Hydrology

The Colorado River runs nearly fifteen hundred miles, winding through seven states and Mexico. It supplies drinking water to nearly 40 million people, irrigates nearly 4 million acres of farmland and attracts millions of nature lovers to scenic Grand Canyon vistas. And it is on the brink. A 20 year...

In 2020, Colorado battled the four largest wildfires in its history, leaving residents anxious for another intense wildfire season this year. But last week, fires weren’t the issue—it was their aftermath. When heavy rains fell over the burn scar from the 2020 Cameron Peak fire, they triggered flash flooding and...

Irrigated agriculture is the planet's largest consumer of freshwater and ultimately produces more than 40% of food worldwide. Yet the exact amounts of water actually being used in irrigation remains largely unknown. Answering that question would provide insight into the global water balance – the flow of water in and...

Much of the western United States has seen less than 85% of the snow it is used to getting and it is worrying some about the fire season ahead. “There absolutely is a lot of concern that we could see another record fire season,” said Ben Livneh, a hydrologist and...

Professor Balaji Rajagopalan and Emily Gill (PhDCivEngr'15) have spent years dissecting the relationship between El Niño and La Niña and monsoonal rainfall in India. They have found that focusing on El Niño and La Niña’s impacts on the monsoon in regions and sub-seasons—instead of all-India for the whole monsoon season—may improve rainfall forecasts.

When Adam Wlostowski transfers to CU-Boulder this summer to complete his PhD, he will be ready to hit the ground running with his research, thanks to a Horton (Hydrology) Research Grant from the American Geophysical Union (AGU). Wlostowski was one of three PhD students nationwide to receive the 2015 grant,...

Roseanna Neupauer performs an original rap for her hydrology class. Two recent awards leave little doubt that associate professor Roseanna Neupauer is an outstanding teacher. Neupauer has been named to the University of Colorado’s President’s Teaching Scholars Program, and has also received a Fulbright Fellowship to spend a summer in...