Dr Kefeng Zhang

Dr Kefeng Zhang

Research Fellow
  • PhD, 2015, Monash University, Australia

  • MsE, 2011, Southeast University, China

  • BsE, 2008, Southeast University, China

Engineering
Civil and Environmental Engineering

Senior Lecturer in the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering's Water Research Centre (WRC)

Kefeng is a dedicated researcher with a strong focus on urban water management and the implementation of nature-based green technologies such as bioretention systems and green walls. His expertise lies in understanding the pollution and risks associated with various water sources, including stormwater, greywater, and pre-treated wastewater, and effectively utilizing green technologies to mana...

Phone
+61 2 9385 5072
E-mail
kefeng.zhang@unsw.edu.au
Location
Room 138, Vallentine Annex, Building H22, University of New South Wales, Sydney NSW 2052

Ongoing

  • (2022-2025) Passive biofiltration processes for effective nitrogen removal from polluted waters. Deletic A., McCarthy D., Zhang K., Prodanovic V., Cook P., Goonetilleke A., Australian Research Council Discovery Projects (ARC DP)
  • (2021-2024) From stormwater to potable water via Water Sensitive Urban Design? Framework for risk quantify, control and monitoring of Water Sensitive Urban Design systems for safe stormwater harvesting, Zhang K., Australian Research Council Discovery Early Career Research Award (ARC DECRA)
  • (2020-2024) Greywater treatment and reuse using vegetated walls for sustainable urban greening in Qatar, Deletic A., Zhang K., Prodanovic V. Qatar National Research Fund 2020

Completed

  • (2021-2022) Review of stormwater quality to support the development of evidence-based stormwater recycling guidelines, Zhang K., McCarthy D., Deletic A., Khan Stuart, Le Clech P., Flecher T. Water Research Australia (and its partners)
  • (2020-2022) Tree-pits for wastewater treatment: Technology development and testing, Deletic A., Prodanovic V., Zhang K. Center of Excellence for Neom Research At KAUST
  • (2017-2021) All-solid-state Z-scheme photocatalysts for water treatment (ARC Discovery project, UNSW CI)
  • (2017-2020) Sino-Australia Centre on Sponge City (Research manager), Dajiang Environment.
  • (2017-2020) Biofiltration Technology for Stormwater Management in Jiangsu. Easthigh Environment.
  • (2018) Business plan for Sponge City technology and modelling tools in Jiangsu China. Jiangsu Industrial Technology Research Institute Project.
  • (2018-2019) A framework for evaluating the success of Sponge City (SC) projects (UNSW -SJTU seed projects)
  • (2019) Cross Faculty Lab for Urban Water Resilience and Sponge Cities (UNSW cross faculty projects)

  • 3 Nov 2020

Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA, DE210101155), by Australian Research Council

  • 29 Jan 2019

UNSW Award - Promoting High Quality Research Papers Scheme (Key Incentive 1)
Publishing manuscript in Water Research journal

  • July 2018

Outstanding Contribution in Reviewing, in recognition of the contributions made to the quality of the journal Science of The Total Environment (top#10% journal in Environmental Engineering)

  • April 2017

Outstanding Contribution in Reviewing, in recognition of the contributions made to the quality of the journal Water Research (the No#1 journal in many water/environmental related areas)

  • 6 Oct 2016

Eric Laurenson Medal by Cooperative Research Centre for Water Sensitive Cities and Monash University – awarded to newly graduated PhD for the best PhD thesis in urban water research. The award values highly on the recipient’s ability to communicate their research findings to industry.

  • 15 Jan 2015

The Postgraduate Publication Award (PPA) by Monash University – awarded to high-achieving PhD students towards the end of their doctoral program at Monash.

  • 2014 & 2013

Organisation Excellence – awarded to the successful organisation of a parallel oral presentation section in Research Symposiums by Victorian Association of Chinese PhD students and Young Scholars (VACPs)

    • 3 Nov 2020
    • 29 Jan 2019

    Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA, DE210101155), by Australian Research Council

    UNSW Award - Promoting High Quality Research Papers Scheme (Key Incentive 1)
    Publishing manuscript in Water Research journal

    • 3 Nov 2020
    • July 2018

    Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA, DE210101155), by Australian Research Council

    Outstanding Contribution in Reviewing, in recognition of the contributions made to the quality of the journal Science of The Total Environment (top#10% journal in Environmental Engineering)

    • 3 Nov 2020
    • April 2017

    Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA, DE210101155), by Australian Research Council

    Outstanding Contribution in Reviewing, in recognition of the contributions made to the quality of the journal Water Research (the No#1 journal in many water/environmental related areas)

    • 3 Nov 2020
    • 6 Oct 2016

    Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA, DE210101155), by Australian Research Council

    Eric Laurenson Medal by Cooperative Research Centre for Water Sensitive Cities and Monash University – awarded to newly graduated PhD for the best PhD thesis in urban water research. The award values highly on the recipient’s ability to communicate their research findings to industry.

    • 3 Nov 2020
    • 15 Jan 2015

    Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA, DE210101155), by Australian Research Council

    The Postgraduate Publication Award (PPA) by Monash University – awarded to high-achieving PhD students towards the end of their doctoral program at Monash.

    • 3 Nov 2020
    • 2014 & 2013

    Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA, DE210101155), by Australian Research Council

    Organisation Excellence – awarded to the successful organisation of a parallel oral presentation section in Research Symposiums by Victorian Association of Chinese PhD students and Young Scholars (VACPs)

Working relationship with:

  • Water Research Australia
  • Melbourne Water
  • Sydney Water
  • Cooks Rivier Alliance
  • Georges Riverkeeper
  • Stormwater NSW
  • Monash University

International collaboration:

  • EAWAG (Switzerland)
  • HBKU (Qatar)
  • KAUST (Saudi Arabia)

My Research Supervision

Ongoing

  • Yinghui Tang (PhD), 2023 - 2027, Nitrogen removal through simultaneous nitrification, anammox and denitrification (SNAD) process in vegetated biofiltration systems (VBS). Primary supervisor
  • Tahereh (Sara) Yazdanparast (PhD), 2023 - 2027, Green Wall Technology: Sustainable Solution for Removal of MPs from Greywater.Primary supervisor
  • Kaixuan Wan (MPhil), 2023- ongoing, Modelling the water balance of green walls treating greywater. Primary supervisor.
  • JIadong Zhang (PhD), 2022- ongoing, Real time control Green Technologies for stormwater management. Primary supervisor.
  • Wenhui Wu, 2020 - ongoing, Planning of Water Sensitive Urban Design systems for urban flood mitigation. Secondary supervisor.

Completed

  • Abd-Ur-Rehman Hafiz Muhammad (Scientia PhD), 2019-2024, Hybrid Green Wall Systems For Wastewater Treatment in Urban Landscape. Primary supervisor.
  • Lihao Yuan (MPhil), 2021 - 2023, Tree pits for wastewater treatement. Primary supervisor.
  • Jia, Jing (PhD), 2019-2023. Sponge City Approches for Chinese Superblocks. Joint supervisor.
  • Zheng, Zhaozhi, 2018- 2022, Using photo-electrochemical oxidation system to treat organic pollutants in stormwater. Primary supervisor.

My Teaching

CVEN9625- Fundamentals of Water Engineering

CVEN9611 - Urban Hydrology and Stormwater Management (Water Sensitive Urban Design)