Land Management & Natural Hazards Unit JRC Study on the Assessment of the economic impacts of drought for non-agricultural sectors Natural Hazards Action

Land Management & Natural Hazards Unit

JRC Study on the

Assessment of the economic impacts of drought

for non-agricultural sectors

Natural Hazards ActionInstitute for Environment and Sustainability

Contact: Carlo Lavalle, Stefan Niemeyer


…”Daily economical life is prepared to cope with variations in weather over days and weeks. An economic definition of drought will have to determine the point at which economy starts to react with measures such as increased prices for food, energy, or transport, because and only because of the impacts of drought.”

“This study aims to assess and quantify the direct and indirect impacts of droughts on economic sectors in Europe (at both continental and national scale) and to collect information about data availability. The study does not include direct impacts of agricultural droughts such as yield loss or livestock reduction.”


Drought impact assessment - objectives:

1. Review and assess the direct and indirect economic impacts of droughts on economic sectors, with the exclusion of direct impacts on agriculture related activities, for the EU Member States plus Norway, Switzerland, Croatia and Turkey.

2. Create a catalogue of metadata of information sources regarding droughts impacts available at EU, national, and regional level.


Drought impact assessment - priorities:

1. Energy sector• hydropower generation• cooling water for thermic and nuclear power plants

scarcity of cooling water warming up of cooling water

• Changes in production, changes in (short-term) prices

2. Transport sector• reduced transport capacity on inland waterways• increased use of alternative transport (esp. roads)• affected goods (esp. mass goods)• increase in prices of transport

3. Household / Drinking water supply / Tourism4. Process water for industry5. indirect agricultural effects, e.g. on food processing, agro-

industry, employment


Drought impact assessment:

• addressing statistical data on national and regional level• addressing interest groups, associations and sectoral

organisations

• results to be expected in summer 2007• depending on availability and quality of metadata catalogue,

further investigations envisaged


JRC project on

FAPAR retrieval as an indicator

of European vegetation health

Systematic Observations of Land and Ocean ActionInstitute for Environment and Sustainability

Contact: Nadine Gobron


Retrieval of the Fraction of Absorbed Photosynthetically Active Radiation (FAPAR)

FAPAR is an indicator of the state of vegetation and a fundamental surface parameter for environmental studies.

It represents the fraction of the solar energy absorbed by vegetation and plays the role of a battery during the plant photosynthetic process. FAPAR can be used to document the spatial variability and temporal evolution of the vegetation cover over large areas and long periods of time, and in particular monitor the seasonal and inter-annual changes.

The Systematic Observations of Land and Ocean Action developed mathematical algorithms to retrieve this fundamental quantity from space remote sensing data (currently SeaWiFS, MERIS).


2003

Anomalies of March-April-May cumulated FAPAR(reference period 1998-2005)

2005


Anomalies of March-April-May cumulated FAPAR(reference period 1998-2005)

The 2003 drought event is clearly detectable in the FAPAR product derived from space data as early as Spring 2003.

The FAPAR anomaly patterns correlate strongly with those of independently derived surface wetness indicators, and show that the water stress preceded the vegetation response by as much as (but not more than) a month in various places.

By contrast, the FAPAR products for the 2005 spring season indicate back to normal conditions of the terrestrial environment in central-western Europe, while the impact of drought on the Iberian Peninsula is visible much stronger in 2005 than in 2003.


JRC activities in the field of

Climate Change Effects on Natural Extremes / Natural Hazards


Contact: Luc Feyen


Climate Change Effects

• Land Management and Natural Hazards Unit comprises activities on• forest fires• floods• droughts• potentially wind storms, heat waves

• Scenario studies• exploit latest climate change model results on the regional scale• application to hydrological models used for flood forecasting• first results available for climate change impact on flood frequency and estimates of changes in potential damage

• … foreseen for other hazards including droughts as well


JRC Project

European Flood Alert System (EFAS)


Contact: Jutta Thielen, Ad de Roo


Background Information on EFAS

The European Flood Alert System (EFAS) based on LISFLOOD model system- Early warning (floods).- Will be capable of providing medium-range flood simulations across Europe with a lead-time between 3 to 15 days.- EFAS is at present in a development and testing phase (operational by 2010).

