CLIMED · Climate Change, Water and Productivity in the Mediterranean: Capacity Building for Geospatial Modelling

Climate Change, Water and Productivity in the Mediterranean: Capacity Building for Geospatial Modelling

Please note that the summary report together with figures and logos is presented as an attachment. Title: Climate Change, Water and Productivity in the Mediterranean: Capacity Building for Geospatial Modelling Turkey is characterized by the contrasts between high mountain chains, vast plains, semi-arid and fertile lands, and transition between marine and continental climates. Presence of high gradients in topography makes the region prone to extremes and relatively rapid climatic changes. There is abundant experimental evidence supporting the assumption that some regions such as, Eastern Mediterranean part of Turkey, will severely be affected by climate change. The major objectives of this research project was to model the current and future dynamics of the Net Primary Productivity (NPP) and hydrological quantities of the Seyhan River Basin at the Eastern Mediterranean coast of Turkey under climate change. Therefore, the CliMed as a high-resolution case study was connected the hydrology with vegetation structure and functioning in a Mediterranean mountain catchment, to develop tools for understanding of climate change consequences using geospatial technologies. The major focus of the project using geospatial technologies is in two folds: i) Climate change and water management and modelling; Modelling the water, solute and erosion dynamics were done by means of the J2000 physically based system which was supported by GIS-analysis and remote sensing; ii) Linking hydrological dynamics with vegetation structure and functioning (e.g. NPP), simulation of temperature rise scenarios to predict the provision of ecosystem services in future. The present spatial distribution of climate data were generated with point data from 45 climate stations in the study area. Regional scale estimated data for 2070 were derived using a Regional Climate Model (RCM), for the research area as part of an international research project called Impact of Climate Changes on Agricultural Production System in Arid Areas (ICCAP). The spatial and downscaled meteorological time series were used to compute the spatially distributed hydrological quantities such as precipitation, evapotranspiration and runoff generation with a conceptual hydrological model approach J2000. The monthly NPP flux, defined as net fixation of CO2 by vegetation, is computed in CASA on the basis of LUE (Monteith, 1972; Potter et al., 2003). The model was utilized to predict annual regional fluxes in terrestrial net primary productivity at variable degrees of C, depending on the yearly conditions, with terrestrial net productivity. Several diverse datasets including temperature, rainfall values, solar radiation, percent tree cover, land cover map of the region, soil texture and NDVI scalars were used in this research. The output of the model was monthly NPP maps. The mean NPP differed significantly by all months and ranged from 0.65 to 125 under climate change. Estimated present and future annual NPP ranged from approximately 0.88–996.67 gCm−2 yr−1 and 0.60–959.33 gCm−2 yr−1 respectively. Using the CASA model we obtained an annual Seyhan watershed regional mean NPP of 328.85 and 311.21 gCm−2 yr−1 for present and future climate change scenarios and the NPP decreased by 17.64 gCm−2 yr−1 under A2 scenario of the SRES for this area. The CliMed multi-disciplinary approach addressed current physical conditions and future climate change scenarios through integrated process-based models, to identify the best practices and management options to arrest ecosystem functions decline and the associated loss of productivity in the Eastern Mediterranean.

Data: CORDIS, © European Union