STARS4Water has released a new policy brief highlighting how climate change is reshaping Europe’s river basins. The brief warns about more frequent droughts and floods, declining snow and glacier storage, and shifting river flow regimes.
Europe is warming at twice the global average, with cascading impacts on water, food, energy, and ecosystems. Hydropower, inland navigation, agriculture, and drinking water supply face mounting risks. STARS4Water has collaboratively explored future water resource availability and water use in seven diverse European river basins, representing a broad spectrum of hydrological and socio-economic contexts across Europe. Regional differences are stark:
- Rhine & Danube: glacier retreat, summer low flows, and winter flood risks.
- Drammen (Norway): earlier snowmelt, stronger rain floods, altered reservoir operations.
- Messara (Crete): worsening water scarcity and aquifer overexploitation.
- Duero (Spain): declining runoff, more frequent droughts, groundwater stress.
- Seine (France): high uncertainty, more summer low flows, need for adaptive reservoir management.
- East Anglia (UK): extreme sensitivity to hotter summers, wetter winters, and rising seas.
The brief links findings to the European Water Resilience Strategy (2025), stressing the need for basin-specific adaptation. It sets out six guiding principles, including holistic river basin approaches, science–stakeholder partnerships, participatory development of future scenarios, and defining a “safe operating space” for water use. The policy brief calls for urgent action to reduce water demand, expand nature-based solutions, and ensure inclusive, resilient water governance.
More information can be found in the following STARS4Water project Deliverable: Duel, H., Kossida, M., Blind, M., Ramos, M.H. (2025): Climate change impacts: water challenges of European river basins, STARS4Water Policy Brief. Horizon Europe project STARS4Water. Deliverable 6.6.