LISFLOOD

JRC European DataSoil, Surface,

river catchment

system, …

Member States data- River dimensions

- Alert levels

Meteo data-ECMWF-DWD-DMI

0

200

400

600

800

1000

1200

1400

0 100 200 300 400 500 600 700

time step

Observed

Original

Afforestation

River & basin management

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500

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1500

2000

2500

8/23/02 0:00 8/24/02 0:00 8/25/02 0:00 8/26/02 0:00 8/27/02 0:00 8/28/02 0:00 8/29/02 0:00 8/30/02 0:00 8/31/02 0:00

Dessau/Rosslau Wittenberg Torgau Riesa Dresden Labe Decin Labe/Usti N.L. Vltava/Prague

Flood simulation & forecasting (EFAS)

Special features:• Early flood alert to National Hydrological Services • Input to the MIC (Monitoring and Information Centre of DG-ENV) during criseshttp://efas.jrc.it


Feasibility on Droughts Detection and Monitoring

• European Flood Alert System (EFAS): spin-off soil moisture development, anomalies discharge, low flow estimates European scale datasets daily moisture status of land surface in Europe, incl. 7-days forecast, at: http://natural-hazards.jrc.it/activities_droughts.html

Soil moistureanomalies,north-west Italy

Daily soil moisture map

Low flow period Ebro, ES

20062005


The following information is currently available on-line at http://natural-hazards.jrc.it/ :

- daily top soil moisture maps - daily top soil moisture anomaly maps

wetter driernormal

The products…

very wet very dry


Soil moisture is presented in form of soil suction (pF) values of the top soil layer. The pF value describes the forces necessary for plants to apply in order to extract water from the soil for their use.It incorporates variations in the water holding capacity of different soil types and thus allows for comparison of the soil water status at different locations throughout Europe.

On the example day July 25th, 2006, the Mediterranean region is predominantly dry, with driest conditions visible in southern Spain. Large parts of U.K., France, and Poland exhibit dry conditions, too.

The products…

The map shows the current soil moisture in relation to the 15-years statistics as modelled with daily JRC-MARS data. Negative values indicate wetter conditions as compared to the normal (green), while positive values represent drier conditions than on average (orange/red).

The comparison with the long-term average reveals regions in Europe with extraordinary drought stress on the example day of July 25th, 2006.Northern Italy, north-west Spain, but also regions in eastern France, northern Germany, U.K. and Ireland are unusually dry for this date.






wetter driernormal

The products…

very wet very dry



- daily development of top-soil moisture in selected regions of Europe here: four regions in north-west Italy

The products…


The map shows administrative boundaries of European countries, of which a few are selected to demonstrate the temporal development of soil moisture during the last years.

The graph on the left shows the development of normalized soil moisture in four regions of Italy from January 2000 to August 2006. The summer 2006 showed a pronounce soil moisture anomaly towards extremely dry conditions for all four regions until July 2006. In August 2006 extensive rainfall finished this dry period and caused the sharp drop towards unusually wet conditions in August.

The graph on the right shows the modelled soil moisture development from January 2005 to today in higher detail. Differences among the regions from mountainous (red) to lowland locations (blue, violet) are well visible.

The products…The following information is currently available on-line at http://natural-hazards.jrc.it/ :

- daily development of top-soil moisture in selected regions of Europe here: four regions in north-west Italy


The products…

Tarn region, south-west France

Cuenca region, eastern Spain

2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006-3

-2

-1

0

1

2

3

years

Soil moisture anomaly Standardized Precipitation Index

2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006-3

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-1

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Soil moisture anomaly Standardized Precipitation Index

Combination of precipitation and soil moisture information:Standardized Precipitation Index – Soil moisture anomaly index


Trend: wetter soil conditions

2000 2002 2004 2006

2005-2006

Soil moisture development in Bulgaria

July 2005 - floods

The products…


Drought ForecastingBasis for drought forecasting are meteorological forecast products- National Weather Services (DWD, MeteoFrance, …)- European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF)

medium-range forecasts (one week) long-range forecasts (one month)

wetter drierNo changeSource: ECMWF seasonal forecast, August 15, 2006


Drought Forecasting

Currently, the medium-range forecasts of up to 10 days are used in flood forecasting & early alerting (EFAS). From this system, the daily 1-week qualitative trend (drier/wetter) in soil moisture development is derived.

In the near future, the medium-range forecast products of ECMWF will be extended to 14 days.

After proper calibration of EFAS, the system will provide valuable information also for river discharge forecasts in the low flow range.

