

Quinn P., S.Burke, C. Hewett, M. Wilkinson and J. Jonczyk. 2010. Catchment Engineering: A 'Hands on' Demonstration Approach to Problem Solving. Proceedings of the British Hydrological Society International Symposium, 2010, Newcastle upon Tyne

Hewett, C.J.M., P.F. Quinn, A.L.Heathwaite, A. Doyle, S. Burke, P.G. Whitehead and D.N. Lerner. 2009. A Multi-Scale Framework for Strategic Management of Diffuse Pollution. Environmental Modelling and Software, 24(1), pp.74-85 (Available online 2 July 2008) doi:10.1016/j.envsoft.2008.05.006

The Great Sustainable Energy Debate 2008, Proceedings by C.J.M. Hewett, January 2009

Posthumus, H., C.J.M. Hewett, J. Morris and P.F. Quinn. 2008. Agricultural land use and flood risk management: Engaging with stakeholders in North Yorkshire. Agricultural Water Management, 95(7), pp.787-798 doi:10.1016/j.agwat.2008.02.001

Quinn, P.F., C.J.M. Hewett and N.D.K. Dayawansa. 2008. TOPCAT-NP: a minimum information requirement model for simulation of flow and nutrient transport from agricultural systems. Hydrological Processes, 22, pp.2565-2580, doi:10.1002/hyp.6855

Pugh, J., C. Hewett and D. Chandler. 2007. Debating (de)territorial governance. Area, 39(1), pp.107-119 doi:10.1111/j.1475-4762.2007.00720a.x

Muste, M., C. Hewett, I. Popescu, P. Quinn, and W-F. Tsai. 2007. Toward the Next generation of Environmental Observatories. Interdisciplinary Research Grant Program Report, 2007, Obermann Center for Advanced Studies, The University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa, USA

Quinn P., C. Hewett, J. Jonczyk & V. Glenis. 2007. The proactive approach to Farm Integrated Runoff Management (FIRM) plans: flood storage on farms. (http://www.ncl.ac.uk/iq/download/PROACTIVEFloods.doc)

The Paradoxical Primate Review by Caspar Hewett, Culture Wars, Feb 2005

Heathwaite, A.L., Quinn, P. and Hewett, C.J.M.. 2005. Modelling and Managing Critical Source Areas of Diffuse Pollution from Agricultural Land by Simulating Hillslope Flow Connectivity. J.Hydrology, 304, pp.446-461 doi:10.1016/j.jhydrol.2004.07.043

Quinn, P.F., Hewett, C.J.M. and Doyle, A. 2005. Integrating Hydrology into Farmer's Decisions. in The Farmer's Decision, Hatfield, J. (ed.), 2005, Soil and Water Conservation Society, Iowa, USA, pp.173-204

Hewett, C.J.M., Quinn, P.F., Whitehead, P.G., Heathwaite, A.L. and Flynn, N.J., 2004. Towards A Nutrient Export Risk Matrix Approach to Managing Agricultural Pollution at Source. Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 8(4), pp.834-845, doi:10.5194/hess-8-834-2004

Quinn, P.F., Hewett, C.J.M. and Doyle, A. 2004. Scale Appropriate Modelling : From Mechanisms to Management. in Scales in Hydrology and Water Management, Tchiguirinskaia, I., Bonell, M. and Hubert, P. (eds.), IAHS Publication 287, pp.17-38

Hewett, C.J.M. and Quinn, P.F. 2004. Hydroinformatics Tools to Aid Decision Making for Nutrient Remediation at Source. In Liong, Phoon & Babovic (eds) Proc. 6th International Conference on Hydroinformatics, June 2004, Singapore

Don’t denigrate specialist knowledge, Caspar Hewett, January 2004 contribution to Fearing the Unknown, The risk and biomedicine debate, spiked-online

Hewett, C. and Quinn, P. 2003. TopManage: A High Resolution GIS Digital Terrain Analysis Tool to Study the Management of Flow on Farms. 7th International Specialised Conference on Diffuse Pollution and Basin Management, August 2003, Dublin, Ireland

Quinn, P. and Hewett, C. 2003. An Earth Systems Engineering Approach to the Direct Management of Runoff Flow Paths and Nutrient Remediation at Source. 7th International Specialised Conference on Diffuse Pollution and Basin Management, August 2003, Dublin, Ireland

Burke, S., Heathwaite, L., Quinn, P., Merrett, S., Whitehead, P., Preedy, N. and Hewett, C. 2003. Strategic Management of Non-point Source Pollution from Sewage Sludge. 7th International Specialised Conference on Diffuse Pollution and Basin Management, August 2003, Dublin, Ireland

Instructions for using TopManage, Caspar J M Hewett and Paul Quinn, March 2003, TOPCAT website

TOPCAT - The Theory, Quinn, P.F., Dayawansa, N.D.K. and Hewett, C.J.M., March 2003, TOPCAT website

Review of 'Man, Beast and Zombie' by Kenan Malik, Caspar Hewett, Audacity website, September 2002

Kutija, V. and Hewett, C.J.M. 2002. Modelling of Supercritical Flow Conditions Revisited: NewC Scheme. J. Hydraulic Research, 40: pp.145-152, doi:10.1080/00221680209499857

Erduran, K.S., Kutija, V. and Hewett, C.J.M.. 2002. Performance of Finite Volume Solutions to the Shallow Water Equations with Shock-Capturing Schemes. Int. J.Numer. Meth. Fluids, 40: pp.1237-1273, doi:10.1002/fld.402

Hewett, C.J.M. and Hope, R. 2002. A Multi-disciplinary Approach to Assessing the Effects of Water and Land Use Policy on Livelihoods. 5th Int. Conf. Hydroinformatics, July 2002; Cardiff.

Hewett, C.J.M. and Kutija, V. 2002. Unconditionally Stable Explicit Finite Difference (USED) Schemes for Four Problems in Hydraulics. 5th Int. Conf. Hydroinformatics, July 2002; Cardiff.

Erduran, K.S., Kutija, V. and Hewett, C.J.M. 2002. Finite Volume Solution For Flow in a Channel with a Step on its Bottom. 5th Int. Conf. Hydroinformatics, July 2002; Cardiff.

'Cafe Scientifique: Clean Energy and the Greenhouse Effect,' Culture Wars website, Jan 2001.

Hewett, C.J.M., Kutija, V. and Erduran, K.S. 2000. Breaking the Taboos: Stability of Finite Difference for the Solution of Flow problems. 4th Int. Conf. Hydroinformatics, July 2000; Iowa., USA.

Erduran, K.S., Hewett, C.J.M. and Kutija, V. 2000. An Investigation of a Straight Channel Assumption for Meandering Channels. 4th Int. Conf. Hydroinformatics, July 2000; Iowa., USA.

C.J.M. Hewett and J.W. Bull. 1993. A Review of Mesh Generation Methods. in B.H.V. Topping, (Editor), Developments in Computational Engineering Mechanics, Civil-Comp Press, Edinburgh, UK, pp 55-62, doi:10.4203/ccp.19.3.1

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