Csilla Farkas
Research Professor
Biography
Csilla Farkas was graduated as a hydrologist and holds a Ph.D. in earth sciences. She has worked in the fields of soil hydrology, soil erosion, catchment hydrology and water quality. She has experience i) in mathematical modelling of land use, management, and climate change indicated changes in water, particle and nutrient transport in the soil and within the landscape and ii) in studying the spatio-temporal variability of soil properties and water balance elements.
Abstract
No abstract has been registered
Authors
Csilla Farkas Moritz Shore Agota Horel Agota Horel Gökhan Cüceloglu Dorota Mirosław-Świątek Maria Eliza TurekAbstract
Within the OPTAIN project, the effects of Natural/Small Water Retention Measures (NSWRMs) on water regime, soil erosion and nutrient transport are evaluated at both catchment- and field-scales for present and future climate conditions. The goal of this deliverable report D4.3 is to perform an integrated, model-based assessment of the effectiveness of NSWRMs at the field scale and to use these results for cross-validating the outputs obtained from the catchment-scale modelling. The assessment is based on the adaptation of a field-scale mathematical model (SWAP) to seven pilot sites across three European biogeographical regions and on combined analyses of NSWRM and projected climate scenarios. The scenarios are designed to evaluate the efficiency and potential of different NSWRMs in improving soil water retention and reducing flash floods and the loss of soil and nutrients under changing climate conditions. This report contains a detailed description of the SWAP modelling workflow, from input data preparation, model setup and harmonisation, model calibration and application in climate and NSWRM scenario runs. It presents calibration and NSWRM scenario results from seven OPTAIN case studies from three different biogeographical regions (Boreal, Continental and Pannonia). The report also describes i) the new approaches and tools developed within the OPTAIN project that facilitate the implementation of the scenarios and the interpretation of the modelling results, ii) the methods used to cross-validate the SWAP and SWAT+ models, and iii) the issues faced during the implementation of this work. The SWAP model was calibrated for all the pilot fields with good or satisfactory results. The impact of four in-field NSWRMs - reduced tillage, shifting to grassland, afforestation and drought tolerant crops - on the water balance elements was evaluated. The scenario results indicate that the effects of measures on soil water retention and other water balance elements have some regional pattern, but can be strongly dependent on local conditions (e.g. soil, crop, slope). According to the scenario results, for most of the cases the studied NSWRMs contributed to reducing evaporation, surface and subsurface runoff and percolation to deeper layers, which results in increased soil water retention or plant water uptake within the fields. The cross-validation of the field scale SWAP and catchment-scale SWAT+ models was a challenging task and could only be performed for selected water balance elements (evaporation, transpiration and drainage outflow). Comparable results were obtained in most of the cases for the baseline scenario, but the differences between the soil water balance elements simulated by the two models increased when implementing the different measures. The increased differences, however, could also reflect the differences in measure implementation, as these were constrained by the model’s structure and parameters. We concluded that the implementation of the SWAP field-scale model in the scenario analysis and cross-validation could positively contribute to i) better understanding the effects of NSWRMs at field level and ii) evaluating the outputs of the SWAP and SWAT+ models in a wider context. We concluded that NSWRMs can contribute to water retention within the landscape, and that this effect seems to decrease and increase in the future for measures related to management and land use change, respectively. The cross-validation of the water balance elements of the two models showed that the SWAP and SWAT+ simulation results were comparable for the status quo (present situation, for which the models have OPTAIN D4.3 Assessment of NSWRM effectiveness at field scale 6 / 143 been calibrated), but differed for the NSWRMs scenarios, depending on how the measures were implemented in the two models.
Authors
Martyn Futter Emma Lannergård Katrin Bieger Csilla Farkas Jens Fölster Pia Geranmayeh Anastasija Isidorova Brien Kronvang Dominika Krzeminska Katarina Kyllman Ainis Lagzdins Anu Lähteenmäki-Uutela Hannu Marttila Michael Peacock Katri Rankinen Eva Skarbøvik Anne Lyche Solheim Pasi Valkama Joachim AudetAbstract
Society increasingly expects that food will be produced in a sustainable, climate-smart manner. Nature based solutions (NBS), including ponds and constructed wetlands are widely promoted by researchers as a class of measures promoting healthy agricultural landscapes. However, a range of trade-offs associated with NBS influence practitioner’s decisions about their implementation and use. Making the right decisions about NBS requires, amongst other things, access to data from environmental monitoring programmes. The value of monitoring programmes depends on how well the data they collect and curate can be used to support decision-making. Here, we present a conceptual framework for assessing the value of monitoring programmes based on the relevance of the data they collect to decision maker needs, their overall running costs and their levels of uncertainty in characterizing the state of the environment. We demonstrate how our proposed framework can be used to assess the value of a range of monitoring programmes for quantifying trade-offs between nutrient load reduction and climate impacts from artificial wetlands in agricultural landscapes.
Division of Environment and Natural Resources
Riverine Inputs and Direct Discharges - RID
The Comprehensive Riverine Inputs and Direct Discharges (RID) programme aims to monitor and assess all inputs and discharges of selected contaminants to the OSPAR maritime area and its regions that are carried via rivers into tidal waters, or are discharged directly into the sea, for example through sewage pipelines or activities like aquaculture inputting substances directly.
Division of Environment and Natural Resources
MARCHES - Methodologies for Assessing the Real Costs to Health of Environmental Stressors
Division of Environment and Natural Resources
NORDBALT ECOSAFE: Nitrogen and phosphorus load reduction approach within safe ecological boundaries for the Nordic Baltic region
About the project
Division of Environment and Natural Resources
ENGAGE: Europe Nutrient Management - Guided Approaches for Greater Export reduction
ENGAGE aims to operationalise a novel vision for the future of multi-scale nutrientexport reduction and associated ecosystem services in national andtransboundary/international river basins in Europe by bringing together robuststakeholder engagement strategies with coupled state-of-the-art computationalhydrology techniques and online interactive use-tailored DS tool approaches that integrate remote sensing, socio-economic, governance, and society-change decisionelements.
Division of Food Production and Society
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Agriculture is one of the main sources of water pollution in Norway, and an important contributor to GHG emissions.