Basis for drought forecasting are meteorological forecast products- National Weather Services (DWD, MeteoFrance, …)- European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF)

medium-range forecasts ( 10 days) long-range forecasts ( one month)

Monthly forecast products of up to 30 days ahead are currently underinvestigation for their potential in drought forecasting.

Seasonal forecasts are existing, but their skill is still quite low,especially for north-western Europe.

All long-term products are producedin ensemble mode and will be treatedas probabilistic products with associated uncertainties.


JRC study

Towards a European Drought Observatory


Contact: Stefan Niemeyer, Giovanni Laguardia


Droughts: the issue

Droughts have been recognized as a major natural hazard throughout Europe, and have created large damages to natural vegetation, agriculture, and society. The drought of 2003 has been responsible for an estimated economic damage of more than 12 billion Euro.

More recently other regions of Europe have been affected by water shortage situations, such as the Iberian Peninsular in 2004/05, France in 2005, or the south-east of the UK, where e.g. restrictions in public water supply have been implemented in spring 2006.

JRC is investigating the possibility to set up a European Drought Observatory, a Europe-wide system for drought forecasting, detection, and monitoring.

Benefiting from the pre-operational mode of the European Flood Alert System (EFAS) that is running on a daily basis, a first set of drought-relevant information can be readily produced and regularly updated.


A European Drought Observatory

• Platform for drought detection and monitoring, forecasting, and information exchange

• Commonly agreed products (e.g. drought indices) joint comparison and analysis of information mutual exchange of knowledge & methodologies direct up- and downscaling

• Multi-scale approach, integrating EU / continental level MS level Regional / basin scale

• Subsidiarity principle: European level information (+ platform) to be developed and managed at CEC-JRC National datasets managed at (interested) MS regional information processed by (interested) river basin / regional environmental authorities

• Exploiting medium- & long-range meteorological ensemble forecasts (weeks to month)


Background information on

Vision of a European Drought Observatory• WWW-based platform for drought monitoring, forecasting, and information exchange• Multi-scale approach, integrating EU / continental level, MS / (multi-)national level, and regional / river basin scale• Commonly agreed suite of products as minimum standard that are produced routinely on all levels

• e.g. SPI, Q95, soil moisture anomaly, …• de-central data holding and management, but direct linking and exchange between levels by common standards & formats• allows for direct up- and downscaling, comparison, analysis, and validation• provides a knowledge-based platform for discussion and exchange• regular feedback process between all levels for comparison and improvement

• Platform to be developed and tested at JRC• Choice of indicators will continuously improve and extend over time• Annual user community workshops• Continuous exchange with research community, thus benefiting from latest methodologies, new indicators, indices, etc.• Access to information managed at respective level (public / user community / restricted)



European Drought Observatory - Subsidiarity principle• EU level:

• managed at JRC • European-level partner organisations (e.g. ECMWF, EUMETSAT)• using European-wide / continental scale datasets• providing continuous and consistent overview information• large spatial scale allows for exploitation of long-term forecasts (up to months)• users: Commission services, MS, and regional bodies, public

• MS level:• at relevant & interested MS authorities (Ministry for Environ., National Meteo. / Hydro Services, …)• using national datasets, homogeneous for the entire territory• linking and integrating national drought observatories (if existing)• issuing national warnings, restrictions, …

• regional / river basin scale:• run by interested regional environmental agencies, river basin authorities, …• using local / regional data and networks• providing additional detailed local information• regional / basin scale measures of water management


A European Drought Observatory – current state

example ES:

• European Level Activities JRC: soil moisture e.g. ECMWF: meteorological forecast products

• Observatorio Nacional de la Sequía Ministerio de Medio Ambiente Estado de los sistemas de explotacion de recursos

• Confederación Hidrográfica del Ebro Indices mensuales Evolucción de la reserva hidraulica



European Drought Observatory – way forward

• start with small pilot version• including European overview level• small number of MS and regional authorities

• soon 1st workshop with (limited number of) interested partners from MS level• … early spring 2007• collect existing information• review experiences gained with National Observatories so far• propose (and agree?) first set of basic drought parameters to be included• discuss common format, presentation

• first prototype by beginning of 2008!• presentation to stakeholders, review and refinement

• networking with scientific community • inclusion of additional interested parties


… Thank you!

http://natural-hazards.jrc.it

Documents

Land Management & Natural Hazards Unit JRC Study on the Assessment of the economic impacts of drought for non-agricultural sectors Natural Hazards Action