Abstract
Rainfall erosivity causes considerable environmental damage by driving soil loss. However, the long-term evolution of erosive forcing (over centennial to millennial time-scales) remains essentially unknown. Using a rainfall erosivity model (REMARB), this study simulates the variability of rainfall erosivity in Arno River Basin (ARB), Italy, a Mediterranean fluvial basin, for the period 1000–2019 CE resulting in the world’s longest time-series of erosivity. The annual estimates show a noticeable and increasing variability of rainfall erosivity during the Little Ice Age (∼1250–1849), especially after c. 1490, until the end of 18th century. During this cold period, erosive forcing reached ∼1600 MJ mm hm−2 h−1 yr−1once every four years, and ∼3000 MJ mm hm−2 h−1 yr−1once every 20 years. The extremes of rainfall erosivity (the 98th percentile) followed a similar increasing trend, with an acceleration of the hydrological hazard (erosivity per unit of rainfall) during the 20th century. The comparison ofREMARBoutput with the sediment yield of the basin (1951–2010) confirmed the model’s ability to predict geomorphological effects in the ARB. Thus, our methodology could be applied to simulate erosivity in environmentally similar basins. A relationship has been identified between the Atlantic Multidecadal Variation and erosivity patterns, suggesting a role of North Atlantic circulation dynamics on the hydrology of central Italy’s fluvial basins.
Highlights
Damaging hydrological events triggered by either short and intense storms, or longer duration rainfall (e.g., Diodato et al, 2020b; Duulatov et al, 2021), cause sustained erosive forcing and considerable soil losses in many parts of the world (Wuepper et al, 2020)
We have improved our understanding of the interannual variability of hydrological extremes in a Mediterranean fluvial basin using a continuous time-series of rainfall erosivity, reconstructed back to 1000 CE
For the whole period assessed (1000–2019 CE), the main results can be summarized as follows: 1. Erosivity estimates across the Arno River Basin (ARB) since 1000 CE show an alternation of stormy and calmer periods, with a change point toward the end of the 15th century (i.e., 1490)
Summary
Damaging hydrological events triggered by either short and intense storms, or longer duration rainfall (e.g., Diodato et al, 2020b; Duulatov et al, 2021), cause sustained erosive forcing and considerable soil losses in many parts of the world (Wuepper et al, 2020). They may increase in frequency and/or severity with changes in the climate system associated with global warming (Easterling et al, 2000; Morera et al, 2017; Harris et al, 2018; Rineau et al, 2019; Wei et al, 2020). Mixtures of convective and mesoscale systems can produce changes of rainfall systems and contribute to erosive storms irregularly distributed in this region (Diodato and Bellocchi, 2012)
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