Our Hydrological Extremes, Coasts and Risk Management theme aims to improve the understanding of climate-water interactions from source to sea.
Our research supports key policies, including Scotland’s Climate Change Plan and the Flood Risk Management Act.
CREW's Hydrological Extremes, Coasts and Risk Management theme focusses on providing high quality science knowledge regarding:
- Nature based solutions
- Resilience and adaption to climate change
- Hydrological extremes: flooding and water scarcity
The projects undertaken within this theme support policy and regulation areas including:
- Scottish National Adaptation Plan (SNAP3) - Water scarcity
- Climate Change Plan for Scotland, UK Climate Change: risk assessment & adaptation
- Flood Risk Management Act
- Flood Resilience Strategy
- Scottish Biodiversity Strategy
- National coastal change assessments inc. erosion management
Recent research published within this thematic area includes:
- Climate Crisis: informing Scotland’s actionable mitigation and adaptation response to water scarcity - the research team reviewed past, present and future changes in water scarcity risk in Scotland, highlighting the current challenges in addressing the water scarcity risk and provide recommendations on how to address them.
- Methodologies for sampling fish populations in Scottish freshwater lochs - the project assessed the currently available methodologies for sampling fish populations in Scottish freshwater lochs. Acknowledging the complexity and longstanding challenges with fish monitoring in standing freshwaters, the project team produced guidelines which support the development of suitable fish assessment programmes.
- Increasing flood resilience: residential and community runoff retention solutions – the project team carried out a literature review, case studies and a cost-benefit analysis to evaluate and compare the cost and effectiveness of residential and community property rainwater runoff source control solutions to increase flood resilience.
- 2022 - Effective future communication of flood risk in Scotland - this project explored how to improve flood risk communication in Scotland, highlighting the need for audience-specific approaches. It emphasised clear messaging, community involvement, and actionable guidance to enhance resilience and avoid maladaptive responses.
- 2020 - Impacts of Flooding in North-east Scotland - in response to severe flooding in the winter of 2015/16, CREW commissioned research in Ballater and Garioch to understand long-term flood impacts and improve recovery support. The project team informed strategies for enhancing flood-risk management and strengthening community resilience.
- 2019 - Quantifying rates of urban creep in Scotland - this project mapped urban creep in Edinburgh from 1990 to 2015, revealing an annual loss of 6.44ha of vegetated land. Findings provide Scotland’s first city-wide estimates, highlighting impacts on surface water flood risk.
Related Research
News
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CRW2022_06 Emerging Contaminants: Informing Scotland’s strategic monitoring and policy approaches on substances of increasing concern
CREW code: CRW2022_06
Theme: Water Quality & Health
Type of project: Capacity Building
Project status: This project has been completed.
Please view project publication page here.
The aim of this project was to inform, prioritise, and coordinate actionable monitoring and policy-based approaches to identify, assess, and mitigate risks from substances of increasing concern to Scotland’s water environment. Contaminants of increasing concern (CICs) comprise a diverse range of substances and organisms, including chemical groups such as pharmaceuticals and pesticides; biological contaminants such as pathogens and antimicrobial-resistant (AMR) genes; nanomaterials; and microplastics. CICs include compounds and organisms that are ‘new’ or increasing in presence in the environment or compounds or organisms already known to be present for which new information becomes available, e.g. on pathways or toxicities. Substances and groups considered CICs therefore evolve over time, due to new insights or new patterns of use.
Using a Substance Mapping approach, including literature review, an expert survey and a knowledge sharing workshop, the team found that based on evidence encountered, no CIC groups can be discounted for Scotland and significant data gaps exist on sources, pathways, exposure routes, hazard and risk. Many national and international databases are however available and could be consolidated for Scotland. The research team further recommended partnership working, an international review of policy options, and expansion of research capacity to further refine and fill the knowledge gaps.
News
CRW2022_01 Developing risk assessment approaches for PFAS and watch list parameters under the recast Drinking Water Directive
CREW Code: CRW2022_01
Theme: Water Quality & Health
Project status: Complete. Please click here to visit the publication page to view the project outputs.
Type of project: Capacity Building
The research project conducted assessments of the potential presence of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), 17β-estradiol, and nonylphenol for drinking water supply sources in Scotland, to identify high risk areas and enable prioritisation of monitoring and additional knowledge generation.
PFAS, a class of synthetic chemicals produced since the 1940s, are persistent, toxic and bioaccumulative and have been linked to detrimental impacts on childhood development, cancers, and immune system disorders. Nonylphenol and 17β-estradiol are endocrine-disrupting chemicals connected to cancer, reduced fertility and obesity. Due to increasing awareness of the potential occurrence of these substances in the environment, a new standard for PFAS was introduced for Scottish drinking water in January 2023, and Scottish Water commenced a nationwide risk based sampling programme at that time. 17β-estradiol and nonylphenol were added to an EU drinking water watchlist, so Scottish Water will need to monitor for their presence in their supplies when the watch list is adopted in Scotland.
