GRIT remaps the world's rivers, branching into the unknown to aid global flood modeling

GRIT remaps the world's rivers, branching into the unknown to aid global flood modeling

A team led by researchers at the University of Oxford has created the most complete map of the world's rivers ever made, offering a major leap forward for flood prediction, climate risk planning, and water resource management in a warming world.

New Global River Map Is the First to Include River Bifurcations and Canals

Source: Water Resources Research Global river datasets represent rivers that flow downstream in single paths that follow surface elevation, but they often miss branching river systems found in areas such as floodplains, canals, and deltas. Forked, or bifurcated, rivers also often exist in densely populated areas, so mapping them at scale is crucial as climate change makes flooding more severe. Wortmann et al. aimed to fill the gaps in existing g…