Deciphering River Flood Change

Major floods around the world have raised questions about the frequency and magnitude of such phenomena. Although changes in climate and land use are known to play a critical role in river floods, how they actually translate into considerable variations in intensity remains unknown.

Prof. Günter Blöschl addresses this issue with a comprehensive approach which includes the analysis of 200 years of flood data from selected catchments all over Europe. Prof. Blöschl aims to build a flood-change model that could predict how variations in one parameter (e.g. change in weather, storms, soil moisture and land use management) could affect flood levels.

The model will be tested for the different catchments and also be compared with results from data-based methods. His research will make it possible to clarify the effects of land use and climate on floods, a vital step towards predicting how floods will change in the future.