Effects of climate warming and increased meteorological variability on large monomictic lakes - a simulation approach using ecological lake models

• Applicant: Dr. Karsten Rinke
• Subject Area: Hydrogeology, Hydrology, Limnology, Urban Water Management, Water Chemistry, Integrated Water Resources Management
• Term: from 2010 to 2016
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 161767760

The projected consequences of global climatic change are expected to negatively affect water resources availability for humankind in terms of both, quantity and quality of water. This proposed project aims at providing information about the response of dominant determinants of water quality, e.g.phytoplankton or nutrient dynamics, and basic ecosystem processes in lakes to climatic conditions as projected by climatologists. In a first phase, we extend an existing coupled hydrodynamic-ecological water quality model of Lake Constance (DYRESM-CAEDYM) for achieving a generalized model specification (long-term simulations of the reoligotrophication of Lake Constance). In a second step we study the response of the model to expected changes in climatic conditions. In advance to previous approaches we will not only investigate the effects of rising temperature (warming effect) but also the consequences of increasing variability in meteorological conditions (variability effect) on the ecosystem scale. Thirdly, we perform – for the first time – model ensemble simulations with four European water quality models for providing a quantitative estimate of model uncertainties. Finally, since we hypothesize that the variability effect has strongly negative consequences for the deep water renewal in large lakes, we conduct field studies about the deep water renewal in Lake Constance and the role of lateral processes involved therein.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants