L E A D I N G WAT E R R E S E A R C H F O R A C H A N G I N G W O R L D
TWO YEAR REPORT FA L L 2 0 2 4 - S U M M E R 2 0 2 6
A Message from the Directors Dear Friends and Colleagues, As we launch our third year leading UVM’s Water Resources Institute, we bring you this report to share the progress we’ve made since our launch in Fall 2024. Over the past two years, we have strengthened the Institute’s foundation by diversifying sources of support and deepening partnerships with existing UVM programs. Our research funded by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the U.S. Geological Survey through the Cooperative Institute for Research to Operations (CIROH) is growing and expanding in reach. Meanwhile, our staff have: • • • • •
maintained and expanded weather and water monitoring infrastructure, connected affiliates with policymakers, agency leads and funding organizations, prepared the next generation of water leaders through training initiatives, engaged communities interested in UVM’s water science, and incentivized faculty teams to secure new research funding.
As we look ahead, we remain committed to growing the scale and scope of UVM’s water research to benefit our researchers, our students, and our communities. We invite you to continue this journey with us.
Beverley Wemple, Director Keith Jennings, Director of Research
Our Mission At the University of Vermont’s Water Resources Institute (WRI), we recognize that humans and water are inextricably linked – water sustains life, shapes ecosystems, and supports economies, yet also poses risk through floods, droughts, and pollution. We advance innovative research, education, and outreach to address these pressing challenges, equipping scientists and partners with the resources and knowledge needed to develop actionable solutions that support communities, infrastructure, decisionmakers, and more.
Institute Goals ENHANCE the flow of information among scholars and trainees by establishing a hub of water research at the nexus of natural and social sciences, human health, design, engineering, and governance. EDUCATE the next generation of problem solvers.
COORDINATE and develop new water-related programs, facilities, and services on campus.
BUILD bridges with external academic, nonprofit, state, federal, and international partners that accelerate the translation of research to practice.
Our Community The Water Resources Institute connects faculty, students, and postdoctoral researchers engaged in water research across the university, fostering an interdisciplinary community that continues to grow in size and expertise. Today, 80 faculty from across seven colleges and schools are apart of the WRI community, alongside 28 supported students and trainees. Since our launch, the Institute has awarded $147,000 to 11 faculty through collaborative grantwriting initiatives, while 10 faculty have partnered on workforce training and development efforts. WRI programs and funding have strengthened research capacity across UVM, with the Cooperative Institute for Research to Operations in Hydrology (CIROH) serving as a signature research program. Guide to UVM College Abbreviations: CALS: College of Agriculture and Life Sciences CAS: College of Arts and Sciences CESS: College of Education and Social Services
CEMS: College of Engineering and Mathematical Sciences CNHS: College of Nursing and Health Sciences
WRI Faculty By College & School:
LCOM: Robert Larner College of Medicine RSENR: Rubenstein School of Environment and Natural Resources
The Cooperative Institute for Research to Operations in Hydrology (CIROH) Established by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in 2022, CIROH advances research that improves water prediction, meeting the needs of NOAA’s Office of Water Prediction, the U.S. Geological Survey, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and other federal agencies. WRI coordinates UVM’s portfolio of CIROH-funded projects. We provide professional development for trainees, perform legislative advocacy, and disseminate research to the public. UVM’s engagement in CIROH brings our work into the national spotlight as a leader in operational hydrologic research.
