1. |
- Arabameri, Alireza, et al.
(author)
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A comparison of statistical methods and multi-criteria decision making to map flood hazard susceptibility in Northern Iran
- 2019
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In: Science of the Total Environment. - : Elsevier BV. - 0048-9697 .- 1879-1026. ; 660, s. 443-458
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- In north of Iran, flood is one of the most important natural hazards that annually inflict great economic damages on humankind infrastructures and natural ecosystems. The Kiasar watershed is known as one of the critical areas in north of Iran, due to numerous floods and waste of water and soil resources, as well as related economic and ecological losses. However, a comprehensive and systematic research to identify flood-prone areas, which may help to establish management and conservation measures, has not been carried out yet. Therefore, this study tested four methods: evidential belief function (EBF), frequency ratio (FR), Technique for Order Preference by Similarity To ideal Solution (TOPSIS) and Vlse Kriterijumsk Optimizacija Kompromisno Resenje (VIKOR) for flood hazard susceptibility mapping (FHSM) in this area. These were combined in two methodological frameworks involving statistical and multi-criteria decision making approaches. The efficiency of statistical and multi-criteria methods in FHSM were compared by using area under receiver operating characteristic (AUROC) curve, seed cell area index and frequency ratio. A database containing flood inventory maps and flood-related conditioning factors was established for this watershed. The flood inventory maps produced included 132 flood conditions, which were randomly classified into two groups, for training (70%) and validation (30%). Analytical hierarchy process (AHP) indicated that slope, distance to stream and land use/land cover are of key importance in flood occurrence in the study catchment. In validation results, the EBF model had a better prediction rate (0.987) and success rate (0.946) than FR, TOPSIS and VIKOR (prediction rate 0.917, 0.888, and 0.810; success rate 0.939, 0.904, and 0.735, respectively). Based on their frequency ratio and seed cell area index values, all models except VIKOR showed acceptable accuracy of classification.
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2. |
- Ardakani, Amir Hossien Hatefi, et al.
(author)
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Selecting potential locations for groundwater recharge by means of remote sensing and GIS and weighting based on Boolean logic and analytic hierarchy process
- 2022
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In: Environmental Earth Sciences. - : Springer Nature. - 1866-6280 .- 1866-6299. ; 81:1
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Growing demand for water, as a consequence of population growth, farmland irrigation, and industrial expansion, results in groundwater resources exploitation. This, in combination with droughts induced by climate change, has caused a sharp drop in groundwater levels throughout arid and semiarid countries. In Iran, all these factors are resulting in alarming water scarcity. Appropriate management and control of existing water resources can overcome water shortages, with healthy and sustainable management of groundwater as one of the most efficient tools. Artificial recharge of aquifers can be used to replenish water supplies and restore the water resources in Iran and other semiarid and arid countries, but selection of the right location for runoff collection is essential to achieve success. Precipitation, slope, geology, lineament density, drainage density, aquifer water quality, groundwater level, vegetation, and land use were selected in this study as key factors in locating suitable sites for artificial recharge. The weight of each, in terms of importance and impact on aquifer recharge, was determined using remote sensing techniques to prepare layers and analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and Boolean logic to identify the optimal weight for each factor. Geographic information system (GIS) was used for modeling, applying the weight of each criterion, and producing a final map. The results showed better performance of AHP than Boolean logic. For artificial recharge, 9.9% of the total study area (Mahdishahr in northern Iran) was found to be in a very good position and 22.6% in a good position. On filtering the privacy layer of fountains and aqueducts, the very good and good area declined to 8.4% and 14.7% of the total area, respectively, and mainly comprised alluvial valleys and coarse alluvial sediments with low slope and drainage density.
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3. |
- Fernandez-Anez, Nieves, et al.
