Future drought

“Global warming likely will intensify drought in groundwater and river flow (hydrological drought) in many regions across the globe. This chapter starts with an overview of hydrological drought assessments over time. It shows that the hydroclimatological community moved from single model to multi‐model ensembles to account for the uncertainty in model simulations. The likely most‐affected regions (hotspots) ‐ e.g. the Mediterranean ‐ are described based on studies using different emission scenarios, model ensembles and characteristics to portray hydrological drought (frequency, duration, severity). The impact of humans (reservoirs, water use), either alleviating or enhancing the drought, can have a substantial impact, which urges scientists to include this influence more comprehensively in future drought studies. Several approaches have been used to explore uncertainty in the assessment of future drought, either based on model outcome or on comparisons with observations. Uncertainty assessments are hard to compare and should be brought together in integrated conceptual frameworks.”

(Citaat: van Lanen, H.A.J., Prudhomme, C., Wanders, N., van Huijgevoort, M.H.J. – Future drought. Chapter 4. In Iglesias, A., Assimacopoulos, D., van Lanen, H.A.J. (Eds.) – Drought, Science and Policy, John Wiley & Sons, Chichester – doi.org/10.1002/9781119017073.ch4)