Changing Water Cycle Programme

What is the Changing Water Cycle Programme?

The Changing Water Cycle is a research programme that will develop a full understanding of the changes taking place in the water cycle across the globe. This will lead to improved predictions for the next few decades of water availability in the global system. The global water cycle includes water held in the the air, oceans, on land, in ice and within plants and animals.

The programme will address the urgent need to

• understand the changes taking place now inthe earth's water systems
• predict changes that will take place over the next few decades
• and, through LWEC, work with partners to build resilience, mitigate problems, and develop adaptive solutions.

What will the programme do?

1. Develop an integrated, quantitative understanding of the changes taking place in the global water cycle.
2. Improve predictions for the next few decades of regional precipitation, amount of water taken up by plants and released to the air and soil moisture.
3. Understand how local to regional scale hydrological and biogeochemical processes are responding and will respond to changing climate and land use, and what the consequent impacts will be on the sustainable use of soil and water.
4. Understand the consequences of the changing water cycle for  natural hazards, including floods and droughts, and to improve prediction and mitigation of these hazards.

Who will use the outputs?

Policy makers

• The results will inform the UK Government strategic goals on climate change adaptation and mitigation
• Organisations such as Defra, the Met Office, and the Environment Agency will be able to use the findings to manage aspects of the water cycle.

Business

• The programme will give the water-related industries the information they need to anticipate, manange and respond to changes in water availability

PROGRAMME FACTS AND FIGURES

Start and end dates: 01/11/2009 to 2014

Website: http://www.nerc.ac.uk/research/programmes/cwc

Contact: Dr Michal Jane Filtness (milt@nerc.ac.uk)