$16M IN CIROH FUNDED RESEARCH THROUGH JULY 2026
11
PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATORS FROM 5 UNITS
41
POST-DOCS, STUDENTS, AND STAFF SUPPORTED
UVM CIROH PROJECT
PI
UNIT
AWARD PERIOD
AMOUNT
Leveraging Emerging Technology to Improve Hydrological Forecasting
A. Schroth
CAS
August ‘22 - July ‘25
$1.5M
Improved Representation of Floodplains and Natural Features for Channel Routing
B. Wemple
CAS
August ‘22 - July ‘25
$2.2M
Integrating Observations and Field Work in Support of Expanded Evaluation Data Testbeds in the Northeast
A. Zia
CALS
August ‘22 - July ‘24
$500k
Enhanced Forecast Design Through Experimental Gaming and Social Impact Assessment
S. Merrill
CALS
August ‘22 - July ‘24
$2.0M
Forecasting the Incidence and Duration of Harmful Algal Blooms
A. Zia
CALS
August ‘22 - July ‘25
$2.2M
Post-processing NWM Output with Spatially Distributed Turbidity Sensing
A. Schroth
CAS
August ‘22 - July ‘25
$749k
Coupling Sensors and Modeling to Inform Water Quality Improvement Targets
A. Schroth
CAS
August ‘22 - July ‘25
$1.5M
Flood Inundation Mapping: Engagement with Technical Users and Communities
A. Jefferson
RSENR
June ‘23 - May ‘25
$62k
Optimizing Flood Warning Information Sharing for Local Stakeholders
A. Jefferson
RSENR
June ‘23 - May ‘25
$33k
Advancing Water Quality Monitoring and Prediction Capability of USGS NGWOS Program
A. Schroth
CAS
June ‘23 - May ‘26
$230k
Advancing CONUS-scale Operational Snow Modeling Capabilities
B. Wemple
CAS
June ‘23 - May ‘25
$276k
A Collaborative Approach to Scoping Water Forecasting Needs
S. Merrill
CALS
June ‘23 - May ‘25
$259k
Novel Geospatial Architecture of Channel and Floodplain Morphological Attributes within the OWP Hydrofabrics
R. Diehl
CAS
June ‘23 - May ‘25
$179k
Advancing Science to Better Characterize Drought and Groundwater-Driven LowFlow Conditions in NOAA and USGS National-Scale Models
D. Rizzo
CEMS
June ‘23 - May ‘25
$188k
Advancing Snow Observation Systems to Improve Operational Streamflow Prediction Capabilities
C. Skalka
CEMS
June ‘23 - May ‘26
$399k
Flood Resilience Education Through GPT-Guided Gaming with Multi-Scale Built Environment Data
S. Merrill
CALS
July ‘24 - June ‘26
$95k
Exploring Critical Attributes of 3D Channels for Enhanced Probabilistic Flood Inundation Mapping
R. Diehl
CAS
July ‘24 - June ‘26
$149k
Operationalizing a Flexible Model and Data Collection Workflow to Detect Harmful Algal Blooms Using Hyperspectral Imagery and Machine Learning
A. Schroth
CAS
July ‘24 - March ‘27
$166k
Establishing a Coupled Human-Water Systems Modeling Think Tank for Advancing Social Models in Parallel with the NextGen Model
A. Zia
CALS
July ‘24 - June ‘25
$34k
Developing and Integrating a Social Water Use Model to Improve the Predictive Capacity of Water Resource Models
A. Zia
CALS
July ‘24 - June ‘25
$53k
Next Gen Ensembled-Derived Precipitation Estimate for River Forecast Centers
P. Clemins
OVPR, CEMS
July '25-March '27
$711k
Evaluating and Improving the Representation of Rain-on-Snow Floods Using the National Water Model and NextGen
K. Jennings
OVPR
July ‘25-March ‘27
$558k
Implementing Community Trust: A Tabletop Exercise for Emergency Managers
S. Merrill
CALS
July ‘25-March ‘27
$204k
Identifying the Usefulness of Flood Forecast Attributes in Support of Impactbased Decision-Making
A. Jefferson
RSENR
July ‘25-March ‘27
$400k
Pathways to Increase the Effectiveness of Flash Flood Forecasts in Mountain Regions
B. Wemple
CAS
July ‘25-March ‘27
$128k
Defining Nationally Consistent Fluvial and Pluvial Flood Hazard Severity Thresholds to Improve Risk Communication
E. Doran
CEMS
July ‘25-March ‘27
$608k
A Think Tank Envisioning CIROH’s Unique Opportunities to Advance Water Quality Forecasting
A. Schroth
CAS
July ‘25-March ‘27
$142k
Scaling Up Recent CIROH Advances in NWM-forced Water Quality Forecasting to Large Basins Across the United States
A. Schroth
CAS
July ‘25-March ‘27
$610k
Assess the Effectiveness of Communication of Total Water Level Visualizing and Conduct User Testing of Compound Flood Products
A. Jefferson
RSENR
July ‘25-March ‘27
$75k
Expanding the National Water Model FIM to Support Infrastructure and Impact
A. Jefferson
RSENR
July ‘25-March ‘27
$75k
Building Networks & Advancing Research for Mountain Settings Vermont’s mountainous terrain presents complex challenges: sparse monitoring networks, rapidly changing weather, and rural communities that are highly vulnerable to weather extremes. Through new funded grants, WRI is building the infrastructure and partnerships that are critical to addressing these challenges. Supported by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Northeast Snow Study brings together researchers, observatory staff, and environmental organizations to assess the feasibility of a northeast analog to the western U.S. snow telemetry (SNOTEL) network. Partners: University of New Hampshire; Appalachian Mountain Club.
