HS5.5 | Water resources policy and management - managing trade-offs at the nexus between water, food, energy and the environment
EDI
Water resources policy and management - managing trade-offs at the nexus between water, food, energy and the environment
Convener: Taher Kahil | Co-conveners: Timothy Foster, Hector Macian-Sorribes, Andrea Momblanch, Stefano Galelli, Charles Rougé, Andrea Castelletti
Orals
| Thu, 27 Apr, 08:30–12:30 (CEST), 14:00–15:45 (CEST)
 
Room 3.29/30
Posters on site
| Attendance Thu, 27 Apr, 16:15–18:00 (CEST)
 
Hall A
Posters virtual
| Attendance Thu, 27 Apr, 16:15–18:00 (CEST)
 
vHall HS
Orals |
Thu, 08:30
Thu, 16:15
Thu, 16:15
Water sustains societies, economies and ecosystem services globally. Increasing water demands driven by ongoing socioeconomic development, coupled with shifts in water availability due to climate change and variability and land use change, are increasing competition and conflict over access to and use of freshwater resources in many regions around the world. To address these challenges, integrative approaches to water management and policy are required to balance and manage trade-offs between social, economic and environmental uses of water. In addition, there is an emerging need for adaptive and flexible solutions capable of updating decisions to newly available information, often issued in the form of weather or streamflow forecasts or extracted from observational data collected via pervasive sensor networks, remote sensing, cyberinfrastructure, or crowdsourcing. This session will provide a forum for showcasing novel and emerging research at the intersection of agricultural production, energy security, water supply, economic development, and environmental conservation. In particular, we encourage contributions to the session that: (i) identify knowledge gaps and improvements to understanding about the critical interconnections, feedbacks, and risks between system components, (ii) highlight development of new methods or tools for evaluating and monitoring trade-offs and performance in water allocation and management between different users and sectors, (iii) evaluate alternative technological, policy, and/or governance interventions to address water-food-energy-environment system challenges in different locations and at various scales (local, regional, and/or global), and (iv) advance the use of multi-sectoral forecasts combined with data analytics machine learning algorithms for informing the real-time control of water systems. We welcome real-world examples on the successful application of these methods to facilitate integrated planning and management of water-food-energy-environment systems.

Orals: Thu, 27 Apr | Room 3.29/30

Chairpersons: Taher Kahil, Timothy Foster, Andrea Momblanch
08:30–08:35
08:35–08:45
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EGU23-8799
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Virtual presentation
Barbara Willaarts, Sarah Milliken, Serena Caucci, Zeynep Okzul, Francesca Girotto, and Stanislav Martinat

Water, energy, food, and ecosystems (WEFE) are key resources that support human well-being and, as such, are security concerns for countries across the world. Awareness about the interconnection and interdependence between resource securities, the so-called “WEFE nexus”, is not new but the combination of intensifying resource demands, growing global uncertainties related to the ongoing climate crisis, and the geopolitical atmosphere, have intensified the interlinkages and amplified the cost of inaction and mismanagement of existing policies.

Promoting the development of sound and effective policies to deal with the growing security challenge and its spillovers on other sectoral domains, require actions across different fronts. A fundamental one is to strengthen the nexus research agenda in such a way that sufficient evidence is available and well communicated to inform the development of a more coherent and aligned policy framework.  This requires developing analytical frameworks that can help to unravel the complex interlinkages across sectors. But as important is to research how greater policy coherence can be achieved in practice and how to create the appropriate enabling environment i.e. nexus governance.

Scientific evidence on WEFE in Europe is substantial, and there is a wealth of scientific evidence probing the high interconnectedness that exists between natural resources, and how the sustained pressures we are exerting over them are generating cascading impacts and trade-offs. Despite the level of nexus science, there is barely any information available on the level of impact nexus research projects have had in shaping the policy agenda at the national or European level.

Our research builds on the efforts developed within the COST ACTION NEXUSNET (CA 20138) to map the nexus research projects funded by key European funding schemes (FP7, H2020, HORiZON, JPI Urban Europe, PRIMA) in the course of the last decade, and explore the type of nexus challenges addressed, main policy recommendations provided and the level of implementation of the proposed measures. Preliminary results show that between 2013 and 2022 more than 70 research projects and innovation actions have been funded, with over 222 case studies and demonstrators across European countries. A survey targeting case studies showcased that the level of implementation and adoption of proposed nexus policy measures was below 20%. These preliminary findings showcase that while the research effort in Europe on nexus has been substantive, the policy impact of such research remains unclear, and efforts are required to understand barriers and enablers to increase the relevance and policy impact of nexus research.

How to cite: Willaarts, B., Milliken, S., Caucci, S., Okzul, Z., Girotto, F., and Martinat, S.: Water, Energy, Food and Ecosystems NEXUS: Gaps and opportunities to increase the policy impact of nexus research in Europe, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-8799, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-8799, 2023.

08:45–08:55
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EGU23-16263
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On-site presentation
Julien Harou, Mohammed Basheer, Mikiyas Etichia, Jose Gonzalez Cabrera, Mathaios Panteli, and Alvaro Calzadilla

Interdependencies between resource systems are projected to increasingly complicate efforts to develop individual water, energy, food and environment sectors and set their growth policies. Given the urgent need to mitigate climate change, investments in energy and water supply security are being co-driven by financial and international political incentives to decarbonize, and so the scrutiny of plans to modify interconnected resource systems will continue to increase. Additionally, given multiple government needs and priorities, economic, environment and social dimensions should be explicitly considered in the prioritisation of new interventions, whether they be new policies or new infrastructure. This talk considers two river basins in Africa, the Nile river basin and the Volta river basin. It describes efforts of the ‘Future Design and Assessment of water-energy-food-environment Mega-Systems’ (FutureDAMS) project to understand and recommend new interventions in these systems at country or multi-country scale. To this end four technical pillars were needed: credible and computationally efficient large-scale simulation of individual sectors, a multi-agent software integration framework that connects disciplinary models at run time, an efficient search technology to sift through large intervention spaces given multiple objectives and multiple uncertainties including climate change, and stakeholder facing tools and outputs. The talk reviews in detail two areas of model building and their application: linking river basin and economic analysis and linking river basins and regional power grids for joint intervention assessment. The talk will discuss which issues most complicated modelling, what solutions were found, and how future research might improve upon them to generate more useful understanding and decision-support for multi-sector human-natural systems.

How to cite: Harou, J., Basheer, M., Etichia, M., Gonzalez Cabrera, J., Panteli, M., and Calzadilla, A.: Multi-sector assessment and design for large scale water-energy-food-environment systems in Africa, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-16263, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-16263, 2023.

08:55–09:05
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EGU23-15150
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ECS
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On-site presentation
Alicia Correa, Jorge Forero, Daniele Codato, Mark Mulligan, and Jorge Marco Renau

Global change has economic, environmental, and social impacts that threaten access to water resources for communities and ecosystems globally. Mismanagement in other sectors, such as food and energy, can further reduce water security. Scientists use the water-energy-food (WEF) nexus as a conceptual tool to identify the interactions between these three systems. Its implementation at natural-local scales (catchments) is essential for proposing sound policies for water resource management and adaptation to global change.
This study aims to identify synergies and trade-offs between WEF through the valuation of related ecosystem services in an Andean-Pacific transboundary catchment of Ecuador and Colombia (Mira-Mataje - 11,791 km2). We used remotely- sensed and globally available datasets in the spatially distributed assessment model Co$tingNature, to first screen interactions of the related ecosystems. Subsequently, we analyzed the polycentric knowledge from stakeholder’s: Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs), community leaders, academics, and State sector workers. Finally, we combined the above analyses into a WEF-related ecosystem services weighted-hypernetwork.
Preliminary results show that some services related to energy and food production have negative impacts on water security throughout the catchment. We identify a significant overlap between areas rich in ecosystem services and ancestral territories of ethnic communities and recognize some key intensive anthropogenic activities that affect water security. In addition, we confirm the paramount dependency of Andean cities on water supply from mountain ecosystems. We identified a widespread perception among stakeholders that WEF-related ecosystem services are at risk due to global change and that, in different ways, all are taking steps to adapt to global change. Finally, there is the potential availability of water service in medium and low catchment areas, although the challenge is to improve distribution and purification systems to supply rural areas and make water service accessible to all.


Keywords: Ecosystem services, water-energy-food, remote sensing, weighted-hypernetwork, local knowledge, transboundary tropical catchment.

How to cite: Correa, A., Forero, J., Codato, D., Mulligan, M., and Marco Renau, J.: The water-energy-food nexus through the valuation of ecosystem services in an Andes-Pacific transboundary catchment., EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-15150, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-15150, 2023.

09:05–09:15
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EGU23-16277
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ECS
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On-site presentation
Adriano Vinca, Giacomo Falchetta, Gregory Ireland, Marta Tuninetti, Muhammad Awais, Edward Byers, Francesco Semeria, and Vittorio Giordano

Sub-Saharan Africa has a large portion of the population with no access to electricity, piped drinking water, or sanitation services. The lack of these basic services also affects farmers that mostly rely on rainfed agriculture instead of irrigation. Given the expected population growth and potential changes in hydrology and crop yield response due to climate change, future development for the region needs to be carefully studied to achieve increased access to basic services and, potentially, synergetic economic benefits in agriculture.

Within the LEAP-RE 4 AFRI project, we developed a framework that combines three high-resolution, single-sector simulation models (crop water requirements, electricity demand and rural electricity dispatchment) to a long-term water-energy-land integrated assessment model to explore different scenarios of future development for Zambia. This helps understand which regions would benefit of better water access and irrigation potential due to improved rural electrification.

We compare two scenarios of moderate and universal electricity-water access with a current trend scenario, we compare the expected costs and benefits for the rural population, including the economic benefits achievable by improving irrigation standards and crop yields.

Although Zambia is a relatively water-abundant region, we focus on it as a case study with a framework that can be transferred to any other country in Sub-Saharan Africa, where climate change impact might have a significant impact on water scarcity, electricity generation potential and crop yields.

How to cite: Vinca, A., Falchetta, G., Ireland, G., Tuninetti, M., Awais, M., Byers, E., Semeria, F., and Giordano, V.: The benefits of rural electrification to improve water access and irrigation in Sub-Saharan Africa, a water-energy-land assessment framework applied to Zambia., EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-16277, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-16277, 2023.