(author)
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Current Wildland Fire Patterns and Challenges in Europe : A Synthesis of National Perspectives
- 2021
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In: Air, Soil and Water Research. - : SAGE Publications. - 1178-6221. ; 14, s. 1-19
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Research review (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Changes in climate, land use, and land management impact the occurrence and severity of wildland fires in many parts of the world. This is particularly evident in Europe, where ongoing changes in land use have strongly modified fire patterns over the last decades. Although satellite data by the European Forest Fire Information System provide large-scale wildland fire statistics across European countries, there is still a crucial need to collect and summarize in-depth local analysis and understanding of the wildland fire condition and associated challenges across Europe. This article aims to provide a general overview of the current wildland fire patterns and challenges as perceived by national representatives, supplemented by national fire statistics (2009–2018) across Europe. For each of the 31 countries included, we present a perspective authored by scientists or practitioners from each respective country, representing a wide range of disciplines and cultural backgrounds. The authors were selected from members of the COST Action “Fire and the Earth System: Science & Society” funded by the European Commission with the aim to share knowledge and improve communication about wildland fire. Where relevant, a brief overview of key studies, particular wildland fire challenges a country is facing, and an overview of notable recent fire events are also presented. Key perceived challenges included (1) the lack of consistent and detailed records for wildland fire events, within and across countries, (2) an increase in wildland fires that pose a risk to properties and human life due to high population densities and sprawl into forested regions, and (3) the view that, irrespective of changes in management, climate change is likely to increase the frequency and impact of wildland fires in the coming decades. Addressing challenge (1) will not only be valuable in advancing national and pan-European wildland fire management strategies, but also in evaluating perceptions (2) and (3) against more robust quantitative evidence.
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4. |
- Kalantari, Zahra, et al.
(author)
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Assessing flood probability for transportation infrastructure based on catchment characteristics, sediment connectivity and remotely sensed soil moisture
- 2019
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In: Science of the Total Environment. - : Elsevier BV. - 0048-9697 .- 1879-1026. ; 661, s. 393-406
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Flooding may damage important transportation infrastructures, such as roads, railways and bridges, which need to be well planned and designed to be able to withstand current and possible future climate-driven increases in flood frequencies and magnitudes. This study develops a novel approach to predictive statistical modelling of the probability of flooding at major road-stream intersection sites, where water, sediment and debris can accumulate and cause failure of drainage facilities and associated road damages. Two areas in south-west Sweden, affected by severe floods in August 2014, are used in representative case studies for this development. A set of physical catchment-descriptors (PCDs), characterizing key aspects of topography, morphology, soil type, land use, hydrology (precipitation and soil moisture) and sediment connectivity in the water-and sediment-contributing catchments, are used for the predictive flood modelling. A main novel contribution to such modelling is to integrate the spatiotemporal characteristics of remotely-sensed soil moisture in indices of sediment connectivity (IC), thereby also allowing for investigation of the role of soil moisture in the flood probability for different road-stream intersections. The results suggest five categories of PCDs as especially important for flood probability quantification and identification of particularly flood-prone intersections along roads (railways, etc.) These include: channel slope at the road-stream intersection and average elevation, soil properties (mainly percentage of till), land use cover (mainly percentage of urban areas), and a sediment connectivity index that considers soil moisture in addition to morphology over the catchment.
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5. |
- Keesstra, Saskia, et al.
(author)
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The superior effect of nature based solutions in land management for enhancing ecosystem services
- 2018
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In: Science of the Total Environment. - : Elsevier BV. - 0048-9697 .- 1879-1026. ; 610, s. 997-1009
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Research review (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The rehabilitation and restoration of land is a key strategy to recover services - goods and resources-ecosystems offer to the humankind. This paper reviews key examples to understand the superior effect of nature based solutions to enhance the sustainability of catchment systems by promoting desirable soil and landscape functions. The use of concepts such as connectivity and the theory of system thinking framework allowed to review coastal and river management as a guide to evaluate other strategies to achieve sustainability. In land management NBSs are not mainstream management. Through a set of case studies: organic farming in Spain; rewilding in Slovenia; land restoration in Iceland, sediment trapping in Ethiopia and wetland construction in Sweden, we show the potential of Nature based solutions (NBSs) as a cost-effective long term solution for hydrological risks and land degradation. NBSs can be divided into two main groups of strategies: soil solutions and landscape solutions. Soil solutions aim to enhance the soil health and soil functions through which local eco-system services will bemaintained or restored. Landscape solutions mainly focus on the concept of connectivity. Making the landscape less connected, facilitating less rainfall to be transformed into runoff and therefore reducing flood risk, increasing soilmoisture and reducing droughts and soil erosionwe can achieve the sustainability. The enhanced eco-system services directly feed into the realization of the Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations.