The research project estimated which supplies had the highest potential likelihood of detecting the substances in the raw (pre-treated) water. The assessments identified higher likelihood of PFAS and nonylphenol presence in those areas with higher population and industry densities (predominantly the central belt and east of Scotland), whereas areas with the highest likelihood of 17β-estradiol presence were those under more intensive agricultural use (predominantly the northeast and south of Scotland). Having identified these areas now allows further refinement of monitoring programmes to aid our understanding of the potential presence of the substances, their sources and possible treatment requirements. This in turn will inform best strategies and actions to reduce concentrations of the contaminants if necessary, not only in drinking water, but also in the envrionment.
Lead research team: University of Dundee
The project has completed. Please click here to visit the publication page to view the project outputs.
News
Our Land and Water Resource Management theme aims to support the recognition and quality of the ecosystem services on which society depends.
Our research supports key policies, including the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) and the River Basin Management Planning (RBMP 3).
CREW’s Land and Water Resource Management theme focusses on providing high quality science knowledge regarding:
• Natural capital
• Land use and soil management
• Diffuse pollution
• Net zero pathway
• Circular economy
• Blue-green infrastructure
The projects undertaken within this theme aligns with policy and regulation areas including:
Recent research published within this thematic area includes:
Key legacy projects published within this thematic area include:
Related Research
News
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CREW Programme Report 2016-2022
Water is at the heart of Scottish life - socially, environmentally, and in economic terms as a sector in its own right, and as a critical resource in Scotland's manufacturing, agriculture, food and drink, tourism and energy sectors. Scotland's Hydro Nation agenda supports the Scottish Government's vision as a world leader in the sustainable management of water. To deliver that vision we must ensure that the respected knowledge generated by research underpins our future. This ambition is central to CREW's values. Our underlying ethos has, and will continue to be, to deliver the right information to the right people at the right time, and in the right way.
Over the last six years, and as highlighted in this Programme Report, CREW has delivered more than 105 projects in the process of meeting its objectives of supporting policy and practice, and in delivering relevant outputs. We aim to achieve this through our core principles of; co-construction, communicability, trustworthiness, timeliness, supporting an inter-disciplinary vision, and focusing on impact, outcome and “value”. There are many examples of CREW's work throughout this report, and on behalf of the team and all research partners, we are proud to highlight what has been achieved, and we hope you find it of interest.
CREW Programme Report 2016-2022
CREW is pleased to present this Programme Report (2016-2022) for the Centre of Expertise for Waters.
Water is at the heart of Scottish life - socially, environmentally, and in economic terms as a sector in its own right, and as a critical resource in Scotland's manufacturing, agriculture, food and drink, tourism and energy sectors. Scotland's Hydro Nation agenda supports the Scottish Government's vision as a world leader in the sustainable management of water. To deliver that vision we must ensure that the respected knowledge generated by research underpins our future. This ambition is central to CREW's values. Our underlying ethos has, and will continue to be, to deliver the right information to the right people at the right time, and in the right way.
Over the last six years, and as highlighted in this Programme Report, CREW has delivered more than 105 projects in the process of meeting its objectives of supporting policy and practice, and in delivering relevant outputs. We aim to achieve this through our core principles of; co-construction, communicability, trustworthiness, timeliness, supporting an inter-disciplinary vision, and focusing on impact, outcome and “value”. There are many examples of CREW's work throughout this report, and on behalf of the team and all research partners, we are proud to highlight what has been achieved, and we hope you find it of interest.
CREW 2022-2027
The Centre of Expertise for Waters began a new Programme of activities on 1st April for 2022-2027.
We would like to thank everyone who contributed to the previous Programme, 2016-2021, and we look forward to working with you all and new contributors in the coming days, months and years.
Opportunities
CREW will soon be announcing calls for proposals for new projects. The calls will be hosted on the CREW website.
Follow us on social media to find out more about our work, recent publications and upcoming opportunities to work with us: @CREW_waters and @HNICScotland.
Changes and growth of CREW and the Hydro Nation International Centre
Bob Ferrier, Director of CREW and the Hydro Nation International Centre retired in September 2022 following 37 years of service at the James Hutton Institute. Bob contributed widely across Institute activities as a respected member of the Executive team and Director of the Centre of Expertise for Waters (CREW) based at the Hydro Nation International Centre. He held an Honorary Chair in the School of Social Sciences at the University of Dundee, Scotland, and is a member of the Scottish Science Advisory Council.
Professor Colin Campbell said “We are grateful to Bob for his leadership, his hard work and the ideas he contributed to the success of the James Hutton Institute and wish him well in retirement. His legacy will be Hydro Nation International Centre and the portfolio of world leading water-related activities that sit within the Centre.”