09:15–09:25
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EGU23-4342
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ECS
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On-site presentation
Safa Baccour, Jose Albiac, Frank Ward, Taher Kahil, Encarna Esteban, Javier Uche, and Elena Calvo

Increasing climate water stress and excessive and unbalanced water withdrawals by sectors are triggering substantial water depletion and environmental degradation in arid and semi-arid basins. Addressing the problem requires the integration of sectoral policies based on interdisciplinary knowledge and sustainable management strategies. The Water-Energy-Food-Ecosystems (WEFE) nexus is an innovative and comprehensive tool to guide river basin managers and stakeholders towards sustainable development goals. Several nexus approaches have been advanced for different sectors, basins, and time periods. However, none to date has presented a monthly dynamic optimization framework that includes ecosystems in order to assess the WEFE nexus for entire large basins. The contribution of this paper is to address water related challenges and highlight the gap in users engagement, by presenting the results of the cross-sectoral integration under future climate water stress (CC-2070; CC-2100), and by designing policy interventions to achieve sustainable outcomes. The WEFE nexus is analyzed for the Ebro River basin; first the analysis identifies the trade-offs and synergies among sectors and spatial locations, and then policy interventions under future climate water stress are evaluated for enhancing water, food and energy security, and for ecosystems protection. Findings provide efficient water allocation plans between competing sectors, emphasizing the importance of ecosystem services in maintaining biodiversity under future climate water stress scenarios. The policy analysis offers insights into the synergies between environmental and economic outcomes, although the costs of certain policies could be high for some groups of stakeholders. Results show that irrigation modernization, increasing reservoir storage capacity, and water trading policies provide efficient water use patterns, enlarging basin stream flows, protecting ecosystems and augmenting the private and social benefits. Sustainable agriculture and water storage management are crucial policies that promote food, water, and energy security and ecosystems protection. These critical results from interventions could help decision makers to bring about efficient water allocation planning among sectors, and advance resilience and adaptation to climate water stress.

 

How to cite: Baccour, S., Albiac, J., Ward, F., Kahil, T., Esteban, E., Uche, J., and Calvo, E.: Managing the water-energy-food-ecosystems nexus under future climate water stress scenarios in the Ebro Basin (Spain), EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-4342, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-4342, 2023.

09:25–09:35
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EGU23-4116
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Virtual presentation
Tatiana Ermolieva, Anatolij G. Zagorodny, Vjacheslav L. Bogdanov, Gang Wang, Petr Havlik, Elena Rovenskaya, Nadejda Komendantova, Taher Kahil, Jose- Pablo Ortiz-Partida, Juraj Balkovic, Rastislav Skalsky, and Christian Folberth

In this presentation we discuss methodologies, modeling tools and case studies on linking distributed disciplinary food, water, energy, environmental (FWEE) systems’ models into multi-systems multi-disciplinary integrated models for truly integrated analysis and managing of FWEE security NEXUS. Models’ linkage approaches enable to operationalize the concept of modeling and data platforms for distributed independent models’ “integration” and integrated FWEE security NEXUS management.

Local, national and global FWEE security in the presence of climate change and risks of various kinds depend on the consistent coordination between and within the interdependent FWEE systems regarding sustainable resource supply and utilization. Detailed independent sectoral and regional systems’ models are often used to address these challenges. However, the independent approaches overlook the close linkages and feedbacks between and within the systems and, therefore, possible cross-sectoral implications. Critical cross-sectoral FWEE systemic supply-demand imbalances can trigger a disruption in a FWEE systems network. Disruptions and failures can be induced by human decisions in combination with natural shocks. For example, overuse of water in one system, e.g., agricultural, can lead to drying up of wells, decrease of reservoir water level, shortage of water in other systems, e.g., for colling power plants or hydropower production; an extra load in a power grid triggered by a power plant or a transmission line failure can cause cascading failures with catastrophic systemic outages; a hurricane in combination with inappropriate land use management can result in a catastrophic flood and human and economic losses, similar to the induced by Hurricane Katrina. These are examples of systemic risks motivating the development of proper models’ linkage approaches and integrated systems analysis.

The linkage algorithms are becoming widely demanded in connection with the need for decentralized planning of distributed systems and technologies emerging in agriculture, water, energy, environmental systems, e.g., distributed precision agriculture technologies; hydro-economic models’ linkages; bio-physical crop modeling; distributed energy production.

In this presentation we define and illustrate the two main linkage methodologies:

  • linkage of distributed FWEE optimization models (land use, water, energy systems models);
  • linkage of simulation and optimization models (crop-yield meta-model from EPIC and a land-use GLOBIOM model).

Both methodologies are based on iterative sequential stochastic quasigradient (SQG) procedures of, in general, non-smooth nondifferentiable stochastic optimization, which converge to socially optimal solution maximizing an implicit nested nondifferentiable social welfare function. The linkage problem can be viewed as a general endogenous reinforced learning problem. The models act as “agents” that communicate with a “central hub” (a regulator) and take decisions in order to maximize the “cumulative reward". The procedure does not require models to exchange full information about their specifications. The distributed models can operate on distant computers of individual agents and “negotiate” with a central computer of a regional planner through the linkage procedure.

How to cite: Ermolieva, T., Zagorodny, A. G., Bogdanov, V. L., Wang, G., Havlik, P., Rovenskaya, E., Komendantova, N., Kahil, T., Ortiz-Partida, J.-P., Balkovic, J., Skalsky, R., and Folberth, C.: Consistent linkage of distributed food, water, energy, environmental (FWEE) models: perspectives of data and modeling platform for integrated FWEE security NEXUS analysis and planning., EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-4116, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-4116, 2023.

09:35–09:45
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EGU23-7018
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ECS
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On-site presentation
Dor Fridman, Taher Kahil, and Yoshihide Wada

Wastewater has been increasingly considered an untapped resource rather than a waste. It can be used for water supply, aquifer recharge, energy generation, and fertilizer production, contributing concurrently to achieving multiple Sustainable Development Goals. Currently, treated wastewater is used for irrigation in different water-scarce countries like Israel and Spain. Recent estimates suggest that treated wastewater irrigates 6 million hectares (Mha) of cropland worldwide, with global potential for irrigating 31-42 Mha. Nevertheless, these estimates often do not account for environmental, social, and economic conditions that may limit this potential, including irrigated crops’ spatial distribution, water quality requirements, and water conveyance options.

Our study advanced a spatial-explicit analysis of four different technological scenarios and estimated the untapped potential of wastewater irrigation at a global, regional, and national scale. We found that utilizing treated wastewater for irrigation can satisfy up to 4% of the global irrigation demand. Considering only water-scarce regions, reduce this global potential to roughly 2%. However, intensification and expansion strategies or scenarios can increase this irrigation share. For example, in ten countries, delivering treated wastewater to croplands by canals adds over 5% to the share of treated wastewater relative to total irrigation demand. An increase of over 1% is evident in 30 countries, mainly in the Middle East, North Africa, and Western Europe.

Increased wastewater treatment capacity (i.e., expansion strategy) potentially increases the share of global irrigation demand satisfied with treated wastewater to 6% -12%. Some regions’ potential exceeds 20% of their irrigation demand, e.g., China and North America. An increase in potential wastewater irrigation becomes significant when considering expansion scenarios (e.g., increased capacities to treat the wastewater).

Considering the changes in different regions’ water scarcity, we find that the potential share of irrigation demand satisfied by treated wastewater is significantly increased in North America, the United Kingdom, Europe, and Western Asia. We conclude that irrigation with treated wastewater in these regions can be an important climate change adaptation measure. Besides, we show that intensifying and expanding wastewater reclamation systems can help manage droughts in regions with high drought risk, like the Italian Po and French Loire River basins.

By exploring expansion and intensification strategies to reclaim treated wastewater, this work establishes an essential step towards planning the global and regional pathways to utilize this untapped resource, abating current and future water scarcity risks.

How to cite: Fridman, D., Kahil, T., and Wada, Y.: Evaluating the global wastewater’s untapped irrigation potential, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-7018, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-7018, 2023.

09:45–09:55
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EGU23-1529
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ECS
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On-site presentation
Han Su, Timothy Foster, Maarten S. Krol, Rick J. Hogeboom, Bárbara Willaarts, Diana V. Luna-Gonzalez, Oleksandr Mialyk, and Joep F. Schyns

Smallholders make up the vast majority of farms globally in terms of numbers (over 400 million), cultivate around 20% of global cropland, and produce 30% of global food. Although 70-80% of smallholders are located in areas already facing water scarcity which may be further exacerbated by climate change and population and economic growth, little is known about the relationship between smallholder farming and water scarcity. This study aims to shed light on this relationship, both regarding how water scarcity affects smallholders’ production and vice versa, how smallholders’ production and water productivity contribute to local water scarcity.

Hereto, we first estimated smallholders’ green and blue water consumption using ACEA 2.0 (AquaCrop-Earth@lternatives 2.0) in 56 countries around 2010, for main crops, and three farming systems. ACEA 2.0  is an updated version of the ACEA global gridded crop model based on AquaCrop-OSPy with a soil fertility module. It leverages a recently developed gridded global crop map that is both farm-size-specific and crop-specific. This inclusion allows us to incorporate the effects of soil fertility stress at an unprecedented level of granularity based on GAEZv4, which is highly relevant for evaluating the low-input rainfed, high-input rainfed, and (high-input) irrigated farming systems separately. The water productivity of smallholders was assessed in terms of a unit of water footprints and nutritional water productivity. Water scarcity was evaluated at the subnational basin level using global hydrological models PCR-GLOBWB, H08, and WaterGAP2-2C through ISIMIP 2a. The individual and combined effects of water and soil fertility stress on smallholders’ production were assessed and compared.

 

How to cite: Su, H., Foster, T., S. Krol, M., J. Hogeboom, R., Willaarts, B., V. Luna-Gonzalez, D., Mialyk, O., and F. Schyns, J.: Smallholder farming and water scarcity: contributions, benefits, and limitations, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-1529, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-1529, 2023.

09:55–10:05
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EGU23-16179
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Virtual presentation
Adrián González-Rosell, Maria Blanco, and Imen Arfa

Currently, achieving food, energy and water security, and the conservation of ecosystems, are some of the main sustainability challenges. Traditionally, in these sectors, the policy measures and decisions have been taken separately, causing a lack of coordination and high trade-offs across sectors. Consequently, it is necessary to design policies or solutions capable of addressing cross-sectoral challenges. The water-energy-food-ecosystems nexus (WEFE nexus) approach analyses the impacts generated by socioeconomic activities on the production, consumption and management of water, energy and food resources, and the interrelationships with ecosystems. In this sense, the use of this approach can facilitate the identification of coherent solutions that promote the transition toward sustainability.  In this study, an evaluation framework for co-designing and evaluating nexus solutions (GoNEXUS SEF) to improve the governance of the WEFE nexus is presented. GoNEXUS SEF is a new methodological framework developed by the authors and has five main phases: (1) identify nexus solutions; (2) nexus dialogues; (3) model toolbox; (4) nexus evidence; and (5) nexus-coherence assessment. For its development, the ability to evaluate at different spatial scales and forecast at different temporal scales through data projections has been considered. GoNEXUS SEF is a participatory process that integrates qualitative and quantitative methods. On the one hand, we engage stakeholders and experts from the different nexus sectors to understand the cross-sectoral interlinkages, identify challenges, and co-design solutions. On the other hand, we apply system dynamics models (SDM), cross-impact analysis (CIA), and network theory to quantify the synergies and trade-offs.

The framework was applied to a practical case study, an increase in the irrigation water price in Andalusia – Spain for the horizon 2030. Case study results revealed that a water price change could generate synergies since it favours water security and ecosystem conservation. However, trade-offs are observed, mainly undermining the food sector in the region. The main difficulties in applying the framework are the integration of qualitative and quantitative information and the conciliation of the spatial and temporal scales across sectors. Beyond the results obtained, the evaluation of this case allowed us to examine the applicability, usefulness, and potential of the framework. GoNEXUS SEF has proven capable of evaluating nexus solutions; it highlights hidden properties and identifies leverage points and key aspects of complex cross-sectoral systems. In addition, it allows the evaluation and coordination of multiple policies at the same time; in that sense, it can help to achieve nexus-coherence policymaking. The framework can be adapted to fit different case studies, considering their own challenges and their spatial and temporal scales, which gives it a competitive advantage over other methodologies focused on analysing the nexus. Participatory approaches, that combine qualitative and quantitative methods, are adequate to identify and evaluate solutions that aim to improve nexus governance.

