Climate change affects the entire water cycle. Surface and underground waters are equally exposed to changes in water quantity and quality. This has direct repercussions on hydropower, water supplies, urban drainage, navigation, agriculture, ecology and water-induced natural hazards.
Water moves in a global cycle. It falls from clouds to the earth as rain or snow, infiltrates the soil and groundwater or evaporates as water vapour, emerges from springs, flows in streams, rivers and lakes and finally reaches the ocean, where it rises back into the atmosphere. Global warming is intensifying the water cycle.
Last modification 16.03.2021
Contact
Federal Office for the Environment FOEN
Hydrology Division
Papiermühlestr. 172
3063 Ittigen
