FOVET Ophélie

Scientist at INRAE / UMR SAS Phone: (+33) 2 23 48 54 38 Email: ophelie.fovet@inrae.fr Address: INRAE Centre Bretagne-Normandie, UMR SAS, 65 rue de St-Brieuc, CS 84215, 35042 Rennes Cedex, France Fields of expertise: hydrology and solute transport, surface water quality Keywords: anthropized catchments, headwaters, nutrient, carbon, suspended solids, water and solute transit times, biogeochemistry

Activities

Research

Current research topic

My research topics are hydrology and biogeochemistry. I am interested in understanding the processes that determine the water quality of streams and rivers, especially in the context of agricultural environments. I use diverse monitoring and modelling approaches to characterize the transfer, transit times and reaction processes of water and some major chemical elements, mainly nutrients (N, P) and C.

I focus on small headwater catchments (10 ha - 100 km²) to medium-scale catchments (ca. 1000 km²).

I am involved in several observation platforms for research. In particular, I am scientific coordinator of a research observatory on agricultural catchments: the AgrHyS Observatory.

Current projects

• Ecological Restoration of the Sélune River: Dynamics of water, sediments and dissolved chemical elements in the Sélune River before, during and after dam removal (2014-2021) & PhD. thesis of J.Bourdon ("Restoration dynamics of Selune river ecosystem after its dams removal")
• Caracterizing intermittency of hydrographic stream network in Western France (2025-2028) 
• DN-BEYOND: Improving European Flowing Waters in an Era of Global Change (2025-2029)
• STRANGE: Ecosystem services supplied by aquatic ecosystems to adjacent agricultural environments at different scales (2023-2027)
• PFAS in agroecosystems: sources, fate and consequences (2025-2029)

Participation in networks

• Research Infrastructures: Critical Zones in France (OZCAR-RI, https://www.ozcar-ri.org) and Long-Term Ecosystem Research in Europe (eLTER-RI, https://www.lter-europe.net/)
• Co-facilitation of the OSERen committe for Observation - Equipment & Data
• Regular EGU member
• INRAe Network on “agricultural systems & water"

Teaching experience

Hydrology: general introduction. Licence Pro PARTAGER (Institut Agro Rennes, Université de Rennes 1)

Transfers in catchments: Part I Hydrologie. ESA Angers.

Productions

Casanova, A., Dupas, R., von Schiller, D., Jeanneau, L., Jaffrezic, A., Lambert, T., Pannard, A. and Fovet, O.  2026.  Spatial variability in nutrient and organic matter concentrations during hydrological fragmentation of an intermittent temperate catchment. Aquatic Sciences 88(1), 12. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00027-025-01247-2

Brekenfeld, N., Cotel, S., Faucheux, M., Fourtet, C., Hamon, Y., Petitjean, P., Blanchouin, A., Bouillis, C., Pierret, M.-C., Henine, H., Pierson-Wickmann, A.-C., Guillon, S., Floury, P., and Fovet, O. (2025) Technical note: High-frequency, multi-elemental stream water monitoring – experiences, feedbacks and suggestions from 7 years of running three French field laboratories (Riverlabs), Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 2615–2631, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-2615-2025

 Salmon-Monviola, J., Fovet, O., and Hrachowitz, M. (2025). Improving the hydrological consistency of a process-based solute-transport model by simultaneous calibration of streamflow and stream concentrations, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 127–158, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-127-2025

Brekenfeld, N., Cotel, S., Faucheux, M., Floury, P., Fourtet, C., Gaillardet, J., Guillon, S., Hamon, Y., Henine, H., Petitjean, P., Pierson-Wickmann, A.-C., Pierret, M.-C., and Fovet, O. (2024) Using high-frequency solute synchronies to determine simple two-end-member mixing in catchments during storm events, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 4309–4329, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4309-2024

Hrour, Y., Fovet, O., Lacombe, G., Rousseau-Gueutin, P., Sebari, K., Pichelin, P., Thomas, Z. (2023) A framework to assess future water-resource under climate change in northern Morocco using hydro-climatic modelling and water-withdrawal scenarios. Journal of Hydrology: Regional Studies, Volume 48, 101465, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejrh.2023.101465

Fovet O, Meric F, Crave A, Cador J-M and Rollet A-J (2023) Early assessment of effects of dam removal on abiotic fluxes of the Selune River, France. Front. Environ. Sci. 11:1231721. https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fenvs.2023.1231721/full

Hrour Y., Thomas Z., Fovet O., Sebari K., Rousseau-Gueutin P. Changes in precipitation and discharge in a Mediterranean catchment as a response to climate change and human activities. Journal of Water and Climate Change 1 September 2022; 13 (9): 3253–3273. doi: https://doi.org/10.2166/wcc.2022.074

Bhaduri B., Sekhar M., Fovet O., Ruiz L. Estimating solute travel times from time series of nitrate concentration in groundwater: Application to a small agricultural catchment in Brittany, France, Journal of Hydrology, Volume 613, Part A, 2022, 128390, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2022.128390

Strohmenger L., Fovet O., Hrachowitz M., Salmon-Monviola J., Gascuel-Odoux C., Is a simple model based on two mixing reservoirs able to reproduce the intra-annual dynamics of DOC and NO3 stream concentrations in an agricultural headwater catchment? Science of The Total Environment, Volume 794, 2021, 148715, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2021.148715

Fovet O, Belemtougri A, Boithias L, et al. Intermittent rivers and ephemeral streams: Perspectives for critical zone science and research on socio-ecosystems. WIREs Water. 2021; 8:e1523. https://doi.org/10.1002/wat2.1523

Guillemot, S., Fovet, O., Gascuel-Odoux, C., Gruau, G., Casquin, A., Curie, F., Minaudo, C., Strohmenger, L., and Moatar, F.: Spatio-temporal controls of C–N–P dynamics across headwater catchments of a temperate agricultural region from public data analysis, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 25, 2491–2511, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-2491-2021, 2021.