Acknowledgements:  This research has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the GoNEXUS project (grant agreement No 101003722). 

How to cite: González-Rosell, A., Blanco, M., and Arfa, I.: GoNEXUS-SEF: A novel participatory framework to co-design and evaluate water-energy-food-ecosystems nexus solutions, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-16179, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-16179, 2023.

10:05–10:15
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EGU23-15269
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ECS
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On-site presentation
Icen Yoosefdoost and Slim Zekri

The water, food, energy and environment (WFEE) Nexus has recently gained attention from researchers and policymakers. This paper reviews the WFEE Nexus articles. Google Scholar search engine was used for the survey.  By examining the articles, we found that 48 articles focused on this approach. Our systematic review found that existing nexus tools rarely used social science methods and failed to apply replicable methods. Our review indicates that  The environment was considered in the nexus after 2017.  The term “Environment”  was only mentioned in 14% of these articles (Fig.1). In articles, we found close synonyms to “Environment,” such as “Earth”; “Ecosystem,” but also the term “Climate.” WFEE approach survey the interdependencies between water demand sectors and social, economic and environmental changes in water resource and demand management. WFEE is a water-centred approach. Based on the (Zhang et al., 2019) study, it is necessary to strengthen the interaction between resources management in different sectors in a structured way. Otherwise, actions in one system of resources will affect another system of resources.  Hence, the value of WFEE for coproducing adaptation scenarios (Momblanch et al., 2019).  Applying the nexus is complex as it needs many inputs and tools for capturing nexus interactions (Albrecht et al., 2018a; Kaddoura and el Khatib, 2017). In order to accomplish this, it is necessary to use methods from various disciplines (Albrecht et al., 2018a), depending on the analysis's aim, scope, and scale. An integrated systems perspective is enhanced by a multidisciplinary approach(Al-Saidi and Elagib, 2017; Khan et al., 2018), which facilitates sector-specific decision-making and planning. The WFEE has been analyzed using a wide range of modelling tools. There are some tools, such as WEAP (Sieber, 2006) and OSeMOSYS (Akute and Cannone, 2022), that follow a silo-based approach in which only one element of nexus is considered (Albrecht et al., 2018b; Leck et al., 2015; Smajgl et al., 2016). while other integrative application like MuSIASEM [44] combines the three modules, food, energy and Water (Fig.2). A significant gap is the lack of attention to the dynamic concept and the interaction between the components. To assess the effects of climate change, most studies combined various hydrological models, such as hydro-economic models,HEM (Bekchanov et al.,2019), WAEP, LHMs (Monteagudo et al., 2022), with IPCC scenarios. However, downscaling IPCC scenario output with different models is a relatively confident technique for climate data and water resources at the basin level (Yoosefdoost et al., 2022), incorporating this downscale output into the environment models are challenging. It is a big limitation to assess one section of the environment without considering the impact of the other parts. The environment is a complex system with all its parts interconnected. Moreover, since several factors affect the environment, using downscaled data on the environment reduces the reliability of the results. To address these issues, the article (Correa-Cano et al., 2022) proposes a conceptual structure for the WEFE modelling package, a system dynamic model combining hydraulic, environmental, and economic models(Fig.3).

Keywords: WFEE, weaknesses

How to cite: Yoosefdoost, I. and Zekri, S.: Water, Energy, Food  and Nexus' Weaknesses, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-15269, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-15269, 2023.

Coffee break
Chairpersons: Charles Rougé, Stefano Galelli, Andrea Castelletti
10:45–10:50
10:50–11:00
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EGU23-4574
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On-site presentation
Paul Block, Kylie Southard, Donghoon Lee, and Juan Bazo

Disasters and their associated physical and social risks pose challenges for local, national, and international relief agencies and disaster management organizations globally.  Novel approaches are desperately needed for vulnerable communities.  Combining season-ahead predictions, proactive management strategies, and communication efforts in disaster planning represents an emerging field in disaster management, particularly when paired with short-term early warnings and post-disaster response.  However, these long-lead action protocols are still in their infancy as only a few have been activated - triggering and financing preparedness actions.  While these protocols have generally been rigorously established, a holistic evaluation of the framework, including interactions, feedbacks, and dynamic components, is urgently warranted.  Open questions across both physical and social aspects remain, including agreeable triggers for action, clarity of roles and responsibilities, and sufficiency of funding.  The large number of disparate actors involved and the highly interdisciplinary nature lead to a complex decision-making setting.  Further, most protocols are static plans, yet disasters, impacts, infrastructure, communities, and vulnerability states are all dynamic, changing in time; how can protocols better reflect a changing world?  Surveys of disaster agencies and communities help to highlight how decision-makers perceive flood-related risk and vulnerability, and how these perceptions impact disaster preparedness and risk communication. These insights, paired with additional holistic analysis for hazard planning and management, are critical for developing proactive preparation and response strategies.  We will discuss the current state of anticipatory actions related to disaster management, followed by current barriers and potential opportunities toward reduction of disaster impacts and community vulnerability.

How to cite: Block, P., Southard, K., Lee, D., and Bazo, J.: Emerging Opportunities and Challenges of Anticipatory Actions for Disaster Preparedness, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-4574, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-4574, 2023.

11:00–11:10
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EGU23-11769
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On-site presentation
Meron Teferi Taye, Sirak Tekleab, Robel Tilaye Geressu, Muluken Alemu, and Abdulkarim Seid

Awash River is the most utilized river basin in Ethiopia. The basin has a total of 110,000 km2. The water resources are exploited for various competing needs; domestic, agriculture, livestock's, energy, industry and environment. This study is aimed at enhancing the existing water resources management practices to make them climate resilient in light of climate variability and change. Frequent rainfall extremes, floods and droughts, an imbalance in water availability and demand, water over use in irrigated fields, water use competition and water quality deterioration are the key water management challenges of the basin. Small scale food producers reliant on rain-fed agriculture, small scale irrigators, pastoral and semi-pastoral communities are vulnerable to climate variability and experiencing its impact already. This study identified that their livelihoods are being impacted due to rainfall failure to produce adequate production in the growing period and shortage of fodder for their cattle due to limited soil moisture availability. Based on the identified problems and the existing water management practices, this study developed a conceptual framework, that encompass Climate Smart Water Management (CS-WM) definitions, CS-WM strategies, actions and recommendations to enhance the existing practices on multiple spatial scales. The proposed strategies briefly include improving data and information for more adaptive water resources planning and management, raising awareness and community engagement for improved water management; enhancing effectiveness of water management via technology and innovations, and enhancing alternative clean energy sources to support economic development while minimizing negative consequences of climate variability and change. The strategies and recommendations proposed are tailored to site specific locations and based on societal needs that could solve the identified water management problems and manage tradeoffs among different sectors in the basin.

How to cite: Taye, M. T., Tekleab, S., Geressu, R. T., Alemu, M., and Seid, A.: Strategies for Climate Smart Water Management in Awash River basin, Ethiopia, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-11769, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-11769, 2023.

11:10–11:20
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EGU23-9106
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On-site presentation
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Matteo Giuliani, Wyatt Arnold, Jazmin Zatarain Salazar, Angelo Carlino, and Andrea Castelletti

A resurgence of dam planning and construction is under way in several river basins where untapped hydropower potential could meet growing energy demands. In Africa, more than 300 new hydropower projects are under consideration. Yet, hydropower expansion is a contentious issue given the uncertainty in water and energy demand as well as the negative impacts of these infrastructures on other sectors. Despite calls for a more comprehensive evaluation of hydropower projects, most dams continue to be planned with traditional methods that neglect interdependencies between planning and management and the cumulative impacts of multiple new dams. Here, we use the transboundary Zambezi Watercourse in southern Africa to present a novel dam planning approach that integrates sequencing of planned reservoirs with adaptive, multipurpose operations to address increasing and competing demands for water, energy, and food in the region.

Results show how seeking compromise through operations while constructing dams early improves environmental and irrigation objectives by 50% and 80%, with an 8% loss in hydropower compared to an operation and sequencing strategy that singularly maximizes hydropower. Alternatively, seeking compromise only through delayed dam construction yields modest environmental and irrigation improvements of 6% and 9%, respectively, with a 22% loss in hydropower. Our findings indicate that while additional hydropower capacity reduces structural energy deficits, operating policies emerge as the main driver of human-environmental tradeoffs. Consequently, traditional single-objective operating policy selection may lead to erroneous perceptions of tradeoffs across infrastructure options. The robustness of this result is tested under an ensemble of stochastic hydrologic projections where environmental flow and irrigation deficits are found more sensitive to operations than shifts in water availability. The predominance of operating policies is relevant for improving multi-objective dam planning in other river basins already fragmented by dams built in the 20th century.

How to cite: Giuliani, M., Arnold, W., Zatarain Salazar, J., Carlino, A., and Castelletti, A.: Operations Eclipse Sequencing in Multipurpose Dam Planning, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-9106, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-9106, 2023.

11:20–11:30
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EGU23-630
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ECS
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On-site presentation
Manvitha Molakala and Riddhi Singh

Water resource management strategies are often identified and evaluated using performance metrics within a simulation-optimization framework. These metrics are likely to have varying levels of sensitivity to input variables such as inflows, model-related choices, and errors from the implementation of the strategies. Quantifying the sensitivity of the performance metrics to the aforementioned uncertain factors may therefore be useful for decision-makers in understanding the relative importance of these factors and their interactions. Furthermore, the total variation in the performance measures, arising as a consequence of the uncertain factors, may be useful to quantify the stability of the performance measures. Here, we quantify the first, second, and total order sensitivity of the performance metrics to uncertain factors using Sobol’s variance-based sensitivity analysis. The stability of the performance metric is quantified as the coefficient of variation of the metric evaluated for varying input factors.

 

We then assess these sensitivity and stability indices for four performance metrics of the multi-purpose Nagarjuna Sagar reservoir, the largest reservoir in the Krishna river basin in southern India. The reservoir supplies water to meet irrigation, industrial and domestic demands while also generating hydropower with an installed capacity of 810MW. The performance metrics evaluated in this study are: (i) maximize hydropower generation, (ii) maximize the reliability of maintaining minimum environmental flows, (iii) maximize the reliability of avoiding high flow exceedance, and (iv) minimize demand deficits. We identify the Pareto approximate set of reservoir operation strategies using evolutionary multi-objective direct policy search (EMODPS), which employs a state-aware operating rule based on radial basis functions. We consider the following uncertain factors in our analysis: (i) the length of the planning horizon (varied from 1 to 15 years), (ii) model timestep (daily, 15-day, monthly timesteps), (iii) imperfect operations while applying optimized strategies, (iv) stochastic and deep uncertainties related to inflows. Our results show that the objective related to hydropower generation is the most sensitive to the model choices. In contrast, high flow non-exceedance reliability, demand deficits, and minimum environmental flow reliability objectives are most sensitive to deep uncertainties in inflows. We find that hydropower generation, environmental flow reliability, and demand deficits are not sensitive to the interaction effects of these factors. On the other hand, high flow non-exceedance-related objectives are sensitive to the interactions between deep uncertainties and model uncertainty. We also find that the first-order sensitivity indices can be calculated with a greater confidence level than the total-order sensitivity indices. We identify that the flood reliability objective is the most stable, and the demand deficits objective is the least stable when subjected to uncertainty. Our framework can be used to identify the relative importance of the uncertain factors and the stability of the performance measures in any water management problem.

