Deliverable 14. Impacts of climate and global change on the ecological, hydrological and agriculture systems in the LIFE MEDACC case study basins

This deliverable contains the results and conclusions of the assessment of climate and global change impacts on the ecological, hydrological and agriculture systems in the LIFE MEDACC case study basins: Muga, Ter and Segre. This deliverable only displays the results of the assessment, whereas the methodology followed and the input data used can be consulted at the Deliverable 13 Methodology to assess climate change impacts in the LIFE MEDACC case study basins: Generation of scenarios, vulnerability maps and quantification of impacts (Pascual et al. 2016).

The first section makes a general introduction to the deliverable objectives. The second section delves into how the climate would be under the RCP4.5 scenario in the three case-study basins. The third section draws future socioeconomic scenarios for the basins. We have developed three land cover scenarios for the headwaters (afforestation, fire and forest management scenarios) and two water use scenarios for the medium and low basin courses (rational use of water resources and increased demand scenarios). The fourth section evaluates the future effects of the combined scenarios in the water cycle and dynamics of the three basins. To do so, we have introduced the climate and socioeconomic scenarios into the calibrated and validated hydrological models (RheSSys and SWAT). The fifth section foresees future changes in agriculture suitability, crop production and growing cycle using net irrigation needs (NIR) of major crops and a set of agroclimatic parameters. Finally, the sixth section evaluates the effects of climate change on forests by inducing climate change into the GOTILWA+ model and estimating future daily DC values for the climate scenario.