Barry has a long and distinguished career as an environmental scientist in both the private and academic sectors, specializing in map-based analysis and assessment. He has been a researcher at Penn State University for over 30 years, most recently with the Earth and Environmental Systems Institute, developing water quality models, and leading research teams in a wide variety of water quality and watershed applications and projects. He has extensive international experience working with these topics. At World Water Watch, we rely on Barry’s expertise and experience to assist us in our AMZnet project (see AMZnet project description in WWW Inititiatives as well as the development and implementation of the International Watershed Academy.
Early in his career, Barry worked for a number of small private environmental/engineering firms, and was a co-founder of a leading GIS consulting firm called Geo Decisions which continues to be a leader in the geospatial analysis field today. From 1995-2018, Dr. Evans was associated with the Penn State Institutes of Energy and the Environment (PSIEE) where he developed numerous GIS-based modeling applications and led research teams involved in a wide variety of water resource-oriented projects related to watershed modeling, TMDL(Total Maximum Daily Load) assessment, drinking water protection, and the evaluation of pollution mitigation strategies at the watershed level. Two major applied research efforts that he led there include the development of the GIS-based water quality modeling tools called AVGWLF and MapShed (see www.mapshed.psu.edu ).
After retiring from Penn State in 2018, Dr. Evans continues to work as an Adjunct Scientist at the Stroud Water Research Center (see www.stroudcenter.org ) where he has been since September of 2012. At Stroud, he has been one of the lead developers of a web-based, national-scale watershed modeling tool called “Model My Watershed” (www.wikiwatershed.org ) that has recently received national acclaim for its numerous innovations ( https://stroudcenter.org/press/watershed-model-amazon-challenge-winner/). Since leaving Penn State, Dr. Evans is a Senior Water Resource Scientist at the Academy of Natural Sciences (ANS) that is now affiliated with Drexel University in Philadelphia, PA ( http://www.ansp.org/research/ ). One of the principal projects that he has been involved in with other ANS faculty has been the development of the Stream Reach Assessment Tool (https://www.streamreachtools.org/ ) that was created to support a major watershed restoration effort being funded by the William Penn Foundation in the Delaware River Basin.
Dr. Evans has also participated in a number of international projects in the Mideast, Europe, and throughout Latin America that were supported by such diverse organizations as the Amazon Center for Environmental Education and Research, the Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute, the Mexican Institute of Water Technology, the National Water Commission of Israel, the Argentine Institute of Oceanography, the Environment Agency of England and Wales, The Joint Research Commission of the European Union, and the Republic of Colombia. As a result of his work in Latin America, Dr. Evans has developed a working proficiency in Spanish.
Barry received a B.S. degree in Natural Resources from the Ohio State University, a Master’s degree in Environmental Pollution Control from Penn State University, and a Ph.D. in Soil Science from Penn State University. He currently resides in Malvern, PA near the city of Philadelphia.