How to cite: Molakala, M. and Singh, R.: Quantifying the sensitivity and stability of the performance of a multi-purpose reservoir to model, inflow, and operational uncertainties , EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-630, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-630, 2023.

11:30–11:40
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EGU23-776
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ECS
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On-site presentation
Divya Upadhyay, Sarth Dubey, and Udit Bhatia

Obtaining optimal reservoir operation policies is a challenging task and a strategic concern for policymakers. These policies are typically derived through a complex decision-making process with conflicting objectives, represented by nonlinear, nonconvex and multi-modal functions. The information on available inflow and various demands play a key role in developing optimal operation rules. However, they are characterized by various uncertainties which reduce the practical applicability of deterministic policy solutions. In literature, most of the studies handle streamflow uncertainty with single-demand scenarios. Although Stochastic Dynamic Programming (SDP) is a widely-used method for reservoir operations optimization under uncertainty, it suffers from the dual curses of dimensionality and modeling. This study considers the uncertainties for streamflow and various demands such as municipal, industrial, hydropower and irrigation water requirements. Here, we present a reinforcement learning framework that utilizes uncertainty-aware streamflow forecasts and demand requirements to yield optimal operation policies for Sardar Sarovar Dam, India. The proposed methodology incorporates the uncertainties of the underlying inflow and demand behavior, and demonstrates better performance than SDP in terms of net benefit. Overall, this work offers reliable techniques that can be used to develop multi-objective reservoir operation policies which are more adaptable in real-time.

How to cite: Upadhyay, D., Dubey, S., and Bhatia, U.: Deriving optimal single-reservoir operating policies with reinforcement learning based approach incorporating uncertainties of demand and streamflow, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-776, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-776, 2023.

11:40–11:50
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EGU23-9180
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ECS
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On-site presentation
Randy Muñoz, Saeid Vaghefi, Fabian Drenkhan, Maria J. Santos, Daniel Viviroli, Veruska Muccione, and Christian Huggel

Mountains are an important source of freshwater for ecosystems and the livelihoods of around two billion people worldwide. However, this abundance of water resources is jeopardized by climatic and socioeconomic changes, particularly in the tropical Andes which are considered one of the most vulnerable regions to these impacts worldwide. Those changes not only impact water availability for local populations but also contribute to the declining health of the aquatic ecosystems reducing their provision of services to society. Adaptive water management has emerged as a concept to address such social and environmental challenges. However, there is limited information on how such an adaptive approach can be systematically implemented. Other important challenges in mountain regions include data scarcity (e.g. hydroclimatic or socioeconomic data), knowledge gaps (e.g. groundwater contribution to total runoff), and uncertain future climatic and socioeconomic changes (obtained from e.g. climate models or socioeconomic projections). All these knowledge gaps and limitations lead to deep uncertainties in water policies, the condition where experts do not know or cannot agree on which initial conditions and corresponding results are most relevant.

To deal with such deep uncertainties we tested the Exploratory Modeling and Analysis (EMA) framework to support adaptive water management. Therefore, we set a case study in the high-Andean Pitumarca catchment in the glaciated headwaters of the Vilcanota basin, Southern Peru. Three policy options were assessed along a large set of uncertainties to achieve water security for human and environmental needs by 2050. A total of 12,000 simulations were run, driven by three climate scenarios (SSP1-1.9, SSP1-2.6, and SSP5-8.5) and 15 climate models, and a wide range of irrigation and domestic water use scenarios.

Results from the applied EMA framework show that in 43% of simulations (5,182) the water system failed to supply water for human and environmental needs mostly driven by the way of implementation of water policies than by climatic or socioeconomic changes. The implemented framework also contributed to identify that a two combination of improvements of irrigation efficiencies and reservoir schemes can avoid system failures under a wide range of changes and uncertainties. These results highlight the importance of focused policy actions to deal with climatic and socioeconomic changes. Such a framework facilitates moving from traditionally broad problems that center on the impact of climate change to more specific and locally tailored questions, e.g. which reservoir scheme should be implemented to avoid system failure. In order to reduce uncertainties and optimize local water use, EMA should be combined with other methods such as citizen science, sensitivity analysis, joint knowledge production. Furthermore, EMA should be implemented through semi-distributed glacio-hydrological models to fully combine the advantages of different approaches and assess the spatio-temporal occurrence of water demand. We also encourage the use of socio-hydrological models where socioeconomic and environmental factors can actively interact.

How to cite: Muñoz, R., Vaghefi, S., Drenkhan, F., Santos, M. J., Viviroli, D., Muccione, V., and Huggel, C.: Exploratory modeling and analysis to inform adaptive water management under deep uncertainty in the Peruvian Andes, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-9180, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-9180, 2023.

11:50–12:00
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EGU23-6203
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ECS
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On-site presentation
Ties van der Heijden, Nick van de Giesen, Peter Palensky, and Edo Abraham

The Netherlands is a low-lying country situated in the Rhine-Meuse delta. A significant portion of the Netherlands is located below sea level, making the proper management of local and national waterways essential. Polders are used to manage groundwater levels, drain excess rainwater, and store water during times of drought. These polders often have pumping stations that pump water into drainage canals, like the Noordzeekanaal-Amsterdam-Rijnkanaal (NZK-ARK), which receives water from the Rhine river and four local water authorities and connects to the North Sea at IJmuiden through a pumping station and a series of undershot gates.

The operators of the NZK-ARK utilize Model Predictive Control (MPC) to schedule the discharge of water through the gates and pumps. The combination of the pump and gate discharge allows the NZK-ARK to discharge excess water to the North Sea when the sea water level is both higher and lower than the water level in the canal. However, traditional MPC can lead to suboptimal schedules when uncertainty is introduced, resulting from, for example, incoming discharge, fluctuating electricity prices, and the availability of renewable energy. Stochastic MPC allows for the consideration of uncertainty in decision-making, optimizing control actions based on a range of potential scenarios. In the future, the objectives for the control system of the gates and pumps may become more complex and may need to take into account factors like renewable energy availability and electricity prices. Ensuring the effective and efficient management of water in the Netherlands is critical, and the use of polders for water storage and control of groundwater tables, and techniques like MPC and stochastic MPC play important roles in achieving this goal.

In this study, we present a framework that combines probabilistic forecasting, scenario generation and reduction, and stochastic MPC to minimize energy costs associated with pumping at the NZK-ARK. This framework is based on probabilistic forecasts of electricity prices and incoming discharge and is specifically designed for use at the NZK-ARK. By considering the uncertainty present in electricity prices and incoming discharge, our framework allows for the optimization of control actions through the use of stochastic MPC. The ultimate goal of this approach is to reduce energy costs at the NZK-ARK by effectively managing the discharge of water through the pumps and gates while complying with local constraints.

How to cite: van der Heijden, T., van de Giesen, N., Palensky, P., and Abraham, E.: A stochastic MPC framework for the control of pumping stations in polder systems with regard for uncertainty in inflow and hourly electricity prices, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-6203, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-6203, 2023.

12:00–12:10
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EGU23-11772
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On-site presentation
Abdulkarim Seid, Robel Geressu, Sirak Tekleab, Muluken Alemu, and Meron Teferi Taye

Decision analysis techniques to meet water systems management challenges under climate change uncertainty have improved with advances in computational technology in the last decades. Infusing improved design and decision analysis techniques in developing countries can be of paramount importance given their higher vulnerability to climate change, fewer professionals with sufficient capacity, and generally high incentive for rapid expansion of low-cost solutions.  However, a large gap exists between scientific progress and practical and policy applications, especially in global south countries. In this paper we discuss the observed challenges in design, analysis and decision making process to achieve climate smart water management in the highly utilized Awash Basin of Ethiopia. The approach we followed is key-informant interviews with water professionals working across multiple disciplines (i.e., water supply, irrigation, hydropower infrastructure design) and working for different organizations (i.e., government ministries, research institutions, consultancy offices) and freelancers and academicians. Efforts were made to represent informants from different academic levels, gender, and professional responsibilities. The results demonstrate multiple but related challenges including the lack of incentive to apply changes at individual or institutional levels, cultural and policy inertia against transparency and public debate in decision making. Technical challenges emanate from the non-inclusion of up-to-date climate change science at higher education level along with lack of access to computational and communication technology. We present tailor made decision support tools to improve management by leveraging advances in computational and visualization of large data to reveal tradeoffs and synergies of water and food systems at multiple watershed scales.  Efficient and timely solutions for vulnerable small-scale producers can be best achieved by changing the role of institutions to reflect local capacity in the water system management sector.  Proposed solutions to help tackle these challenges include overhaul of the skill requirement for water resources professionals along with continuous skills training and evaluation.

How to cite: Seid, A., Geressu, R., Tekleab, S., Alemu, M., and Taye, M. T.: Enhancing decision making tools for climate-smart water management in the Awash Basin, Ethiopia., EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-11772, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-11772, 2023.

12:10–12:20
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EGU23-4178
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ECS
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On-site presentation
Nadia Kirstein, Morten Rungø, and Roland Löwe

Dynamic operation of urban water infrastructure has many times been demonstrated as an efficient way to manage storm- and wastewater flows with a minimum of cost and material resources, and to improve the health of surface water environments by reducing, for example, combined sewer overflows. Adopting dynamic, real-time control strategies become even more important as climate change is challenging existing water infrastructure with increasing precipitation intensities and volumes. Nevertheless, urban water managers are hesitant to adopt such strategies and rather fall back to upgrading the infrastructure with e.g. underground basins and tunnels. Based on a series of semi-structured interviews and workshops with operators and planners from six Danish utilities, we can demonstrate that many aspects make utility employees feel uncomfortable with dynamic control schemes, e.g.:

  • lack of knowledge on the environmental improvements that can be achieved with dynamic operation
  • lack of understanding of the algorithms in applied control schemes
  • lack of experience with dynamic operation
  • lack of knowledge of the effect of system changes (e.g. construction work) on the dynamic control performance
  • lack of collaboration across different departments within the utility
  • lack of motivation from the operators

Furthermore, there is a general lack of time of the interviewed employees to engage in these aspects.

While the identified issues span across different stages of the planning and operation process, several issues (such as the lack of knowledge on potential environmental improvement, or the lack of collaboration between disciplines) arise in initial planning stages where strategic decisions are made. For this purpose, we have developed an automated screening approach for the potential environmental effects of dynamically operating urban water systems, where the approach and visualizations were developed iteratively and in close collaboration with the stakeholders.

