Emerging Trends in Environmental Flow Science

Abstract

The past decade has brought wide recognition of the importance of natural flow regimes as the conceptual underpinning of sustainable environmental flows and an expanding attention to a framework for developing regional flow standards. This article summarizes and highlights some of the most relevant developments in environmental flow science nationally and their ongoing application in the Eastern and Southeastern United States, with a focus on approaches for basinwide environmental flows based on hydrologic and geomorphic classification, flow alteration, and flow-biological responses.