The FDRI scoping project funded by NERC aimed to establish the requirements for a potential new national Floods and Droughts Research Infrastructure (FDRI) and provide NERC with the information needed to submit a business case. The FDRI scoping project ran for 21-months from May 2020 to January 2022.
The primary objective of FDRI is to increase the UK’s resilience to floods and droughts through a transformational research capability, which will dramatically improve in UK’s flood and drought forecasting, planning, incident response and management.
The Scoping Study team was led by the UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology and comprised researchers from the University of Bristol, Imperial College London, and the British Geological Survey.
Building on NERC-funded community workshops in 2019, which identified strong stakeholder interest in engaging with a dedicated scoping project, the FDRI team sought views, ideas and inputs from a broad range of stakeholders across business, landowners, government and regulatory agencies via a series of surveys, webinars and virtual workshops.
The team also carried out a thorough review of past and ongoing flood and drought monitoring programmes, both in the UK and internationally.
The project was delivered through several complementary work packages, one of which was responsible for overall project management. Members of the Project Management team were as follows:
| Gareth Old | UKCEH, Principal Investigator & WP Lead |
| Nichola Badcock | NERC, Quality Assurance |
| Victoria Barlow | UKCEH, Project Manager |
| John Bloomfield | BGS, WP Lead |
| Wouter Buytaert | Imperial College London, WP Lead |
| Matt Fry | UKCEH, WP Lead |
| Gwyn Rees | UKCEH, Project Co-Lead |
| Nick Reynard | UKCEH, Project Co-Lead |
| Marcia Spencer | UKCEH, Outreach, Communication & Project Support |
| Thorsten Wagener | University of Bristol, WP Lead |
| Gemma Coxon | University of Bristol, WP Lead |
The project was overseen by a Project Steering Committee. Members included:
| David Hannah (Chair) | University of Birmingham |
| Nichola Badcock | NERC, Head of Capital |
| Lindsay Beevers | Herriot-Watt University |
| Alex Chahian | NERC, Programme Sponsor, Major Projects |
| Nick Chappell | Lancaster University |
| Stewart Clarke | National Trust |
| Hannah Cloke | University of Reading |
| Isabelle Durance | Cardiff University |
| Steve Hallett | Cranfield University |
| Joseph Holden | University of Leeds |
| Steve Kaye | UKWIR |
| Ruth Kelman | NERC, Head of Resilient Environments |
| Oliver Knevitt | NERC, Programme Manager, Capital and Resilient Environments |
| Michelle Manning | NERC, Senior Programme Manager, Resilient Environments |
| Thomas Robinson | NERC, Senior Programme Manager, Capital |
| John Remedios | NCEO / University of Leicester |
| Rebecca Smith | NERC, Programme Manager, Capital |
| Doug Whitfield | Environment Agency |