Towards pan-European drought risk maps: quantifying the link between drought indices and reported drought impacts

Bibliographic Details
Title: Towards pan-European drought risk maps: quantifying the link between drought indices and reported drought impacts
Authors: Veit Blauhut, Lukas Gudmundsson, Kerstin Stahl
Source: Environmental Research Letters, Vol 10, Iss 1, p 014008 (2015)
Publisher Information: IOP Publishing, 2015.
Publication Year: 2015
Collection: LCC:Environmental technology. Sanitary engineering
LCC:Environmental sciences
LCC:Science
LCC:Physics
Subject Terms: drought impacts, drought risk, drought risk mapping, drought vulnerability, likelihood of impact occurrence, proxy approach, Environmental technology. Sanitary engineering, TD1-1066, Environmental sciences, GE1-350, Science, Physics, QC1-999
More Details: Drought in Europe is a hazard with a wide range of transboundary, environmental and socio-economic impacts on various sectors including agriculture, energy production, public water supply and water quality. Despite the apparent importance of this natural hazard, observed pan-European drought impacts have not yet been quantitatively related to the most important climatological drivers to map drought risk on a continental scale. This contribution approaches the issue by quantitatively assessing the likelihood of drought impact occurrence as a function of the standardized precipitation evapotranspiration index for four European macro regions using logistic regression. The resulting models allow mapping the sector-specific likelihood of drought impact occurrence for specific index levels. For the most severe drought conditions the maps suggest the highest risk of impact occurrence for ‘Water Quality’ in Maritime Europe, followed by ‘Agriculture & Livestock Farming’ in Western Mediterranean Europe and ‘Energy & Industry’ in Maritime Europe. Merely impacts on ‘Public Water Supply’ result in overall lower risk estimates. The work suggests that modeling and mapping for North- and Southeastern Europe requires further enhancement to the impact database in these regions. Such maps may become an essential component of drought risk management to foster resilience for this hazard at large scale.
Document Type: article
File Description: electronic resource
Language: English
ISSN: 1748-9326
Relation: https://doaj.org/toc/1748-9326
DOI: 10.1088/1748-9326/10/1/014008
Access URL: https://doaj.org/article/bdf4853028054df5bfd24b0d6850e54b
Accession Number: edsdoj.bdf4853028054df5bfd24b0d6850e54b
Database: Directory of Open Access Journals
More Details
ISSN:17489326
DOI:10.1088/1748-9326/10/1/014008
Published in:Environmental Research Letters
Language:English