Environmental improvements are in scientific literature often reported for the entire catchment (e.g. the total potential overflow volume reduction); however, a key learning from our work is that the environmental effects need to be visualized for each individual control point in the system. This makes it much more tangible for stakeholders to compare the potential environmental effect with the needed effort and cost, and the detailed result visualization of the dynamic control thus aligns much better with the decision-making process of the stakeholders. Furthermore, the stakeholders prefer simple, understandable control algorithms, even if these don’t fully exploit the potential of dynamic operation. This preference stands in direct contradiction to academic literature, which focuses on advancing control algorithms rather than making sure that existing algorithms are implemented.

Our results are currently implemented in a dashboard for screening the potential of dynamic operation of urban water systems, and will form the basis for generic rule-based operation strategies for urban water systems.

How to cite: Kirstein, N., Rungø, M., and Löwe, R.: Reasons for urban water utilities’ hesitance towards dynamic system operation – and solutions to mitigate these, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-4178, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-4178, 2023.

12:20–12:30
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EGU23-1266
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On-site presentation
Ibrahim Mohammed, Giovanni Romero, John Bolten, and Jim Nelson

NASA has launched a new initiative; the Open-Source Initiative (OSSI) to enable and support science towards openness. The OSSI new initiative supports open-source software development and dissemination. This presentation highlights an open-source platform (i.e., NASAaccess) for accessing, reformatting, and presenting quantitative remote sensing earth observation data products. The main objective of developing the NASAaccess platform is to facilitate exploration, modeling and understanding of the data for scientists, stakeholders, and concerned citizens aligning with the new OSSI initiative goals. NASAaccess platform is available with an open-source software packages (i.e., R and python libraries), and an interactive format web-based environmental modeling application for earth observation data. NASAaccess software program is also linked to various downscaled climate change data products processed by NASA. The NASAaccess web application development and hosting environment is based on Tethys Platform (Swain et al., 2016). NASAaccess current capabilities (v.3.3.0) covers various NASA datasets and products that include the Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) data products, the Global Land Data Assimilation System (GLDAS) land surface states and fluxes, and the NASA Earth Exchange Global Daily Downscaled Projections (NEX-GDDP) CMIP5 & CMIP6 climate change dataset products. NASAaccess installation instructions and documentations along with tutorial materials are available at Open Science Framework repository ‘NASAaccess Home’ (doi:10.17605/OSF.IO/CTJ2K).

How to cite: Mohammed, I., Romero, G., Bolten, J., and Nelson, J.: NASAaccess – earth observation data tool, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-1266, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-1266, 2023.

Lunch break
Chairpersons: Andrea Momblanch, Hector Macian-Sorribes, Taher Kahil
14:00–14:05
14:05–14:15
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EGU23-856
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ECS
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On-site presentation
Enrico Lucca, Jérôme El Jeitany, Giulio Castelli, Tommaso Pacetti, Elena Bresci, and Enrica Caporali

Over the last few years, the Water-Energy-Food (WEF) Nexus has been brought forward by scientists as a novel way of analysing the interconnectedness of global resources systems, and by policy makers as an approach to achieving water, food and energy security while preserving the environment.  Implementing such an integrated thinking is crucial for the Mediterranean, a region characterised by increasing demand for food and energy, and vulnerable to water scarcity, impact of climate change and degradation of natural ecosystems.  Through an integrative review of scientific literature, we examined the evolution of Nexus research in the Mediterranean in terms of critical interlinkages being investigated, explored topics, methods and scales of analysis, and context of operationalizations. The 136 reviewed articles revealed that (a) water-energy interlinkages dominates Nexus research in the Mediterranean, driven by the need of satisfying water demands for drinking and irrigation through energy-intensive water resources; (b) the expansion of Nexus thinking to additional components is mostly limited to assessing the impact of Nexus sectors on the physical environment and the climate, without capturing feedback dynamics; (c) there are only few Nexus studies working  at the entire Mediterranean scale which would provide a much needed contextual setting to the impact of isolated case studies; (d) there is promising evidence that Nexus research in the Mediterranean is going beyond the biophysical dimension to encompass socio-economic interactions and governance aspects; yet, (e) their analysis often remain segregated in silos because of a limited integration of methods across disciplines; (f) Sustainable Technology and Natural Resources Management are the key drivers of Nexus research operationalization and would  benefit from an harmonisation to coherently advance Nexus implementation in the Mediterranean region. This review concludes that Nexus research in the Mediterranean would benefit from an integration of the knowledge developed so far in multi-scale, multi-sector, and multi-dimensional frameworks, which would be capable of supporting technological, socio-economic and governance interventions.

How to cite: Lucca, E., El Jeitany, J., Castelli, G., Pacetti, T., Bresci, E., and Caporali, E.: A Review on the Water-Energy-Food-Ecosystems Nexus Research in the Mediterranean: Evolution, Gaps and Applications, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-856, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-856, 2023.

14:15–14:25
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EGU23-6034
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ECS
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On-site presentation
Jasmin Heilemann, Mansi Nagpal, Christian Klassert, Michael Peichl, Bernd Klauer, and Erik Gawel

Climate change increases the frequency and severity of droughts in Central Europe and thereby threatens food production in the German agricultural sector, which is mostly rain-fed and heavily dependent on precipitation. Farmers need to adapt to these changing conditions, for instance by shifting to irrigated production systems. This increases the future agricultural water demand and may result in competition for water use and higher groundwater depletion. Simultaneously, farmers adapt their land-use patterns towards an optimal crop mix, responding to changes in climatic and economic conditions. This land-use adaptation also affects the irrigation water demand.

To project the future irrigation water demand in Germany considering land-use adaptation, we present the spatial multi-agent system (MAS) model DroughtMAS which simulates agricultural land-use adaptation of the 8 major field crops using a positive mathematical programming (PMP) approach. Each agent captures the behavior of farmers in one of Germany’s 401 NUTS-3 regions, is individually calibrated to the observed production conditions for a 20-year historic average, and is empirically validated for the same period. Therefore, the agent-based structure portrays the agroeconomic and biophysical heterogeneity of Germany. To consider uncertainties concerning future climate change levels and socioeconomic developments, we project the future land-use adaptation and irrigation water demand using integrated RCP-SSP scenarios. To this end, the MAS model is coupled to a statistical crop yield model driven by meteorological indicators and soil moisture, derived from the mesoscale Hydrologic Model (mHM). Projections of the agricultural crop prices are based on the SSP scenarios. The integrated hydro-economic model consequently reflects the adaptive behavior of agents responding to changing crop yields and prices.

The results emphasize the importance of accounting for land-use adaptation to accurately project farmers’ irrigation water demand and to consider changes in biophysical and socioeconomic variables simultaneously. Such estimates are crucial in planning for future agricultural water demands to prevent user conflicts and water resource depletion.

How to cite: Heilemann, J., Nagpal, M., Klassert, C., Peichl, M., Klauer, B., and Gawel, E.: From rain-fed to irrigated agriculture? Projecting the future irrigation water demand in Germany using a hydro-economic multi-agent system model, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-6034, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-6034, 2023.

14:25–14:35
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EGU23-10277
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ECS
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On-site presentation
Sophie Erfurth, Matthias Wildemeersch, Jacopo Baggio, Reetik Kumar Sahu, and Dustin Garrick

Groundwater user groups in Tunisia face severe collective action problems. Aquifer depletion leads to empty wells and farmers’ unwillingness to pay water fees leads to bankrupt user groups – both disastrous for the many communities that rely on irrigation agriculture for their livelihoods. What conditions or combination of conditions drive water user behaviour in a system that is governed by institutional uncertainty and bounded rationality? What conditions or interventions are effective in avoiding or delaying system collapse? What is the role of social norms, particularly trust and leadership, in overcoming collective action problems? Based on and expanding on the theory of common pool resource governance, this paper ties institutional results to environmental outcomes. The complex common-pool resource system studied here is simulated by an Agent-Based Model (ABM) of groundwater user decision-making. This systematic coupling of social and biophysical data and models offers new insights into simulating dynamic interactions between human behaviour, social norms, and the underlying resource. The project aims to provide a guideline for alternative modes of policy-making and implementation to address the main water governance challenge in Tunisia, i.e. groundwater overexploitation. 

How to cite: Erfurth, S., Wildemeersch, M., Baggio, J., Sahu, R. K., and Garrick, D.: Governing Common Pool Resources in Fragile Political Systems: Modelling Behaviour, Institutions, and Social-Ecological Dynamics, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-10277, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-10277, 2023.

14:35–14:45
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EGU23-11240
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ECS
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On-site presentation
Dan Wang, Reetik Kumar Sahu, Taher Kahil, Ting Tang, Yuli Shan, and Klaus Hubacek

Wastewater treatment removes water pollutants and wastewater reclamation provides an alternative water supply. It is believed that increasing the rate of wastewater reuse and reclamation can reduce water stress. This study aims at understanding whether reusing more wastewater can help mitigate water stress in China. Through scenario analysis, it is found that the potential for reuse of reclaimed water under a water conservation scenario is only 12-56% of the actual situation, but regional water stress under a water saving scenario is 10-82% lower than the current reality. The results show that a higher amount of reclamation does not necessarily lead to a lower water stress in one region. The potential for wastewater treatment and reuse is determined by return flows, which can reduce water use efficiency and exacerbate water stress. To effectively alleviate water stress, it is important to not only increase wastewater reuse, but also prioritize water conservation.

How to cite: Wang, D., Sahu, R. K., Kahil, T., Tang, T., Shan, Y., and Hubacek, K.: The more wastewater reclamation, the less water stress?, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-11240, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-11240, 2023.

14:45–14:55
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EGU23-1572
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ECS
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On-site presentation
Danyang Gao, Albert S. Chen, and Fayyaz Ali Memon

The management of water resource in China has been under pressures due to rapid socioeconomic growth that escalates the demands in food, energy and domestic sectors, which rely on reliable water provision. Together with climate change, water security is expected to face greater uncertainty in the future. To support sustainable water resource management, this study established a system dynamic model to investigate the impacts of policy, socioeconomic and climate change on water security in China during 2025 to 2100. Five policy options related to carbon neutrality and water management, three socioeconomic and climate scenarios (SSP1-RCP2.6, SSP2-RCP4.5 and SSP5-RCP8.5) were considered. The results show that water demand and water resource will both be greater in the future. Under BAU, water demand will reach 514, 544 and 717 km3 while water resource will increase to 989, 992 and 1032 km3 in 2086-2100 under SSP1-RCP2.6, SSP2-RCP4.5 and SSP5-RCP8.5, respectively. Future water demand for food sector is expected to decrease slightly and then increase under SSP1-RCP2.6, while it shows continuous increase under SSP2-RCP4.5 and SSP5-RCP8.5 due to the changes of planted area, livestock and temperature. Water demand for domestic sector will decrease under three SSP-RCPs because the population will reach a peak around 2030 and then decrease with time. Water demand for energy is expected to decrease under SSP1-RCP2.6 while it will increase under other SSP-RCPs because of more energy demand under SSP2-RCP4.5 and SSP5-RCP8.5. China may face low water security pressure without policy intervention in the future especially under SSP5-RCP8.5. The analysis shows that bioenergy-oriented agriculture cannot mitigate water scarcity risks in China, while low-carbon agriculture strategies can potentially ensure water safety under carbon neutral goal. Water scarcity can be averted if we follow the development path of SSP1-RCP2.6 as well as apply interventions on water management combining with carbon neutral policies that focus on low-carbon agriculture and supplemented by low fossil energy.

