Can’t escape the WaterScape: transforming water and governance systems for dealing with climate impacts in the Dutch Delta (WaterScape)

Linking climate, land use and local water management: interacting processes in the soil-water-plantatmosphere system The effect of climatic forcings on water fluxes is most evident on the Earth’s surface where precipitation can take multiple pathways to the surface water system. By means of runoff, infiltration or via evaporation the water can continue its journey. Besides climatic conditions, anthropogenic land use, water use and water management affect water resources. Consequently, both climate change and anthropogenic activities ‘at the soil surface’ can provide offsetting and additive impacts on water resources, while water resources also determine the suitability of areas for e.g. agricultural land use and specific nature targets. The shallow subsurface – with its interacting processes in the soil-water-plant-atmosphere system – thus connects atmospheric conditions with plant functioning, land use and groundwater recharge. This workpackage that is part of the Waterscape project, will enhance our process-based understanding of the interaction between climate change, water management and water use on groundwater recharge, nature and agriculture, by improving local scale modelling tools and policy supporting instruments.