Soil erosion under extreme rainfall modeled using a radar-runoff-nowcasting-system

Soil erosion by water is one of the most widespread forms of soil degradation responsible for relevant agricultural productivity losses. Under climate change, soil erosion is expected to increase mostly for a rising of the frequency of extreme and localised events. In intense hydrological phenomena such as flooding, and soil erosion, the spatiotemporal extent significantly impacts these phenomena, especially in extreme events. Therefore, an approach directed to better refine to understand such dynamics is recommended.

Here, we present the MSCA – SED RUNS project, focusing on the extreme rainfall effects on soil erosion using ground-weather-radar observations and hydrological modelling at regional scale (namely in Tuscany, central Italy).

The approach, based on statistical analysis and modelling methods, aims to: 1) Quantifying, over the last decade, the spatiotemporal distribution of extreme rainfalls / runoff and soil erosion, 2) Building a platform to model runoff and soil erosion for extreme events, 3) Simulating in real-time runoff and soil erosion as a precursor of for a regional-warning-system for extreme weather events.

Rainfall data will be provided by the national and regional institutions such as LaMMA Consortium (Tuscany Meteorological Agency) and the “Italian Civil Protection”, whose radar dataset of the national network (DPCN) covers the 2010–2020 period, with a spatial resolution of 1 km in a 10-mins time-step.

The project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie, Grant Agreement n. 101033236.