How to cite: Gao, D., Chen, A. S., and Memon, F. A.: Modelling the impacts of policy, climate and socioeconomic change on water security in China, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-1572, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-1572, 2023.

14:55–15:05
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EGU23-6817
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ECS
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On-site presentation
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Julian Joseph, Sylvia Tramberend, Diana Luna Gonzalez, Günther Fischer, and Taher Kahil

Sustainable Intensification of agriculture is a means to meet increasing future food demand in regions with rapidly growing populations and economies. In many of these regions, productivity is currently low. Increasing productivity while limiting additional use of resources such as water and land is therefore key to providing demanded and nutritious food in these countries. To model sustainable intensification, we build an optimization model. In its main economic specification, the objective of the model is to maximize farmer profit while at the same time respecting ecological boundaries. Therefore, constraints of the model are given by land availability and agronomic and climatic constraints to crop growth from the Global Agroecological Zones (GAEZ) method, as well as water availability derived from the Global Hydro-Economic Model (ECHO). The framework can be applied for either a single crop or multiple crops. The results of our analysis provide guidance on where and under which circumstances production of a crop can most efficiently be intensified. This can include the spatial distribution of irrigation or the allocation of several crops to optimally meet estimated demand. Demand is derived from projections of human population, economic growth and income elasticities. We use scenario analysis to examine how optimal sustainable intensification strategies change under different trade regimes for agricultural products and under different levels of climate resilience. Application of the model focuses on the East African extended Lake Victoria Basin (eLVB). In eLVB agroecological conditions are favorable for a wide range of crops, sufficient water is available in several sub-basins and population and food demand are projected to rapidly expand.

How to cite: Joseph, J., Tramberend, S., Luna Gonzalez, D., Fischer, G., and Kahil, T.: Modeling Sustainable Intensification of Agriculture under Resource Constraints, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-6817, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-6817, 2023.

15:05–15:15
|
EGU23-13969
|
ECS
|
On-site presentation
Veronica Piuri, Elena Matta, Guang Yang, Matteo Giuliani, George Papagiannis, Athanasios Yannacopoulos, Martina Sardo, Davide Danilo Chiarelli, Maria Cristina Rulli, Phoebe Kondouri, and Andrea Castelletti

Arid and semi-arid regions such as the Middle East and North Africa are increasingly suffering from water scarcity, exacerbated by climate change and population growth. This trend calls for new strategies for managing water demand and supply to face global changes in social-economic development, water system expansions, and cross-border differences.

In this work, we explore the potential to mitigate the existing conflicts over the Nile River Basin, interconnecting water demand and supply using novel technological solutions, such as desalination and aquaponics, combined with traditional uses (i.e., groundwater extraction and water reuse). We analyse the complex dynamics and tradeoffs between energy production and irrigation water supply in Ethiopia, Sudan, and Egypt. We propose innovative portfolios of interventions that combine the coordinated operation of large water dams (i.e., the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance, Merowe, and High Aswan) and the main irrigation diversions with smart water demand management options. Desalination involves the process of removing salt and other minerals from seawater, making it suitable for irrigation and other domestic uses. Aquaponics involves the cultivation of fish and plants in a symbiotic environment, with the waste produced by the fish providing nutrients for the plants and the plants purifying the water for the fish. This technology can be an efficient and sustainable way to produce food with very low water consumption.

Our approach is used to study current and future tradeoffs, generating solutions that are efficient and resilient to future hydroclimatic and demographic scenarios. We first quantified the impacts of dynamically downscaled and bias-adjusted climate projections for three Representative Concentrated Pathways (i.e., RCP2.6, RCP4.5 and RCP8.5) on the runoffs of the main tributaries of the Nile. We also considered stochastic projections of water demand based on Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs), and a strategic model that reallocates crops according to future climatic and demographic scenarios, according to a balanced diet and agricultural intensification strategy to generate a positive impact on food self-sufficiency.

Our results show that the Nile River Basin features both strong tradeoffs and synergies across riparian countries, with the irrigation supply in Sudan playing a major role in allocating water between competing sectors. The results show a decrease of up to 20% of the Nile River's runoff and a doubling of the Egyptian municipal demand in the most severe scenario that leads to exacerbating tensions between the three countries. Notably, the potential reduction of the Egyptian water demand through different combinations of aquaponics, desalination, reuse, and groundwater pumping in the Nile Delta, along with a substantial decrease in Sudan irrigation demand through crop reallocation, can contribute to mitigating existing and future conflicts. Further technological improvements are needed for attaining large water demand reductions via soilless agriculture and desalination, which today cannot completely substitute reuse and groundwater contributions, whose high exploitation can induce relevant environmental risks.

How to cite: Piuri, V., Matta, E., Yang, G., Giuliani, M., Papagiannis, G., Yannacopoulos, A., Sardo, M., Chiarelli, D. D., Rulli, M. C., Kondouri, P., and Castelletti, A.: Closing the loop between water supply and demand in the Nile River Basin under global change, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-13969, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-13969, 2023.

15:15–15:25
|
EGU23-8152
|
ECS
|
Virtual presentation
Daniel Crespo, Mehdi Nemati, Ariel Dinar, Zachary Frankel, and Nick Halberg

Colorado River Basin faces a supply crisis that makes the water system vulnerable to failure, economic losses, conflicts between regions and water users, and ecosystem degradation. The crisis results from water management that allows excessive water withdrawals, legal restrictions established on historical facts, and decreased water availability due to climate change. The agricultural sector, urban centers, hydropower production, and aquatic ecosystems compete for the exhaust water resources in the basin. Despite the reduction in per capita urban water usage and reduction of irrigated land, projections of population and economic growth and increasing crop evapotranspiration indicate an expansion of water demand. The shrinking water availability and growing demand for water will exacerbate existing problems, hampering water management. This article evaluates several alternatives to water management to identify the sectoral and spatial trade-offs of water use by the agricultural sector, urban centers, hydropower production, and aquatic ecosystems. A hydro-economic model is developed to assess current and alternative water allocation’s economic impact on drought, climate change, and growing population. The model examines coalition arrangements among some or all basin states, Tribal Nations and Mexico and the implementation of institutional reforms such as water markets, proportional sharing, and mechanisms that promote water savings. The development of existing but unused Tribal Nation rights is analyzed to evaluate its impact and to determine the potential for new agreements. Simulation shows that shrinking water allocation promotes efficiency improvements and strengthens the sustainability of the water system. However, droughts and climate change erode the benefits of water use and environmental conditions. Reductions in hydropower generation results in economic losses and higher greenhouse gas emissions. Urban centers endure heavy welfare reductions due to water use restrictions, but purchasing water from irrigation districts alleviates the burden and enhances the social surplus. Water markets and cooperation mitigate benefit losses but increase the pressure on ecosystems. Water exchange and side payments (for improved water savings) between states and irrigation districts indicate potential improvements in water use efficiency. Crops with high economic value that are irrigated with advanced technologies are maintained in production. Instead, field crop producers suffer from water shortages. Improvements in irrigation technology reduce the risk of exposure to water scarcity but curtail water returns than sustain ecosystems and downstream activities. Maintaining tribal Nations' rights and establishing environmental flows rectify the inefficient use of water by other users.

How to cite: Crespo, D., Nemati, M., Dinar, A., Frankel, Z., and Halberg, N.: Policies to Achieve Sustainability in the Colorado River Basin under Climate Change Conditions and Growing Demand: A Hydro-economic Analysis, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-8152, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-8152, 2023.

15:25–15:35
|
EGU23-10363
|
Virtual presentation
Frank Ward

Economic analysis has considerable power to guide a number of water development proposals to inform climate adaptation planning.  Much work has appeared in recent years on valuing water resources to support that planning, but little theoretically rigorous analysis exists on valuing resources in over a wide range of physical and economic conditions in a general equilibrium setting.   Moreover, no published work to date has solved the inverse problem of inferring the parameters of a system of water production functions when observed data are constrained by a single observation.  This paper addresses an important inverse problem in water economics, namely the process of inferring from a single observation on land and water use the parameters of the underlying production functions. It solves an inverse problem by going from data on observed factor use, factor prices, commodity production, and commodity prices to the underlying production function parameters.  From the recovered production function parameters, marginal values of water are calculated over a wide range of water supply and economic conditions.   An example is illustrated for land and water development planning in the American Southwest.  This paper’s original contribution can inform policy debates internationally over competing proposals for climate adaptation planning.

How to cite: Ward, F.: A Simple Method of Water Valuation for Climate Planning, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-10363, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-10363, 2023.

15:35–15:45
|
EGU23-1708
|
On-site presentation
Maria P. Papadopoulou, Orfeas Roussos, Leto Papadopoulou, and Dionissia Hatzilacou

Prespa Lakes is a transboundary (Greece-Albania-North Macedonia) aquatic ecosystem with a unique ecological value that includes a great variety of habitats and life forms, endemic and rare species. The water quality of this ecosystem is essential to sustain ecosystem services, as well as local economic activity. Climate change may lead to a potential decrease in water quality and availability, increasing the competition among the different water users. Integrated water management and policy approaches that will engage all competing water users is the answer to achieve the sustainability of sensitive and high-value aquatic systems, as the one found in Prespa Lakes. This challenge is even greater when these aquatic systems are transboundary and belong to the Natura2000 network.

Recognizing the need for a rational management of high-value water ecosystems, the Greek administration adopted, in 2020, a new governance system, with the establishment of the Natural Environment and Climate Change Agency (NECCA), an agency responsible for all the protected areas in Greece, with an emphasis on the conservation and protection of biodiversity in the 446 Natura2000 sites in the country . Within this new administrative system, all 446 Natura2000 sites are grouped into 24 decentralized protected area units (DPAU) and at each DPAU, a Local Management Committee (LMC) is appointed, in order to  bring together all interested stakeholders at local level such as regional and municipal authorities, technical economic chambers, forest management authorities, environmental NGOs and professional associations. The LMC functions as a consultation body to the DPAU. Its primary focus is on the implementation of the relevant protected area management plan and monitoring scheme, for the conservation of protected habitats and species, but it also participates in every other action related to sustainable development, mitigation and adaptation to climate change. Special concern will be given to actions related to water quality, food production, ecosystem health and climate resilience, as critical elements of WEFE Nexus.

In this frame, climate resilience of all environmental, economic, and social sectors related to water use is analyzed in the Orhid/Prespa Lakes ecosystem as a whole, to secure a balanced use of available water resources in this transboundary ecosystem. A System Innovation Approach is implemented through the development of Working Groups functioning at national level followed by a transboundary Living Lab focusing on water scarcity issues. Stakeholders related to water management and representing all sectors at local level take part in these Working Groups and in the transboundary Living Lab to shape common pathways of innovations on climate adaptation and resilience. It is envisaged that the results will support the work of the LMC, as well as that of the transboundary Prespa Park Management Committee, and could also be transferred, by NECCA, to other protected areas with similar ecosystem characteristics, and challenges.

How to cite: Papadopoulou, M. P., Roussos, O., Papadopoulou, L., and Hatzilacou, D.: WEFE Nexus governance approach to tackle water management issues in a transboundary aquatic ecosystem, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-1708, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-1708, 2023.