$130K
The Northeast Network of Mountain Observatories, funded by the U.S. EPA Environmental Network Program, supports the integration of data from mountain observatories in New Hampshire, Vermont, and New York. Leads: Arne Bomblies (CEMS) and Joshua Beneš (WRI).
$500K
Science to Advance Freshwater Ecosystem and Community Resilience in the Appalachians (SAFER Apps) is an NSF planning grant that joins researchers, conservation organizations, officials, and communities to consider unmet needs in flood-vulnerable and impacted mountain communities. Partners: Penn State University; West Virginia University. Lead: Beverley Wemple (CAS).
$200K
The Vermont Mesonet is a statewide meteorological monitoring initiative to improve operational weather forecasting. The network’s first station was completed in Lyndonville in May 2026. The project also incorporates the Summit to Shore Environmental Observation Network’s 22 weather and snowpack monitoring stations as a sub-network. Partner: Leahy Institute for Rural Partnerships. WRI faculty affiliates, Asim Zia (CALS) and Andrew Schroth (CAS), are leading national-scale think tanks to advance continental-scale humanwater systems modeling and improve water quality forecasting. Snow STORE (Science and Technology for Operations, Research, and Economic Development in Northern New England) will improve mountain snowpack observations and develop foundational snow monitoring infrastructure adapted for the region’s unique climates, geographies, ecosystems, and communities. Partners: University of New Hampshire; University of Maine; Vermont State Lyndon; UMaine Farmington; Mt. Washington Observatory. UVM Team: Keith Jennings (WRI), Patrick Clemins (CEMS), M. Salim Udden (RSENR), Kimberly Coleman (RSENR), Joshua Beneš (WRI).
$217K $176K $3.3M
Growing Research Capacity WRI has funded teams of faculty to pursue competitive grant proposals addressing critical science and training needs. We support teams with summer salary and staff assistance.
WRI Faculty Collaborative Grant-writing Fund FACULTY SUPPORTED
PROJECT TITLE
AWARDED
Rachelle Gould, RSENR Cheryl Morse, CAS Carol Adair, RSENR Andrew Schroth, CAS
Sacred Water: Intersections between religion, spirituality and water science
$48,728
Eric Roy, RSENR Kristen Underwood, CEMS Rebecca Diehl, CAS
Upscaling methods to estimate the water quality benefits of restored floodplains to large spatial scales
$25,826
Julia Perdrial, CAS Donna Ramirez-Harrington, CAS Future Leaders Optimizing Water with Matt Scarborough, CEMS Artificial Intelligence (FLOW-AI) Mindy Morales, RSENR
$46,879
Appala Raju Badireddy, CEMS Tian Xia, CEMS Hao Chen, CALS Eric Roy, RSENR
$25,722
Distributed Sensor Networks to Resolve Transport and Export Dynamics of Aquatic Black Carbon, Microplastics, and PFAS in Runoff Systems
WRI Career Development Awards
In 2026, the Institute provided $5000 to three faculty affiliates, funding them to write competitive career development proposals. The following awards have been granted: • • •
Hao Chen, Assistant Professor, CALS Kimberly Coleman, Associate Professor, RSENR Rebecca Diehl, Research Associate Professor, CAS
Preparing Future Water Leaders The Water Workforce Project partners WRI with the Vermont Rural Water Association to cultivate a new generation of diverse, skilled water professionals through facility tours, summer internships, and course-based learning. Since 2025, WRI affiliates Kristen Underwood (CEMS) and Andrew Schroth (CAS) have led a biweekly working group on AI and machine learning topics for approximately 15 graduate students and postdoctoral researchers at UVM. These meetings allow students to present research, receive feedback to resolve road blocks, share tips and software packages for implementing workflows, and “dry-run” conference presentations or posters. The Research Computing and Data (RCD) working group, organized by Patrick Clemins (CEMS), meets regularly to discuss RCD topics relevant to water researchers. Topics include parallel processing, computational workflows, use of highperformance computing clusters, Python and R packages, and data visualization. In January 2025, WRI facilitated a 3-hour, cross-institutional workshop on a novel machine learning tool for exploratory data analysis. CIROH researchers, Kristen Underwood (CEMS) and Donna Rizzo (CEMS), led instruction in the use and application of the Tandem EVolutionary Algorithm (TEVA) for environmental data sets. The workshop engaged graduate students, post-docs, faculty, and collaborators from the NSF Critical Zone Cluster Network and CIROH at UVM, including participants from Nevada, Utah, Kansas, and Pennsylvania.
