On 1 April 2023, Elie Gerges joined the IGRAC team as Junior Groundwater Specialist. However, this is not his first acquaintance with IGRAC, because he has previously done an internship during MSc programme at IGRAC's in-house partner IHE Delft. As part of this internship, Elie produced regional transboundary aquifer maps for North America, the Middle East, Europe, Central/Southern America, Asia/Oceania and Africa.
Elie is partially responsible for the groundwater component of the next WMO State of Global Water Resources report 2022. The 2021 edition did not yet take groundwater resources into consideration, but thanks to the efforts of Elie and Arnaud Sterckx it will be included in the 2022 report.
Before joining IGRAC as Junior Groundwater Specialist, Elie conducted an MSc research aimed to evaluate the recharge of groundwater in volcanic rock while considering the impact of land use, using the Wondo Genet catchment in Ethiopia as a case study. The study utilized various data collection techniques to understand the groundwater system's behavior under different geological and land use conditions in the study area. For more information about this research, read this interview.
Prior to this, Elie obtained a Master's degree in civil and environmental engineering, with specialisation in water and environment, at the Saint Joseph University in Beirut, Lebanon.
- GIS Intern at International Groundwater Resources Assessment Centre (IGRAC), Delft, Netherlands, from October 2022 to November 2022.
- Water Engineer Intern at Dar Al Handasah - Shair & Partners, Beirut, Lebanon, from June 2019 to August 2019.