WP8: D 8.4 DELIVERABLE 8.4 EFFICIENCY ASSESSMENT OF THE MEASURES TO MITIGATE GLOBAL CHANGE

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1 DELIVERABLE 8.4 EFFICIENCY ASSESSMENT OF THE MEASURES TO MITIGATE GLOBAL CHANGE TECHNICAL DETAILS Description: Report corresponding to the deliverable 8.4 of the Work Package 8: SERVICES () Elaboration: WP8 Members (led by the Vicenç Acuña) Contact: Vicenç Acuña Delivery date: Nov 1 st,

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3 During the SCARCE project, the InVEST model has been implemented in Mediterranean basins (Llobregat and Ebro) (Terrado et al., 2014), and has been used to evaluate the current flow of services, as well as the flow of services under Global change scenarios (Bangash et al., 2013). Furthermore, it has been also used to assess the effects of mitigation actions against Climate change (Boithias et al., 2013). Simultaneously, the model has been improved, to include more services (Terrado et al., 2015a), and to value ecosystem services with multiple benefits and accounting for uncertainty (Boithias et al., 2015). Improvements also included analysis of uncertainty of two of the most important services, water provisioning (Sánchez-Canales et al., 2012), and erosion control (Sánchez-Canales et al., 2014); as well as the implementation of in-stream processes in the model to account for the services waste treatment and erosion control (Sánchez-Canales et al., 2014). Finally, the model has been also used to estimate the benefits related with the implementation of the management actions detailed in the Program of Measures of the Llobregat River basin management plan (Terrado et al., 2015b). The goal of D8.4 is to describe the use of the developed model to evaluate how different management actions could be used to mitigate the effects of climate change in a river basin. This implies testing alternatives, time horizons, and scenarios, using different hydrological data and also different operating policies. The product to be obtained includes flows and state of the elements; multi-objective performance indicators (reliability, resiliency and vulnerability); and environmental requirements indicators. This has been the object of two papers developed under the SCARCE framework. These articles are that on the mitigation actions against Climate Change (Boithias et al., 2013), and the assessment of multiple benefits related with the implementation of the Program of Measures (Terrado et al., 2015b). The first one is an exercise of the effects of Climate change on the balance between supply and demand of a particular ecosystem service, water provisioning. Furthermore, the effect of the implementation of various mitigation actions was assessed. Briefly, we computed water balances across the Ebro River basin (North-East Spain) with the spatially explicit InVEST model. We highlighted the spatial and temporal mismatches existing across a single hydrological basin regarding water provisioning and its consumption, considering or not, the environmental demand (environmental flow). The 3

4 article showed that water scarcity is commonly a local issue (sub-basin to region scales), but that all demands were met at the largest considered spatial scale (basin). This was not the case in the worst-case scenario (increasing demands and decreasing supply), as the supply:demand ratio (S:D) at the basin scale was near 1, indicating that serious problems of water scarcity might occur in the near future even at the basin scale. The analysis of possible mitigation scenarios revealed that the impact of Global change may be counteracted by the decrease of irrigated areas (Figure 1). Figure 1. Interannual average of the simulated supply:demand (S:D) ratio throughout the Ebro River basin in the case of a dry climate extreme (annual precipitation average of years 1996, 1997, 2003, and 2008), for 3 scenarios of land use regarding changes in the irrigated area (actual, 20% and+20%) and at 4 different spatial scales, (a) for supply not considering environmental flow and, (b) for supply considering environmental flow. 4

5 The second article is by Terrado (Terrado et al., 2015b). It counts with the assessment of multiple benefits linked with the biophysical estimates of four freshwater ecosystem services (water provisioning, erosion control, waste treatment, and habitat for species). This second article allows in fact for the monetary valuation of the effect of management actions, and has been focused on the Program of Measures of the Llobregat River basin management plan. For example, a management action such as the implementation of environmental flows influences the delivery of the ecosystem service water provisioning, so that several benefits are also influenced. Among those benefits changing, some provide positive marginal values, whereas others such as hydroelectric production provide negative marginal values (Figure 2). Figure 2. Hydropower production in the Llobregat River basin (expressed for each sub-basin associated to a specific water body) with no action (first from left), and with the implementation of the action (second from left). The marginal value in biophysical units is expressed in MWh per year (third from left), and in monetary units (fourth from left). The rationale of providing efficiency assessment of the measures to mitigate global change is to use the methodology of the second paper described above and the objectives of the first one. At the moment of the deliverable preparation, the related 5

6 second article is not completed, as the tools to perform the exercise are not yet fully operative, but is expected to be completed during the first half of

7 REFERENCES WP8: D 8.4 Bangash RF, Passuello A, Sánchez-Canales M et al. (2013) Ecosystem services in Mediterranean river basin: Climate change impact on water provisioning and erosion control. The Science of the total environment, , Boithias L, Acuña V, Vergoñós L, Ziv G, Marcé R, Sabater S (2013) Assessment of the water supply:demand ratios in a Mediterranean basin under different global change scenarios and mitigation alternatives. The Science of the total environment, C, Boithias L, Terrado M, Corominas L et al. (2015) Analysis of the uncertainty in ecosystem services monetary valuation a case study at the river basin scale. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences - In revision. Sánchez-Canales M, López Benito A, Passuello A et al. (2012) Sensitivity analysis of ecosystem service valuation in a Mediterranean watershed. The Science of the total environment, 440, Sánchez-Canales M, López-Benito a, Acuña V, Ziv G, Hamel P, Chaplin-Kramer R, Elorza FJ (2014) Sensitivity analysis of a sediment dynamics model applied in a Mediterranean river basin: Global change and management implications. The Science of the total environment, 502C, Terrado M, Acuña V, Ennaanay D, Tallis H, Sabater S (2014) Impact of climate extremes on hydrological ecosystem services in a heavily humanized Mediterranean basin. Ecological Indicators, 37, Terrado M, Sabater S, Chaplin-Kramer B, Mandle L, Ziv G, Acuña V (2015a) Model development for the assessment of terrestrial and aquatic habitat quality in conservation planning. Conservation Biology. In revision. Terrado M, Boithias L, Bardina M, Munné A, Chaplin-Kramer B, Sabater S, Acuňa V (2015b) Assessment of the costs and benefits of the measures to be implemented in the river basin management plans. In preparation. 7