Fanny presents regulate’s research work in the EWA (European water association) yearbook 2022 as one “European Highlight”.

Globally, groundwater is the most important source for drinking water and a key resource in agriculture. It is home to a unique biodiversity and provides essential ecosystem services, such as contaminant degradation, water storage and energy provision. And yet, the conservation of this valuable resource is often neglected both locally and globally.

In the Anthropocene epoch, multiple social-ecological processes that easily transgress hydrological boundaries challenge the basin-scale perspective. Even groundwater, a thoroughly localized resource, is increasingly subject to new supra-regional social-ecological dynamics, such as inter-basin water transfers, migration and virtual water trade. In ‘regulate’ we set out to close knowledge gaps on these social-ecological dynamics of groundwater and its governance. In a two-level approach, local effects of telecouplings on groundwater quality and quantity are analyzed in different case-studies, while this bottom-up knowledge is up-scaled and extrapolated to the European level together with stakeholders (among them EWA) to address key challenges in the European regulatory framework for groundwater.

Find the yearbook on the EWA website (‘regulate’ on p. 47f).