Ongoing RdP-related projects
Hydrological Controls on Carbonate-mediated CO2 Consumption
Funded by the Italian Ministry of University and Research
Unraveling interactions between WATER and carbon cycles during drought and their impact on water resources and forest and grassland ecosySTEMs in the Mediterranean climate
Funded by the Italian Ministry of University and Research
A new interdisciplinary approach to advance understanding of sediment and large wood TRANSport in FORested Mountain catchments
Funded by the European Union (Next Generation EU)
WATer isotopeS in the critical zONe: from groundwater recharge to plant transpiration
Funded by the European Union
Past RdP-related projects
​WATer mixing in the critical ZONe: observations and predictions under environmental changes
Funded by the Italian Ministry of University and Research
Hydro4C
Carbon is the fourth most abundant element in the universe and plays a vital role in Earth’s environment. Chemical weathering of carbonate and silicate minerals is an important sink of carbon as it consumes atmospheric CO2 and increases the ion content in the rivers. In the short geological term (<1 Myr) both carbonate and silicate weathering consume atmospheric CO2, while in the long term only silicate weathering contributes to CO2 consumption. Recent studies suggest that the role of carbonate weathering in the global carbon cycle cannot be overlooked also at small timescales (100-10.000 yr) due to fast kinetics of carbonate dissolution, and that the effect of lithologies where the carbonate component is non-dominant (but non-negligible) is still not clear. Furthermore, the interactions that hydrological (e.g., variation in water runoff), hydrogeological (groundwater flow) and geomorphological (e.g. erosion) processes have with chemical weathering remain controversial and poorly understood.
Hydro4C project aims at better understanding and quantifying the hydrological mechanisms that regulate the exchange of CO2 between the atmosphere and rocks in Mediterranean basins. In particular, the project addresses two fundamental questions:
1) In the short term, is there a significant difference between the CO2 consumption in catchments with mixed sedimentary lithologies versus purely carbonate lithologies?
2) How much atmospheric CO2 consumption is driven by hydrologically governed processes such as erosion and groundwater flow?
The project will be carried out within the Arno and Tiber basins (Central Italy) and will involve three pilot catchments set on two of the rock types that mainly outcrop in Italy. Two of the catchments are characterized by mixed sedimentary lithologies and one is purely set on carbonate rocks. All catchments are already instrumented and monitored, guaranteeing the feasibility and success of the proposed activities. In all catchments, the following tasks will be performed: 1) monitoring and sampling of dissolved and suspended load, 2) empirical modeling of chemical weathering products versus water discharge, electrical conductivity and suspended sediment concentration, 3) calculation of atmospheric CO2 consumption by means of hydrological and geomorphological modeling of surface runoff and sediment transport.
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TRANSFORM (read more on the project here)
Transport of bedload, suspended sediment, and large wood in mountain catchments is a key process that profoundly affects stream morphology and ecology and controls natural hazards. Reliable monitoring and modelling approaches are critical to interpret sediment and large wood movements across the stream network and predict the stream morphodynamics evolution, supporting management strategies. Despite the number of previous studies, several processes remain poorly known, mostly due to the use of monodisciplinary methodologies. TRANSFORM relies on a partnership with highly complementary expertise and adopts a novel and integrated approach at the intersection of different disciplines to obtain a more detailed understanding of sediment and large wood transport dynamics in mountain forested catchments.
TRANSFORM addresses still unanswered questions on i) the temporal variability of sediment and large wood across multiple scales in small mountain forested catchments; ii) the role of streamflow temporal sources in controlling sediment and large wood transport during runoff events of different magnitude; iii) the suitability of geophysical (seismic and acoustic) measurements coupled to direct and indirect measurements and multi-dimensional models to improve sediment and large wood transport monitoring; and iv) the development of new mathematical models to reproduce mutual interactions between flow, sediment, and large wood, and their impact on hydraulic infrastructures.
The project results will advance scientific knowledge and strongly impact the interdisciplinary community interested in stream hydrology and geomorphology, geophysical monitoring, and numerical modelling of fluvial processes. At the same time, the project findings will have important societal implications providing the main stakeholders with robust, scientific-based information useful for decision-making and effective and sustainable management of sediment and large wood in forested mountain catchments.
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WATZON
Understanding and predicting water availability and associated ecosystem services in the critical zone (CZ), which is the domain where water cycle connects the subsurface to vegetation and atmosphere, controlling water quantity and quality, is essential to provide effective solutions for sustainable land and water resources management. The main objective of WATZON (WATer mixing in the critical ZONe: observations and predictions under environmental changes) is to advance the understanding of water mixing in the CZ by investigating ecohydrological processes of water exchange between vegetation and
water compartments. The project will integrate environmental tracers, advanced geophysical measurements and detailed ecohydrological models, applied through the creation of a new network of study sites in Italy, to develop an interdisciplinary and holistic comprehension of ecohydrological dynamics under different climatic forcing and land use conditions. The main impact of the project will include a significant advancement of scientific research on water mixing processes in the CZ, and the translation of scientific knowledge into practices for stakeholders to develop effective solutions for sustainable water resources management across a variety of climate settings.
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