Dr Rachel Helliwell, who has managed the Centre of Expertise for Waters (CREW) for the past 3 years will take on the role of Director of the Hydro Nation International Centre and CREW. She has 27 years of research and management experience in integrated sustainable water research and during that time has enjoyed working at the science:policy interface.
Further changes to the HNIC/CREW teams include the appointment of Dr Nikki Dodd to Deputy CREW Manager and the recruitment of Rebekah Burman as a CREW Project Manager. Nikki brings significant experience to the role having been a CREW Project Manager since 2016. Rebekah joins the team from NHS Orkney where she managed projects with environmental and health streams, including promoting the utilisation of blue and green spaces for health and wellbeing benefits.
Within the HNIC, Dr Maricela Blair, a former Hydro Nation Scholar, joined the team in September as a Hydro Nation Policy Officer drawing on her experiences from her PhD and working as an Analyst / Adviser for Science and Technology Institute in Honduras.
HNIC/CREW are expanding the team and are soon to be joined by a further CREW project Manager, Impact Officer and International Development Officer.
Our Water Quality and Health theme aims to improve the understanding of the interrelationships between water quality and human/environmental health.
Our research supports key policies, including the Drinking Water Directive and the Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive.
CREW’s Water Quality and Health theme focusses on providing high quality science knowledge regarding:
• Water, wastewater and drainage
• Human and environmental health
• Epidemiology
• Contaminants in the environment
The projects undertaken within this theme support policy and regulation areas including:
• Drinking Water Directive
• Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive
• Water Framework Directive
• One Health Framework
Recent research published within this thematic area includes:
Key legacy projects published within this thematic area include:
Related Research
News
Related Publications
IMPRESS: Approaches to IMProve flood and drought forecasting and warning in catchments influenced by REServoirS
IMPRESS investigated improved methods for forecasting of floods and droughts where these are influenced by reservoir operations. A strong capability to forecast sub-hourly river flows a week ahead for flood warning/guidance purposes has been developed by SEPA, using hydrological and hydraulic models of rivers in combination with weather model predictions of precipitation. However, the effect of reservoir operation is not well represented and this can impact adversely on the quality of flow forecasts at locations downstream of reservoirs.
Reservoir operators have developed their own procedures for managing reservoirs to meet often a primary purpose of public water supply (Scottish Water) or hydropower generation (e.g. SSE Renewables, Drax). Longer time-horizons (weeks, months, a year or more) are of greater importance to these reservoir operators. SEPA, as a water resource regulator, also wishes to extend its forecasting capability to longer lead-times and drought flows. Both SEPA and the reservoir operators have developed monitoring, modelling and forecasting capabilities aligned to their respective priorities. The IMPRESS project has identified clear benefits in sharing and jointly developing some of these capabilities at times of both flood and drought that are in the public good.
IMPRESS undertook a review of current practice, identified possible improved approaches, and made recommendations for realising benefits through partnership working and future joint programmes of work.
The research suggested the following priority activities: (i) developing a tailored reservoir routing module (with outlet structures and control rules) to work within existing modelling frameworks, (ii) formulating improved procedures for modelling catchments (across the full range of flows) with ungauged areas and influenced by reservoirs, (iii) investigating the water balance of reservoirs, supported by case studies, with benefits to drought planning for water and hydropower supply, (iv) making better use of longer (weeks to seasons) meteorological predictions in reservoir operation and drought forecasting, accounting for their uncertainty, (v) sharing of information on reservoir geometry, operation and monitoring, along with developments in river flow forecasting capability over time-horizons of hours, weeks and months.
A Road Map of activities with a 10-year vision is proposed, guided by a Reservoir Working Group and Partnership Days.
Understanding the social factors influencing resilience to drought exposure in Scotland
Climate change poses an increasing risk of drought hazards in Scotland, with those depending on Private Water Supplies particularly exposed to water scarcity. Underlying social circumstances need to be acknowledged in drought resilience policy. This project was a CREW policy fellowship aimed to improve the understanding of the social factors influencing resilience to drought exposure in Scotland in order to inform Scottish water policy. For that, the CREW policy fellows undertook a systematic international literature review on the personal, social, environmental, and institutional conversion factors that interact to either enhance or reduce people’s vulnerability to drought. Improving communication around drought hazards can help mitigate the impact these factors have on vulnerability. To help tailor communication and improve resilience for people on Private Water Supplies and more broadly for people across Scotland, these factors were aligned with three areas of drought communication: drought forecasting, drought preparedness, and drought response. A key challenge for Scotland is the national messaging around climate change impacts to water resources. Policy implications that would help improve public messaging to target these conversion factors were identified and policy recommendations made.
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