Posters on site: Thu, 27 Apr, 16:15–18:00 | Hall A

Chairpersons: Taher Kahil, Andrea Momblanch, Stefano Galelli
A.36
|
EGU23-11645
Gang Wang, Kun Zhu, David R. Johnson, Chujin Ruan, Josep Ramoneda, Guram Gogia, Hongyu Ran, and Peixuan Zhang

The microscale spatiotemporal heterogeneities of physicochemical- and biological properties and their variational dynamics are key factors regulating microbial activity, soil quality and functionalities. Yet little is known about the underlying mechanisms and impacts on the functioning biogeochemical processes of the earth-surface ecosystems typically the soil-water-microbe-climate nexus. Employing microscale experiments, we illustrate how small-scale water and nutrient configurations as well as those of biological (populations) and chemical (such as O2 and pH) gradients regulate microbial interactions and functionality, and impacts on soil carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) cycling. We firstly use pairs of fluorescently labelled bacterial strains and a hyphae-forming fungal strain that expand together across a nutrient-amended surface, and show that flagellar motility drives bacterial dispersal along the hyphal network, which counteracts the purifying effects of ecological drift at the expansion frontier and thereby increases the spatial intermixing and extent of range expansion of the bacterial strains. We further demonstrate that fungal hyphae are important regulators of bacterial diversity and promote plasmid-mediated functional novelty during range expansion in an interaction-independent manner. In addition, we employed a soil column experiment and illustrated that sufficient labile carbon from plant residues such as straw induced fast O2 consumption with microoxic development in the straw-soil interfaces. In the meantime, the porous structure of straw materials could enhance O2 diffusive inputs in the core area, and subsequently formed a a concentric ring-like microoxic area around the straw patch. Such enriched oxic-microoxic transient zones would induce nitrification coupled denitrification, which led to the high N2O emissions. Additionally, the microbial degradation of straw resulted in a pulse decline of soil pH, which possibly inhibited the N2O reductases, yielding enhanced N2O emissions. These results contribute to a better understanding of the driving factors for microbial interactions and possible impacts of soil key element (such as C and N) cycling.

How to cite: Wang, G., Zhu, K., R. Johnson, D., Ruan, C., Ramoneda, J., Gogia, G., Ran, H., and Zhang, P.: Microscale physicochemical- and biological configurations regulate microbial biogeochemical processes and functionality, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-11645, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-11645, 2023.

A.37
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EGU23-4655
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ECS
Chang Liu

 Agriculture is one of the largest consumers of water and energy. This paper evaluated
the agricultural sustainability of the Chenmengquan irrigation district of China based on the
water–energy–food nexus. One objective weighting method and one subjective weighting method
were integrated, based on game theory, and a matter–element model was constructed to evaluate
agricultural sustainability for the research region. The sensitivity of each index to the evaluation class
was also analyzed. The results showed that agricultural sustainability was moderate in 2006–2012
and high in 2012–2015. The indexes, which represent water-use e
fficiency and yield per unit area
of crops, had higher sensitivities in the context of the present case study. The results also indicated
that agricultural sustainability had a comparatively positive trend between 2012 and 2015, and that
pesticide utilization was the most important issue for agricultural sustainability. The approach
of using the combination of a weighting method, based upon game theory, and the use of the
matter–element model provides a guide for the evaluation of agricultural sustainability
 

How to cite: Liu, C.: Evaluating Agricultural Sustainability Based on theWater–Energy–Food Nexus in the ChenmengquanIrrigation District of China, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-4655, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-4655, 2023.

A.38
|
EGU23-12001
|
ECS
Samarth Singh, Julianne Quinn, Nathan Wiens, and Rebecca Smith

Droughts are among the most severe natural disasters, but are difficult to prepare for because of their slow
onset. In absence of effective drought early warning systems and response plans, water users often
continue to pursue short-term economic gains that ultimately come at the expense of longer-term
economic and ecological sustainability. Fortunately, seasonal forecasts have shown promise for informing
adaptive water management policies that can reduce these impacts. One avenue of adaptation is through
reservoir operations, where seasonal streamflow forecasts can enable hedging of releases to favor more
frequent but less impactful water shortages over more devastating impacts down the line. This can be
achieved by optimizing reservoir operating policies that define how much water to release from a network
of reservoirs as a function of these seasonal forecasts. However, the best functional form for such policies
is an open research question.

The goal of this project is to compare alternative formulations of reservoir operating policies conditional
on seasonal climate forecasts to see which is most effective in reducing economic and ecological drought
impacts. We investigate this question in the Colorado River Basin (CRB). Commonly termed the
“lifeblood of the West,” the Colorado River provides irrigation water for over 5.5 million acres of
agricultural land, drinking water for more than 40 million people, and over 4000 MW of installed
hydropower capacity. Yet managing this system is becoming increasingly challenging due to ongoing
climatic and anthropogenic drought conditions that jeopardize water security and endanger the river’s
ecological health. To improve water security in the basin, this project aims to optimize reservoir operating
policies in Lake Mead, Lake Powell, and three upstream reservoirs by coupling a RiverWare reservoir
model of the CRB with Borg, a multi-objective optimization algorithm, to reduce the frequency and
severity of water shortages to the Upper Colorado River Basin (UCRB), Lower Colorado River Basin
(LCRB), and Mexico. In this study, we explore different ways of incorporating seasonal forecasts of the
inflows to these five reservoirs into their operating policies considering different functional forms of the
operating policies using a model-free, closed loop optimal control method called Direct Policy Search
(DPS). Specifically, we compare using logistic and Gaussian Radial Basis Functions (RBFs) for the
reservoir rules. Our work illustrates the value of integrating streamflow forecasts into reservoir operating
rules for drought management, while also providing insights into how to formulate the policies to
maximize that value.

How to cite: Singh, S., Quinn, J., Wiens, N., and Smith, R.: Determining the best functional form of reservoir operating policies to maximize the value of integrating seasonal streamflow forecasts into reservoir operations in the Colorado River Basin, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-12001, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-12001, 2023.

A.39
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EGU23-4304
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Stefano Galelli and Rachel Koh

The value of seasonal streamflow forecasts for the hydropower industry has long been assessed by considering metrics related to hydropower production. However, this current approach overlooks the role played by hydropower dams within the power grid, therefore providing a myopic view of how forecasts could improve the operations of large-scale power systems. There are, in particular, two points worth stressing. First, the inherent uncertainty of streamflow forecasts could be easily propagated into the grid, especially if the power system is highly reliant on hydropower. Second, the relationship between water and power systems is not unidirectional: failing to capture feedback mechanisms may add uncertainty to exercises aimed at characterizing the value of seasonal forecasts. To fill in this gap, we developed a novel modelling framework that (i) hard-couples a reservoir system model with a power system model, and (ii) is subject to reservoir inflow forecasts with different levels of accuracy. We implement the framework on a real-world case study based on the Cambodian grid, which relies on hydropower, coal, oil, and imports from neighboring countries. In particular, we evaluate the performance of both systems in terms of power production costs, CO2 emissions, and the amount of curtailed hydropower. Through this framework, we demonstrate that the value of streamflow forecasts is affected not only by their skill, but also by the dynamic behavior of the coupled water-power system.

How to cite: Galelli, S. and Koh, R.: Valuing seasonal streamflow forecasts in power system operations, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-4304, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-4304, 2023.

A.40
|
EGU23-14991
David Haro Monteagudo, Andrea Momblanch, Mikhail Smilovic, and Peter Burek

Future water security will be determined by climate change along with socio-economic changes, driving water availability, water demands and catchment conditions. Over recent decades, hydrological models have evolved to incorporate the effect of anthropic activities that allow them to explore the main challenges and opportunities regarding global water security. These advances have been underpinned by progress in high-resolution and large-scale data availability, as well as in computational and data storage capabilities. Hydrologists are currently capable of developing high-resolution large-scale hydrological models designed to represent and study the global hydrological cycle, and even to zoom-in on specific regions essentially removing the barriers between global and regional models. However, the use of these modelling approaches is often seen with suspicion by end-users, be it regional water managers or water users, who may consider that their personal knowledge and understanding of the catchments where they carry out their activities is disregarded in favour of novel technologies.

Indeed, despite their growing sophistication, the current generation of LHMs is not yet exempt of limitations in their ability to represent dynamic trade-offs in the water-food-energy-environment nexus, and water competition between upstream and downstream users in complex water resources systems. These limitations hinder the ability of LHMs to provide reliable insights at the regional or local levels, leaving the task of incorporating human water management activities within these models as one of the grand challenges for the hydrologic research community. The inclusion of this local knowledge into LHMs’ modelling process can, therefore, increase their capacity to support rigorous nexus analyses to inform water policy and management decisions. Unfortunately, the access to these data may be limited by several inconveniences such as overprotective water authorities, language access barriers, or simply not existing at all. This work explores to what extent the inclusion of local knowledge can improve the performance of globally formulated models as well as their reliability to support decision making on the ground. We discuss what type of data might be more relevant and what should be the priorities in data acquisition to maximise the output of modellers efforts.

To demonstrate this, we built a CWatM model of the Ebro River catchment in Spain using large-scale datasets to later substitute or enhance such datasets with data obtained from local and regional specific datasets available from local authorities and water users. The additional data/enhancements were included in separate and cumulative steps. The model improvements were assessed comparing the model results against gauged flows, reservoir storage, water demand and supply, and the system’s drought indicator. The findings of this study will assist in the transition of globally formulated models to being applied locally by identifying the priorities in data gathering and advances in modelling capabilities, ensuring that they provide reliable outputs to inform decision making.

How to cite: Haro Monteagudo, D., Momblanch, A., Smilovic, M., and Burek, P.: Do we need better models or more local knowledge? Assessing the added value of using locally sourced data over larger-scale datasets in regional to local hydrological modelling, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-14991, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-14991, 2023.

A.41
|
EGU23-5637
|
ECS
Zoë Bovermann, Elahe Fallah-Mehdipour, and Jörg Dietrich

Due to population growth, urbanization, industrial and agricultural development, water demands have increased especially during the recent decades. On the other hand, shortage of the available water resources is a considerable challenge for water allocation and conflict resolution particularly in the semi-arid regions. The Laja Lake is a natural reservoir located in the Bío-Bío Region of Chile. It provides water for different stakeholders including energy and agriculture. This lake releases water to the downstream river by natural seepage through the volcanic barrier and by a controlled outlet via a transmission line. Two hydropower plants have been constructed on the mentioned river and transmission line and four other hydropower plants have been built in a series downstream. However, agricultural stakeholders have rights to supply their irrigation water demands from the lake. Accordingly, the control of the upstream hydropower plant effects all other water users. In this research, optimal trade-offs between energy generation by the hydropower plants (transmission line and river) and supply of agricultural irrigation water have been determined by applying NSGA-II (non-dominant sorting genetic algorithm). A water balance simulation model has been coupled with NSGA-II to be applied for monthly time series of water availability and demand. Using TOPSIS (technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution), a multi-criteria analysis method, the non-dominated solutions from ten runs have been reduced to a few solutions. They were used to perform a trade-off analysis among stakeholders to achieve an acceptable optimal operation. The results have been compared to those of the SOP (standard operating policy) and the actual reservoir operation. The application of trade-off analysis based on simulation-optimization results allowed finding a better compromise between different stakeholder utilities. Furthermore, the system’s analytic tool can be applied for different hydro-meteorological inputs and thus be used for predictive development of operation policies under changed climate.

