Anne F. van Loon

HS Hydrological Sciences

The 2017 Division Outstanding Early Career Scientist Award is awarded to Anne F. van Loon for her innovative research on the feedbacks between climatic and anthropogenic-induced drought and their impacts on water availability.

The dominant controls on freshwater availability are of global concern, and in a short but transformative career Anne van Loon has made significant contributions to our understanding of how different kinds of drought are impacting these resources. Her research focuses on the processes related to hydrological drought (drought in groundwater and surface water) and she is especially interested in the influence of storage in groundwater, human activities, and cold conditions (snow and glaciers) on the development of drought. In particular, van Loon is at the forefront of hydrological sciences in exploring the feedbacks between climatic and anthropogenic induced drought and their impacts on water availability. She is leading the hydrological science community in rethinking the role of humans in the hydrological cycle during these periods of high vulnerability, highlighting the current inefficiencies in drought management. She is coordinating the ‘Drought in the Anthropocene’ theme within the International Association of Hydrological Sciences Panta Rhei initiative, and is providing a substantial contribution to the achievements of EURO FRIEND-Water Low Flow and Drought network.

Publication resulting from the award

Van Loon, A. F., Kumar, R., and Mishra, V.: Testing the use of standardised indices and GRACE satellite data to estimate the European 2015 groundwater drought in near-real time, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 21, 1947–1971, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-21-1947-2017, 2017.