Have river flow droughts become more severe? A review of the evidence from the UK – a data-rich, temperate environment

Hannaford, Jamie; Turner, Stephen; Chevuturi, Amulya; Chan, Wilson; Barker, Lucy J.; Tanguy, Maliko; Parry, Simon; Allen, Stuart

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-4371-2025

Articles | Volume 29, issue 18

https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-4371-2025

© Author(s) 2025. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Special issue:

Drought, society, and ecosystems (NHESS/BG/GC/HESS inter-journal...

https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-4371-2025

© Author(s) 2025. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 29, issue 18

Review article

|

16 Sep 2025

Review article |

| 16 Sep 2025

Have river flow droughts become more severe? A review of the evidence from the UK – a data-rich, temperate environment

Jamie Hannaford, Stephen Turner, Amulya Chevuturi, Wilson Chan, Lucy J. Barker, Maliko Tanguy, Simon Parry, and Stuart Allen

Supplement

https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-4371-2025-supplement

Data sets

Historic Standardised Streamflow Index (SSI) using Tweedie distribution with standard period 1961-2010 for 303 UK catchments (1891-2015) L. J. Barker et al. https://doi.org/10.5285/58ef13a9-539f-46e5-88ad-c89274191ff9

Historic reconstructions of daily river flow for 303 UK catchments (1891-2015) K. A. Smith et al. https://doi.org/10.5285/f710bed1-e564-47bf-b82c-4c2a2fe2810e

NOAA Extended Reconstructed SST V5 NOAA https://psl.noaa.gov/data/gridded/data.noaa.ersst.v5.html

NOAA Extended Reconstructed Sea Surface Temperature (ERSST) B. Huang et al. https://doi.org/10.7289/V5T72FNM

Model code and software

NERC-CEH/ROBIN_pipeline: ROBIN hydrometric data processing v1.0 A. Griffin et al. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.16900796

Short summary

This extended review asks whether hydrological (river flow) droughts have become more severe over time in the UK based on literature review and original analyses. The UK is a good international exemplar, given the richness of available data. We find that there is little compelling evidence for a trend towards worsening river flow droughts, at odds with future climate change projections. We outline reasons for this discrepancy and make recommendations to guide researchers and policymakers.