The East Anglian Branch covers a geographical region that ranges from the North Norfolk coast to Hertfordshire in the south. This region includes rural areas with very low rainfall and low flow rivers, an important wetlands national park, a number of nitrate protection zones, a coastline with significant erosion problems and a number of important sewage treatment works that have recently been upgraded to state-of-the-art standards. The urban areas of the region are fast growing and the next few years will see some of the largest developments of brownfield sites in the UK. The economy of the region is dominated by intensive agriculture, food and drink processing and manufacture, the pharmaceutical and biotechnology sectors but includes aerospace, automobile manufacture, printing, packaging and paper, environmental services and waste management. The region is traversed by a number of heavily used motorways and includes two important airports.

Events

The main function of the East Anglian Branch is to organise a programme of events at a local level on subjects relevant to its branch membership. Unless otherwise indicated in the programme meetings start at 17:00 with some light refreshments, followed by a presentation that starts at 17:30. There is time for questions and we normally finish by 19:30. Thanks to sponsorship from regional employers, there is normally no charge for the evening technical meetings.

We normally arrange at least one conference each year, a graduate student paper competition, and a social event in the summer. Full details of each meeting are sent to branch members four to six weeks in advance. Visitors and guests are welcome and committee members will be pleased to provide information about how to join CIWEM. We collaborate with a number of other professional bodies and organise joint events where appropriate. Please contact us if you have any queries or suggestions about future events.

Student/graduate prize

Best Presentation in the Risk Management series

During 2008 and 2009, Students and Graduates contributed greatly to the presentations in the Risk Management series by organising venues, booking speakers, and managing the afternoon or evening events. The Branch Committee judged that, by a very narrow margin, the team who co-ordinated the event dealing with "Risk Management and Climate Change" had made the greatest contribution. The event featured two presentations, one from Roger Street (UKCIP) on the 09 scenarios that will be released later in the year and one from Geoff Darch (Atkins) who gave a presentation on the practical applications of how to manage climate change risk in water resources and flood modelling. The presentations were followed by a 'café-style breakout session', which Roger ran. 

In the picture, left to right are Louise Pennington (retiring Branch Chair, who presented the awards at the Branch AGM), and team members Rob McSweeney, Claire Hickey, and Nikki Williams. Amy Ryan was also part of the team but was unable to attend