A new method for fine-scale assessments of the average urban Heat island over large areas and the effectiveness of nature-based solutions

People living in cities experience extra heat stress due to the so-called Urban Heat Island (UHI) effect. To gain an insight into the spatial variability of the UHI for the Netherlands, a detailed map (10 m horizontal resolution) has been calculated that shows the summer-averaged daily maximal UHI situation. The map is based on a relationship between the UHI, mean wind speed at 10 m height and the number of people living within a distance of 10 km, derived from simulations of over 100 European cities with the extensively validated urban climate model UrbClim. The cooling effect of green and blue infrastructure is also taken into account in the map, based on these simulation results. The presented map will help local authorities in defining target areas for climate adaptation measures and estimate the impact of nature-based solutions

Environment Explorer: Spatial Support System for the Integrated Assessment of Socio-Economic and Environmental Policies in the Netherlands

Environment Explorer is a system developed to support spatial scientists, planners and decision makers at the regional and national levels in the Netherlands to help them analyse a wide range of social, economic and environmental policies and their associated temporal and spatial dynamics. The core of this system consists of linked dynamic spatial models operating at both the macro- and the micro-geographical scales. At the macro scale, the modelling framework integrates several component sub models, representing the natural, social, and economic sub-systems. At the micro level, cellular automata based models determine the fate of individual parcels of land, based on institutional, physical and environmental factors as well as on the type of activities in their immediate neighbourhoods. The approach chosen enables the straightforward integration of detailed physical, environmental, and institutional characteristics as well as the particulars of the transportation infrastructure, and permits a very detailed representation of the evolving spatial system. As part of the policy support system, the models are supplemented with dedicated tools for interactive design, analysis and evaluation of the policy interventions and scenarios to be tried out. The system covers the entire territory of the Netherlands and represents processes at the national, the regional (40 economic regions), and the cellular (25 ha cells) levels. It runs on top of detailed GIS information and generates future land use and land cover for the period 2000 till 2030. The quality of the policies tried out is expressed in some 40 economic, social and environmental indicators available in the model as dynamic maps. The application has been developed over the past 5 years. It has been used at the national and the provincial level for the preparation of spatial policy documents. Some conclusions relative to the development and the use of the system are presented

Effect of climate change on runoff of Campylobacter and Cryptosporidium from land to surface water

Faeces originating from wildlife, domestic animals or manure-fertilized fields, is considered an important source of zoonotic pathogens to which people may be exposed by, for instance, bathing or drinking-water consumption. An increase in runoff, and associated wash-off of animal faeces from fields, is assumed to contribute to the increase of disease outbreaks during periods of high precipitation. Climate change is expected to increase winter precipitation and extreme precipitation events during summer, but has simultaneously also other effects such as temperature rise and changes in evapotranspiration. The question is to what extent the combination of these effects influence the input of zoonotic pathogens to the surface waters. To quantitatively analyse the impacts of climate change on pathogen runoff, pathogen concentrations reaching surface waters through runoff were calculated by combining an input model for catchment pathogen loads with the Wageningen Lowland Runoff Simulator (WALRUS). Runoff of Cryptosporidium and Campylobacter was evaluated under different climate change scenarios and by applying different scenarios for sources of faecal pollution in the catchments, namely dairy cows and geese and manure fertilization. Model evaluation of these scenarios shows that climate change has little overall impact on runoff of Campylobacter and Cryptosporidium from land to the surface waters. Even though individual processes like runoff fluxes, pathogen release and dilution are affected, either positively or negatively, the net effect on the pathogen concentration in surface waters and consequently also on infection risks through recreation seems limited

Assessment of the Impact of Climate Change and Land Management Change on Soil Organic Carbon Content, Leached Carbon Rates and Dissolved Organic Carbon Concentrations