Trainee Success Stories Kate Hale, postdoctoral associate, CEMS, 2022-2024 | Assistant Professor of Geography University of British Columbia Researches snowpack, climate, and ecohydrologic variability to identify drivers of water availability in alpine and Arctic watersheds. Julianne Scamardo, postdoctoral associate, CAS, 2023-2024 | Assistant Professor of Watershed Science Utah State University Studies the connections between form and function in fluvial systems to improve predictions of resilience to disturbances such as floods, fires, and drought. John Kemper, postdoctoral associate, CAS, 2023-2026 | Assistant Professor of Geosciences Idaho State University Studies the transport of water, sediment, wood, and nutrients through river basins to understand how river landscapes act, react, and evolve as connected networks of processes. Jessica Balerna, postdoctoral associate, RSENR, 2023-2025 | Post-doctoral research associate Climate Measurements Center of Excellence, Gund Institute, UVM Evaluates the approaches and challenges of current sub-national climate assessments, as well as works to understand and promote best practices for future climate assessments. Scott Lawson, research analyst, CAS, 2022-2024 | Hydrologist and Water Resources Engineer Dewberry Focuses on flood hydrology, leveraging his expertise in statistical and computational modeling, data management, automation, and geospatial analysis. Anna Grunes, graduate student, CEMS, 2023-2025 | Fulbright Research Award New Zealand Researches rain-on-snow flooding events, drawing on her background in snow modeling and sensing networks.
Bringing UVM Research to the World The Water Resources Institute amplifies the work of UVM faculty by connecting their research with students, partners, policymakers, and the public. Through 34 seminars, two national symposiums, and six research gatherings, WRI has engaged more than 2,000 participants, expanding the reach and impact of UVM’s water research. Held each semester, Water Connects highlights water research by UVM faculty, alumni, and partners. The series has featured 26 talks, reaching more than 950 individuals from the university and beyond. Talks and Walks on UVM’s Water Side pairs public research seminars with field visits that showcase the latest advances and applications of water research. Topics have ranged from maple sugaring to snowmelt monitoring, with visits to research sites across Vermont. In our 2025-2026 series, 196 individuals attended 7 events. Hosted annually each May, the CIROH Developers Conference (DevCon) brings together students and postdoctoral associates with researchers and agency leads for training in continental-scale operational forecasting. UVM served as the host institution in 2025, welcoming 225 participants from across the U.S. and Canada. The 2026 Lake Champlain Research Conference, co-hosted by the Lake Champlain Basin Program, Lake Champlain Sea Grant, and WRI, convened 334 researchers, policymakers, and community members to share the latest science from across the multi-jurisdictional watershed. Research Dissemination By College & School:
Water Research in the News WRI advances the work of our faculty, bolstering their impact through news articles, social media posts, videos, newsletters, and the distribution of research talks online. WRI has published over 40 research stories. Our affiliates’ research has been featured in major news outlets such as National Geographic, Washington Post, and AP News, as well as local news organizations, such as WCAX, VT Digger, and Vermont Public. We disseminate this research in short-form content across our social media channels, including Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.
Top News Stories: Climate Change and Cyanobacteria: UVM’s Cutting-Edge Research on Lake and Stream Health: Mindy Morales (RSENR) First-Of-Its-Kind AI Tool Can Predict Water Quality Across the U.S.: Andrew Schroth (CAS) Research For Vermont: Understanding and Mitigating Flood Risk: Rebecca Diehl (CAS); Kristen Underwood (CEMS); Jessica Balerna (RSENR, Gund); Brendan Fisher (RSENR); Elizabeth Doran (CEMS); Anne Jefferson (RSENR) UVM Begins Development of a Statewide Weather Monitoring Network: Joshua Beneš (WRI) ALCHEMIST’s Modern-Day Magic: Appala Raju Badireddy (CEMS); Tian Xia (CEMS) Building Water Resilient Agricultural Systems: Eric von Wettberg (CALS)
1.3K
FOLLOWERS ON WRI SOCIAL MEDIA
85% WRI WEBSITE ENGAGEMENT
6K
WRI LANDING PAGE VIEWS
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