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6. |
- Rahmati, Omid, et al.
(author)
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TET : An automated tool for evaluating suitable check-dam sites based on sediment trapping efficiency
- 2020
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In: Journal of Cleaner Production. - : Elsevier BV. - 0959-6526 .- 1879-1786. ; 266
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Sediment control is important for supplying clean water. Although check dams control sediment yield, site selection for check dams based on the sediment trapping efficiency (TE) is often complex and time-consuming. Currently, a multi-step trial-and-error process is used to find the optimal sediment TE for check dam construction, which limits this approach in practice. To cope with this challenge, we developed a user-friendly, cost- and time-efficient geographic information system (GIS)-based tool, the trap efficiency tool (TET), in the Python programming language. We applied the tool to two watersheds, the Hableh-Rud and the Poldokhtar, in Iran. To identify suitable sites for check dams, four scenarios (S1: TE ≥ 60%, S2: TE ≥ 70%, S3: TE ≥ 80%, S4: TE ≥ 90%) were tested. TET identified 189, 117, 96, and 77 suitable sites for building check dams in S1, S2, S3, and S4, respectively, in the Hableh-Rud watershed, and 346, 204, 156, and 60 sites in S1, S2, S3, and S4, respectively, in the Poldokhtar watershed. Evaluation of 136 existing check dams in the Hableh-Rud watershed indicated that only 10% and 5% were well-located and these were in the TE classes of 80–90% and ≥90%, respectively. In the Poldokhtar watershed, only 11% and 8% of the 207 existing check dams fell into TE classes 80–90% and ≥90%, respectively. Thus, the conventional approach for locating suitable sites at which check dams should be constructed is not effective at reaching suitable sediment control efficiency. Importantly, TET provides valuable insights for site selection of check dams and can help decision makers avoid monetary losses incurred by inefficient check-dam performance.
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7. |
- Raška, Pavel, et al.
(author)
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Identifying barriers for nature-based solutions in flood risk management : An interdisciplinary overview using expert community approach
- 2022
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In: Journal of Environmental Management. - : Elsevier BV. - 0301-4797 .- 1095-8630. ; 310
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The major event that hit Europe in summer 2021 reminds society that floods are recurrent and among the costliest and deadliest natural hazards. The long-term flood risk management (FRM) efforts preferring sole technical measures to prevent and mitigate floods have shown to be not sufficiently effective and sensitive to the environment. Nature-Based Solutions (NBS) mark a recent paradigm shift of FRM towards solutions that use nature-derived features, processes and management options to improve water retention and mitigate floods. Yet, the empirical evidence on the effects of NBS across various settings remains fragmented and their implementation faces a series of institutional barriers. In this paper, we adopt a community expert perspective drawing upon LAND4FLOOD Natural flood retention on private land network (https://www.land4flood.eu) in order to identify a set of barriers and their cascading and compound interactions relevant to individual NBS. The experts identified a comprehensive set of 17 barriers affecting the implementation of 12 groups of NBS in both urban and rural settings in five European regional environmental domains (i.e., Boreal, Atlantic, Continental, Alpine-Carpathian, and Mediterranean). Based on the results, we define avenues for further research, connecting hydrology and soil science, on the one hand, and land use planning, social geography and economics, on the other. Our suggestions ultimately call for a transdisciplinary turn in the research of NBS in FRM.
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