Climate change is projected to significantly affect the concentrations and mobility of contaminants, such as metals and pathogens, in soil, groundwater and surface water. Climate- and land management-induced changes in soil organic carbon and dissolved organic carbon levels may promote the transport of toxic substances, such as copper and cadmium, and pathogenic microorganisms, ultimately affecting the exposure of humans and ecosystems to these contaminants. In this study, we adopted the Century model to simulate past (1900 - 2010), present, and future (2010 - 2100) SOC and DOC levels for a sandy and a loamy soil typical for Central and Western European conditions under three land use types (forest, grassland and arable land) and several future scenarios addressing climate change and land management change. The climate scenarios were based on the KNMI'06 G+ and W+ scenarios from the Royal Dutch Meteorological Institute. The simulated current SOC levels were compared to observed SOC values derived from various Dutch soil databases, taking into account the different soil depths the simulated and observed values refer to. The simulated SOC levels were generally in line with the observed values for the different kinds of soil and land use types. Climate change scenarios resulted in a decrease in both SOC and DOC for the grassland systems, whereas in the arable land (on sandy soil) and in the forest systems, SOC was found to increase and DOC to decrease. A sensitivity analysis of the individual effects of changes in temperature and precipitation showed that the effect of temperature predominates over the effect of precipitation. A reduction in the application rates of artificial fertilizers leads to a decrease in the SOC stocks and the leached carbon rates in the arable land systems, but has a negligible effect on SOC and DOC levels of the grassland systems. This study demonstrated the ability of the Century model to simulate climate change and agricultural management effects on SOC dynamics. The following step of this study will involve the translation of the soil organic matter pools as simulated with Century model, into pools of different metal binding capacity to be used for the metal partitioning and leaching modelling

A novel approach in calculating site-specific aftercare completion criteria for landfills in The Netherlands : Policy developments

As part of a more circular economy, current attention on waste is shifting from landfilling towards the prevention, re-use and recycling of waste materials. Although the need for landfills is decreasing, there are many landfills around the world that are still operational or at the point of starting the aftercare period. With traditional aftercare management, these landfills require perpetual aftercare at considerable cost due to monitoring and regular maintenance of liners. In an attempt to lower these aftercare costs, and to prevent that future generations become responsible for finding a sustainable solution of present day waste, the Dutch government takes action to explore the possibilities of sustainable landfill management. A project was started to investigate whether the use of source-oriented treatment techniques (so-called active treatment) of landfills can result in a sustainable emission reduction to soil and groundwater. During the next decade, sustainable landfill management is tested at three selected pilot landfills in the Netherlands. To enable this pilot testing and to determine its success after the experimental treatment period, a new methodology and conceptual framework was developed. The aim of this paper is to describe the development of the new methodology, and in particular the policy decisions, needed to determine whether the pilot experiments will be successful. The pilot projects are considered successful when the concentrations in the leachate of the pilot landfills have sufficiently been reduced and for longer periods of time and comply with the derived site-specific Environmental Protection Criteria (EPC). In that case, aftercare can be reduced, and it can be determined whether sustainable landfill management is economically feasible for further implementation

Assessment of the Effects of Climate Change on the Mobility and Distribution of Metals and Pathogens at the River Basin Scale

Anticipated climate change will most likely affect the mobility and distribution of contaminants, such as metals and pathogens, in soil, groundwater and surface water, ultimately affecting terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems, as well as public health. For example, temperature-induced changes in soil structure may affect species composition, thereby promoting the transport of toxic substances, such as copper and cadmium, and pathogenic microorganisms. In the framework of a project to assess the effects of climate change on the concentrations and fluxes of metals and pathogens at the catchment scale, a dynamic, spatially distributed River Basin Model that integrates catchment-scale transport models will be developed. The River Basin Model will consist of modules describing the transfers and feedbacks between the environmental compartments soil, groundwater and surface water. The innovative aspect of this project involves the development of a novel soil module to include the effects of changing soil organic matter content and composition on the speciation and transport pathways of contaminants. For this purpose, a point-scale soil organic matter and nutrient dynamics model will be linked to a chemical speciation and transport model, which allows a quantitative assessment of climate change effects on the mobility of metals and pathogens in various soil types. The results of this model analyses will be used to parameterize a large-scale soil module to be included in the river basin model. To assess the impact of climate change and changes in land use on the future distributions of contaminant concentrations in the major exposure pathways to man and ecosystems, a selected number of scenarios addressing climate change, agricultural practices (land use change, land management), current policies and mitigation strategies, will be defined. For each scenario, the River Basin Model will be used to project the probability distributions of contaminant concentrations in soil, groundwater and surface water. The River Basin Model will be tested in a moderately-sized river basin in the Netherlands and will feed input to a probabilistic risk assessment model that is being developed in a parallel project

Effects of climate change and land management on soil organic carbon dynamics and carbon leaching in northwestern Europe

