Flood Science and Management with Dr Günter Blöschl
How and why does flooding take place? How are flood risks evolving with climate change and large-scale human alteration of riverscapes and watersheds? Does it even make sense to measure a ‘100-year-flood’ any more?
Stockholm Water Prize 2025 winner Dr Günter Blöschl shares a masterclass on the science and management of floods on the third episode of Season 2 of the Water Data Podcast. The Water Data Podcast is a talk show on the science, systems, and stories of water hosted by Veena Srinivasan.
Professor Günter Blöschl is a hydrologist, engineer and academic from Austria. Dr Bloeschl is Head of the Institute of Hydraulic Engineering and Water Resources Management, Director of the Centre for Water Resource Systems of the Vienna University of Technology as well as Chair of the Vienna Doctoral Programme on Water Resource Systems.
He is also the 2025 recipient of the Stockholm Water Prize, awarded by the Swedish Academy of Sciences and the Stockholm Water Foundation. One of the highest honours in the water sciences, Dr Bloeschl received it for his extensive work on flood risk reduction, water resource management, flood scaling, and regional process hydrology.
In this episode, Dr Blöschl talks about the science of flooding, what research shows about the evolving causes and impacts of floods in Europe, and flood mitigation and management lessons for India and the world.
Suggested Readings:
- Dr. Günter Blöschl on Google Scholar.
- Blöschl, Günter, Julia Hall, Alberto Viglione, Rui AP Perdigão, Juraj Parajka, Bruno Merz, David Lun et al. “Changing climate both increases and decreases European river floods.” Nature 573, no. 7772 (2019): 108-111.
- Merz, Bruno, Günter Blöschl, Sergiy Vorogushyn, Francesco Dottori, Jeroen CJH Aerts, Paul Bates, Miriam Bertola et al. “Causes, impacts and patterns of disastrous river floods.” Nature Reviews Earth & Environment 2, no. 9 (2021): 592-609.
- Blöschl, Günter, Julia Hall, Juraj Parajka, Rui AP Perdigão, Bruno Merz, Berit Arheimer, Giuseppe T. Aronica et al. “Changing climate shifts timing of European floods.” Science 357, no. 6351 (2017): 588-590.
- Di Baldassarre, Giuliano, Alberto Montanari, Harry Lins, Demetris Koutsoyiannis, Luigia Brandimarte, and Günter Blöschl. “Flood fatalities in Africa: From diagnosis to mitigation.” Geophysical research letters 37, no. 22 (2010).
- Di Baldassarre, Giuliano, Alberto Viglione, Gemma Carr, Linda Kuil, José Luis Salinas, and Günter Blöschl. “Socio-hydrology: conceptualising human-flood interactions.” Hydrology and Earth System Sciences 17, no. 8 (2013): 3295-3303.
- Gaume, Eric, Valerie Bain, Pietro Bernardara, Olivier Newinger, Mihai Barbuc, Allen Bateman, Lotta Blaškovičová et al. “A compilation of data on European flash floods.” Journal of Hydrology 367, no. 1-2 (2009): 70-78.
- Bertola, Miriam, Alberto Viglione, Sergiy Vorogushyn, David Lun, Bruno Merz, and Günter Blöschl. “Do small and large floods have the same drivers of change? A regional attribution analysis in Europe.” Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions 2020 (2020): 1-26.
- Blöschl, Günter. “Three hypotheses on changing river flood hazards.” Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions 2022 (2022): 1-37.
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Recording by Nanditha Gogate and Nabina Chakraborty
Video editing by Vraj Acharya and Nabina Chakraborty
Graphics and artwork by Aparna Nambiar
Audio mixing and mastering by Vijay Doiphode
Podcast production and management by Nabina Chakraborty and Pavan Srinath
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