CIBER - Climate Impacts on Freshwater Biodiversity, Ecosystems and Resources

Despite substantial progress in biodiversity research, assessing freshwater ecosystems at large spatial scales remains limited by sparse in situ observations, inconsistent monitoring approaches, and the high temporal variability of aquatic environments. Freshwater biodiversity is declining faster than for any other ecosystem type, but consistent, spatially detailed tools to monitor these changes and link them to climate drivers are still lacking. Integrating satellite Earth Observation (EO) with ecological knowledge provides a way to address this gap and improve largescale assessments of freshwater ecosystem dynamics.

The CIBER project is a part of the ESA Biodiversity-Climate Studies Activities and addresses these challenges by integrating satellite EO based information with ecological modelling. Building on the ESA Climate Change Initiative (CCI), CIBER uses the Essential Climate Variable (ECV) datasets together with complementary EO products to improve understanding of how climate driven and environmental processes shape freshwater biodiversity. A key part of this project involves developing literature-informed habitat template models for inland fish species across Europe and Central Asia. These templates combine knowledge on environmental tolerances, functional requirements, and species environment relationships, forming a basis for linking ecological information with spatially explicit EO variables.

The complementary information generated in CIBER corresponds to spatially resolved habitat-relevant information from satellite based measurements of lake temperature regimes, trophic state, chlorophyll concentration, transparency, and turbidity. These variables can be mapped consistently across space and time, providing an opportunity to identify ecological gradients and detect shifts that local surveys may not capture. The project also develops model based reconstructions of vertical temperature and oxygen profiles in lakes, which are key factors of fish habitat availability and community organisation.

By combining EO datasets, ecological theory, and modelling tools, CIBER advances the development of scalable indicators for freshwater biodiversity assessment. This integrated framework improves the capacity to evaluate climate related impacts, informs conservation and management strategies, and contributes to a more consistent and data driven understanding of freshwater ecosystem dynamics across large geographic regions.