Climate change and land management practices are projected to significantly affect soil organic carbon (SOC) dynamics and dissolved organic carbon (DOC) leaching from soils. In this modelling study, we adopted the Century model to simulate past (1906-2012), present, and future (2013-2100) SOC and DOC levels for sandy and loamy soils typical of northwestern European conditions under three land use types (forest, grassland, and arable land) and several future scenarios addressing climate change and land management change. To our knowledge, this is the first time that the Century model has been applied to assess the effects of climate change and land management on DOC concentrations and leaching rates, which, in combination with SOC, play a major role in metal transport through soil. The simulated current SOC levels were generally in line with the observed values for the different kinds of soil and land use types. The climate change scenarios result in a decrease in both SOC and DOC for the agricultural systems, whereas for the forest systems, SOC is projected to slightly increase and DOC to decrease. An analysis of the sole effects of changes in temperature and changes in precipitation showed that, for SOC, the temperature effect predominates over the precipitation effect, whereas for DOC the precipitation effect is more prominent. A reduction in the application rates of fertilisers under the land management scenario leads to a decrease in the SOC stocks and the DOC leaching rates for the arable land systems, but it has a negligible effect on SOC and DOC levels for the grassland systems. Our study demonstrated the ability of the Century model to simulate climate change and agricultural management effects on SOC dynamics and DOC leaching, providing a robust tool for the assessment of carbon sequestration and the implications for contaminant transport in soils

Direct and Indirect Effects of Climate Change on the Risk of Infection by Water-Transmitted Pathogens

Climate change is likely to affect the infectious disease burden from exposure to pathogens in water used for drinking and recreation. Effective intervention measures require quantification of impacts of climate change on the distribution of pathogens in the environment and their potential effects on human health. Objectives of this systematic review were to summarize current knowledge available to estimate how climate change may directly and indirectly affect infection risks due to <i>Campylobacter</i>, <i>Cryptosporidium</i>, norovirus, and <i>Vibrio</i>. Secondary objectives were to prioritize natural processes and interactions that are susceptible to climate change and to identify knowledge gaps. Search strategies were determined based on a conceptual model and scenarios with the main emphasis on The Netherlands. The literature search resulted in a large quantity of publications on climate variables affecting pathogen input and behavior in aquatic environments. However, not all processes and pathogens are evenly covered by the literature, and in many cases, the direction of change is still unclear. To make useful predictions of climate change, it is necessary to combine both negative and positive effects. This review provides an overview of the most important effects of climate change on human health and shows the importance of QMRA to quantify the net effects

Towards an ecosystem service-based method to quantify the filtration services of mussels under chemical exposure

Contains fulltext : 230302.pdf (publisher's version ) (Open Access

The response of metal leaching from soils to climate change and land management in a temperate lowland catchment

<p>Changes in soil hydrology as a result of climate change or changes in land management may affect metal release and leaching from soils. The aim of this study is to assess the cascading response of SOM and DOC levels and metal leaching to climate change in the medium-sized lowland Dommel catchment in the southern part of the Netherlands. We implemented the CENTURY model in a spatial setting to simulate SOM, DOC, and water dynamics in topsoils of the Dutch portion of the Dommel catchment under various climate and land management scenarios. These CENTURY model outputs were subsequently used to calculate changes in the topsoil concentrations, solubility, and leaching of cadmium (Cd) and zinc (Zn) for current (1991–2010) and future (2081–2100) conditions using empirical partition-relations. Since the metal leaching model could not be evaluated quantitatively against measured values, we focus mainly on the trends in the projected metal concentrations and leaching rates for the different scenarios. Our results show that under all climate and land management scenarios, the SOM contents in the topsoil of the Dommel catchment are projected to increase by about 10% and the DOC concentrations to decrease by about 20% in the period from present to 2100. These changes in SOM and DOC only have a minor influence on metal concentrations and leaching rates under the climate change scenarios. Our scenario calculations show a considerable decrease in topsoil Cd concentrations in the next century as a result of increased percolation rates. Zinc, however, shows an increase due to agricultural inputs to soil via manure application. These trends are primarily controlled by the balance between atmospheric and agricultural inputs and output via leaching. While SOM and DOC are important controls on the spatial variation in metal mobility and leaching rates, climate-induced changes in SOM and DOC only have a minor influence on metal concentrations and leaching rates. The climate-induced changes in metal concentrations in both the topsoil and the soil leachate are primarily driven by changes in precipitation and associated water percolation rates.</p