Keywords: multi-objective optimization, conflict resolution, water-energy trade-offs

How to cite: Bovermann, Z., Fallah-Mehdipour, E., and Dietrich, J.: Multi-objective trade-off analysis of conflicting water demands in the Chilean Laja River basin, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-5637, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-5637, 2023.

A.42
|
EGU23-12212
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ECS
|
Tewelde Hagos Gebremedhin, Paolo Colosio, Marco Peli, Thi Hien Nguyen, Hai Yen Nguyen, Stefano Barontini, and Roberto Ranzi

Due to the changing climate, rapid development, and population growth, the current management of water resources is expected to be critically affected. The majority of reservoirs are multipurpose including water supply, flood control, hydropower production, etc., and often involve several competing interests. Most of the current reservoir management practices are ineffective, outdated, and highly subjective. Therefore, it is necessary to re-evaluate the current management rules for optimizing the objectives, reduction of water stress, and mitigation of climate change impacts.

Lake Como is a regulated lake in Northern Italy and the third largest lake, receiving water from the upper Adda River and controlled downstream by the “Olginate” regulation dam. The regulation dam has been constructed to manage the release according to irrigation and hydropower demand. In addition, it regulates the water level in the Lake within a certain threshold (i.e., upper, and lower bounds), to prevent flooding in the town of Como and to allow navigation and for environmental reasons.

This research mainly focuses on optimizing two conflicting objectives, the satisfaction of irrigation demand which is parametrized by α (the ratio between the actual release and the agricultural demand), and upstream flood regulation in the city of Como parametrized by β (the ratio between the actual active storage and the reference storage). Considering the characteristics of the reservoir and the targeted objectives, an optimal operating strategy has been developed by adopting a deterministic Revised Min-Max (RMM) approach. It focuses on the determination of the minimum water level required to satisfy the irrigation demand and the maximum water level to avoid flooding for a specified value of α and β. This approach is based on simulating the continuity equation for a set of 71 years of inflow and outflow time series, from 1946 (the operation of the Olginate dam began) to 2016. besides, the outflow time series was used to simulate the current management policy and historical efficiency of the system in terms of α and β.

Out of the several feasible solutions (combinations of α and β), we are interested in efficient (Pareto optimal) solutions, where there are no other solutions that can improve either α and/or β. We evaluate three possible management strategies depending on the storage condition and the feasible solutions with different combinations of α and β through a trade-off analysis. The first tends to approach historical average levels (BAUL: Business As Usual Level); the second approaches the historical average releases (BAUR: Business As Usual Release); the third one allows to modulate of the releases with the parameter delta (0< δ <1), which tends to satisfy irrigation demand (δ=0) or flood control (δ=1). In summary, this study shows that the current operating rule can be substantially improved with respect to both objectives, with an improvement of 19% in terms of irrigation demand satisfaction and 69% in terms of flood control.

How to cite: Gebremedhin, T. H., Colosio, P., Peli, M., Nguyen, T. H., Nguyen, H. Y., Barontini, S., and Ranzi, R.: Revised Min-Max (RMM) Approach for Two-Objective Reservoir Operation, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-12212, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-12212, 2023.

Posters virtual: Thu, 27 Apr, 16:15–18:00 | vHall HS

Chairpersons: Timothy Foster, Charles Rougé, Taher Kahil
vHS.6
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EGU23-4699
|
ECS
Xiangxiang Ji, La Zhuo, and Pute Wu

The impacts of multiple changes in climatic and socioeconomic conditions within countries and regions are spatially heterogeneous, thus complicating stringent agricultural water management. Here we developed a framework for the dynamic identification of zone types and provided targeted agricultural water management strategies for each zone in response to global change. Considering China as an example, eight zones of typical major grain crop production prefectures were identified based on an analysis of the spatial and temporal evolution characteristics at four levels (agricultural, natural, social, and economic) according to the water footprint of major grain crop production at the prefecture level for the past 15 years (2004-2018). We then presented the response of China's future zoning landscape for 2030, 2050, and 2080 under three representative scenarios by combining shared socioeconomic paths (SSPs) and representative concentration paths (RCPs). Results show that, by 2080, the national water consumption of the major grain crop production will increase under all scenarios. Half of prefectures facing function shifts are likely to change from low to high water consuming zones. Different zonal prefectures react differently under global changes, especially those that are prone to functional transformation, should pay attention to their instability. Consideration of the water footprint in agricultural zoning is of great importance for national sustainable water resources management. This study proposes a more explicit approach to coping with global change, that is, to propose locally appropriate agricultural water management strategies and measures for China and beyond.

How to cite: Ji, X., Zhuo, L., and Wu, P.: Spatial and temporal explicit and dynamic zoning of crop water consumption under past and future climate and socioeconomic changes: a case study of China, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-4699, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-4699, 2023.

vHS.7
|
EGU23-17551
|
ECS
|
Naomi Wambui Ng’ang’a, Halima Saado Abdillahi, Sarah Nduku Nzau, and Zachary Mwambi Misiani

Extreme weather events such as floods and droughts annually affect thousands of people in Kenya disproportionally affecting the poor, elderly, disabled, women and children. Currently, natural disaster response is frequently reactive rather than proactive resulting in increased suffering among the most vulnerable, high response costs and duplication of efforts among humanitarian actors. Forecast based financing (FbF) can play a critical role in mitigating disaster impacts. Less evidence however, is documented about the effectiveness of implementing FBF compared to traditional emergency response. In 2019, Kenya Red Cross Society (KRCS) in partnership with National FbF Technical Working Group (TWG) began developing National Flood and drought Early Action Protocols (EAP). The goal was to minimise potential damage and loss of life by acting early, before the hazard reached its peak. In 2021, the drought EAP was activated after attaining trigger thresholds indicating below average seasonal rainfall for October-November-December rains. This provided a good opportunity for real-time testing of effectiveness of the selected/prioritised early actions.

This paper presents findings of a study conducted to compare the effectiveness of FBF to emergency response a case study of West Pokot County where the drought EAP was activated. The study adopted quasi-experiment approach to measure different outcomes between beneficiary households of AA and Control group/Emergency Response beneficiaries of similar vulnerability.

A total of 388 respondents participated in the survey where 260 were beneficiaries of AA while 128 were non-beneficiaries. With regards to food security, 24.6% of the AA beneficiaries sampled obtained food from own production compared to 17.2% non-beneficiaries. Few (8.5%) AA beneficiaries borrowed food from relatives compared to 13.3% of the non-beneficiaries. More (41.8%) children under-five from AA beneficiary households had three meals and some food/snack in between compared to 31.6% from non-beneficiary households. Very few (25.4%) adults from AA households ate only one meal compared to 35.2% from non-beneficiary households. The coping strategy index for the AA beneficiaries was (3.1) while for the non-beneficiaries was (3.8).

In addressing water scarcity, more (11.6%) beneficiaries’ households had access to borehole water compared to 7.7% non-beneficiaries. Distance to water sources was higher among the non-beneficiary where 52.5% non-beneficiaries spend between 30 mins-1hour to collect water compared to 43.0% beneficiaries. Beneficiaries noted changes that came as a result of the AA in water to be: reduction in water borne diseases cases (5.0%); access to cleaner/safer water (96.7%); reduced amount of money spent on water (8.3%); meals prepared regularly (12.4%) and improved hygiene (38.8%).

Lessons documented included: Community participation and stakeholder coordination are essential for the successful implementation of AA. To ensure timely implementation of AA, it is necessary to combine community knowledge of seasons with scientific forecasts and streamline institutional readiness. Flexible funding is the most effective way to take early action in the window of opportunity between forecast and disaster.

Study findings show that anticipatory actions have a positive impact on reducing the effects of drought on water scarcity and food insecurity. Furthermore, AA have a higher benefit to cost ratio, indicating their cost-effectiveness and return on investment.

How to cite: Wambui Ng’ang’a, N., Saado Abdillahi, H., Nduku Nzau, S., and Mwambi Misiani, Z.: Testing Effectiveness of Forecast Based Financing as Compared to Traditional Emergency Response: A Case Study of West Pokot County -Kenya, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-17551, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-17551, 2023.

vHS.8
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EGU23-4054
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ECS
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Maithili Mohanty and Vinod Tare

Hydrological alteration refers to any modification to different components of the natural flow regime of a river that human interventions may cause. The interventions are built to store excess water for different purposes, such as hydropower generation, irrigation, and domestic uses. The headwaters of the Peace River in Canada that flows from the Rocky Mountains of British Columbia became regulated by two large dams, the W. A. C. Bennett dam in 1968 and the Peace Canyon dam in 1980. The objective of the paper quantified the hydrological alterations caused by the cascade of dams across the Peace River. We have used a powerful tool 'River Flow Health Index' to quantify the alterations in different flow regime components on a 0-1 scale (0 means unaltered and one means completely altered). Historical hydrological data is obtained from the Water Survey of Canada (http://www.ec.gc.ca/rhc-wsc/) at a gauge station, Peace River near Taylor (coordinates: 56° 8'8.99"N, 120°40'13.01"W) for the years 1945-2015. 1945-1962 is chosen as the reference state because the dams were constructed after 1963. The altered period is referred to the period 1970-2015 after the operation of the dams started. We scrutinized 171 hydrologically relevant parameters grouped into seven components of the flow regime: magnitude, variability, duration, frequency, timing, rate of change, and others. The methodology for estimating the River Flow Health Index (RFHI) consists of four steps: (1) segregation of the flow data based on preimpact and postimpact periods, (2) identification of important hydrological parameters, (3) assessment of the alterations, and (4) development of an index indicating the health of the river flow during the altered period on a 0–1 scale. The flow health of the river changed significantly due to the dams, with an overall alteration of 0.897. The degree of alterations in different components of the flow regime is magnitude (0.646), variability (0.978), duration (0.941), frequency (1.000), timing (0.978), rate of change (0.801), and others (1.000).

Daily flows at the downstream site during 1945–2015 reveal substantial reductions in flows after the construction of the W. A. C. Bennett and Peace Canyon dams. Homogenization of flows in the post-impact period altered the variability component of the flow regime. The duration and frequency of the extreme events are stunted post-dam regulation. This might result from water storage and release, and these multiple dams can store and attenuate all high-and low-pulse events. Alterations in the timing component resulted in the seasonal shift in streamflow by storing flood flows and releasing or utilizing them during lean seasons. Changes in Group 6, i.e., rate of change after the construction of the dams, indicate dam operations for energy production (i.e., peaking operations). Thus, the results indicate that the large dams across the Peace River can substantially change the natural flow regime. Our results may help upgrade the design and implementation of reservoir operation policies that consider downstream hydrological alterations.

How to cite: Mohanty, M. and Tare, V.: Method to quantify hydrological alterations due to anthropogenic interventions: A case study of Peace River, Canada, EGU General Assembly 2023, Vienna, Austria, 23–28 Apr 2023, EGU23-4054, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu23-4054, 2023.