Abstract
Droughts are becoming an increasing concern in the Alps and in the lowland areas that receive Alpine water. Therefore, the monitoring and management of droughts are indispensable in securing the wellbeing of society and environment. The ADO Project (Alpine Drought Observatory, https://www.alpine-space.org/projects/ado/) provides a scientifically sound operational drought information web platform aiding decision makers on an alpine to regional level in managing water resources and drought impacts. The project is led by Eurac Research and combines the experience and competences of research institutes of six alpine countries. The ADO platform is integrating climate models, satellite data observations, ground station measurements and historical records from all Alpine countries to produce a set of scientifically proven indices suitable for monitoring droughts. The drought index data is harmonized and operationally updated daily or weekly depending on the observation index. All data is offered as open access under the CC-BY 4.0 license. ADO provides the following data for the entire alpine space on political and hydrological relevant boundaries as well as the original gridded data: (i) Meteorological indicators such as SPI (precipitation), SPEI (evaporation), and SSPI (snow conditions), (ii) Satellite based vegetation indicators VHI and VCI, (iii) Hydrological data from monitoring stations along most rivers in the Alps, (iv) Historical database on drought impacts from scientific articles and media reports, (v) Vulnerability analysis and relevant data for its assessment. The data is openly available through an interactive web platform (https://ado.eurac.edu) curated for public usage. For experts, the raw data is also freely available through the Environmental Data Platform (https://edpportal.eurac.edu), which allows for direct processing and analysis. The usability of the platform has been showcased in multiple use cases carried out by hydrological offices across the alps.