Alpine Drought Observatory
According to the Alpine Convention, water scarcity and related conflicts are becoming a worrying topic in Alpine regions. Moreover, lowland regions far beyond the Alps suffer from missing water from the Alps. Thus, countries are invited to act on this topic with common strategies. Building on findings from previously funded projects (e.g. AlpWaterScarce), our aim is to set up an Alpine Drought Observatory (ADO) and to derive recommendations for improved risk preparedness and efficiency of drought management, specifically, for the Alpine territory. The ADO itself will be a transnational Alpine-wide operational system with a web-interface (e.g. WebGIS, periodic reports) to access data and specific impact-oriented indices for monitoring droughts and their impacts. It will provide optimized observations and forecasts for mountainous areas, which could be integrated in existing EU-level monitoring systems (e.g. European Drought Observatory). Monitoring will be based on a fusion of existing approaches (e.g. meteorological drought indices, hydrological drought indices), and newly available information (e.g. remote sensing of snow and soil moisture), to create new combined drought indices and a common drought classification. The ADO will be applied in six case studies in all alpine countries with local partners. The case studies represent different drought issues such as agricultural drought, hydrological drought or drought impact on ecosystems. Out of the case studies, guidelines for an improved drought risk management will be developed. Findings will be upscaled to recommendations for drought governance policies for the Alps. Main beneficiaries of project findings are institutions with decision-making capacities in the field of water management, energy production, and agriculture. Many of them are directly involved in the project as partners, observers, or stakeholders. The total budget of the project will be €1.9M.