Abstract
Over the last 200 years, large parts of the European wetlands have been drained and turned into land for agricultural use. Yet most of them are still characterised by groundwater levels just below the surface. Ecology and land use in these areas are adjusted to the specific site conditions. However, especially in regions of a more continental character such as the Elbe Lowlands, a lot of these wetlands are threatened today, because of the current hydro-climatic boundary conditions and water resources management practices. The questions are how global change will affect the water balance in the future, where the most vulnerable wetlands are and which site conditions have the most impact on the vulnerability of the wetlands. The water balance model WBalMo GLOWA-Elbe was used for scenario investigations at 35 large wetlands in the Elbe Lowlands. The results show increasing problems for the protection of typical wetland site conditions in the future. The actual evapotranspiration and the water consumption of the wetland areas will increase despite decreasing precipitation and usable water supply from the catchments in the summer months. Wetlands with relatively small catchments will have more problems than wetlands with large catchments. The consequence is an increasing water withdrawal deficit connected with lower groundwater levels. Water balance conditions typical for dry years today may be the ‘normal’ (mean) situation in 2050. This will intensify the problems and make the wetlands in the Elbe Lowland very vulnerable landscape elements in the future. For most wetlands in the Elbe Lowlands, climate change is the major threat. The only case where economic change has had a substantial impact on wetlands is in a basin where the water balance is affected by the future development of opencast lignite mines.
Published Version
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