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World Resources Institute (WRI)

Aqueduct Global Water Risk Atlas (WRI)

The Aqueduct Water Risk Atlas is an interactive global water risk assessment and mapping tool developed by the World Resources Institute. The platform enables companies, governments, investors, researchers, and communities to assess and visualise current and future water-related risks worldwide, including water stress, drought, flooding, and water supply variability. Using peer-reviewed methodologies and open datasets, the tool provides high-resolution, customisable maps and indicators to support climate risk assessment, water management, resilience planning, sustainability reporting, and adaptation decision-making.

Open tool

What you can do with it

Input

  • Select a country, state, river basin or aquifer of interest.
  • Explore current and future water-risk indicators.
  • Examine water stress, drought, flooding, coastal risk and water-supply variability.
  • Compare locations using consistent global datasets and indicators.
  • Use available climate, hydrological and socio-economic information relevant to the assessment.

Output

  • Customisable global water-risk maps.
  • Water-risk indicators and datasets.
  • Current and forward-looking information on water stress, drought, flooding and water-supply variability.
  • Results at HydroBASINS Level 6, state and aquifer scales, depending on the indicator.
  • Downloadable information supporting comparison across locations.

Use it to

  • Screen water-related risks for territories, investments and operations.
  • Compare water risk across countries, basins, states and aquifers.
  • Support climate-risk and vulnerability assessments.
  • Inform water-management, resilience and land-use planning.
  • Identify areas requiring more detailed local water-risk analysis.
  • Support sustainability reporting and adaptation decision-making.

Why is it relevant to climate adaptation

Provides a globally consistent way to compare water-related risks across locations, which is particularly useful for organisations managing activities, investments or supply chains in several countries. By bringing water stress, drought, flooding and variability into a common framework, it helps users identify priority areas and start water-resilience discussions. Its global consistency is a major strength, but local decisions should be supported by more detailed information because the Atlas does not fully capture local water transfers or validate every indicator at local scale.

Used in

  • Global water-risk screening by governments, companies, investors, researchers and communities.
  • Cross-country and river-basin comparison of water stress, drought, flooding and supply variability.
  • Water-risk analysis for agriculture, business, energy, finance, disaster-risk reduction and land-use planning.
  • Global assessments at HydroBASINS Level 6, state and WHYMAP aquifer scales.
  • Climate-resilience and sustainability analysis using World Resources Institute Aqueduct datasets.
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This translation is generated by eTranslation, a machine translation tool provided by the European Commission.

Exclusion of liability
This translation is generated by eTranslation, a machine translation tool provided by the European Commission.