Faculty of Architecture, Landscape Architecture Department, Cukurova University, 01330, Adana, Turkey.
School of Geography, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK.
Environ Monit Assess. 2020 Jul 7;192(8):491. doi: 10.1007/s10661-020-08429-5.
The impacts of climate change on soil erosion are mainly caused by the changes in the amount and intensity of rainfall and rising temperature. The combination of rainfall and temperature change is likely to be accompanied by negative or positive variations in agricultural and forest management. Turkey contains vast fertile plains, high mountain chains and semi-arid lands, with a climate that ranges from marine to continental and therefore is susceptible to soil erosion under climate change, particularly on high gradients and in semi-arid areas. This study aims to model the soil erosion risk under climate change scenarios in Turkey using the Pan-European Soil Erosion Assessment (PESERA) model, predicting the likely effects of land use/cover and climate change on sediment transport and soil erosion in the country. For this purpose, PESERA was applied to estimate the monthly and annual soil loss for 12 land use/cover types in Turkey. The model inputs included 128 variables derived from soil, climate, land use/cover and topography data. The total soil loss from the land surface is speculated to be approximately 285.5 million tonnes per year. According to the IPCC 5th Assessment Report of four climate change scenarios, the total soil losses were predicted as 308.9, 323.5, 320.3 and 355.3 million tonnes for RCP2.6, RCP4.5, RCP6.0 and RCP8.5 scenarios respectively from 2060 to 2080. The predicted amounts of fertile soil loss from agricultural land in a year were predicted to be 55.5 million tonnes at present, and 62.7, 59.9, 61.7 and 58.1 under RCP2.6, RCP4.5, RCP6.0 and RCP8.5 respectively. This confirms that approximately 30% of the total erosion occurs over the agricultural lands. In this respect, degraded forests, scrub and arable lands were subjected to the highest erosion rate (68%) of the total, whereas, fruit trees and berry plantations reflected the lowest erosion rates. Low soil organic carbon, sparse vegetation cover and variable climatic conditions significantly enhanced the erosion of the cultivated lands by primarily removing the potential food for organisms. Finally, process-based models offer a valuable resource for decision-makers when improving environmental management schemes and also decrease uncertainty when considering risks.
气候变化对土壤侵蚀的影响主要是由降雨量和温度升高的变化引起的。降雨和温度变化的结合可能伴随着农业和林业管理的负面或正面变化。土耳其拥有广阔肥沃的平原、高山山脉和半干旱地区，气候从海洋性到大陆性不等，因此容易受到气候变化引起的土壤侵蚀的影响，特别是在高坡度和半干旱地区。本研究旨在使用泛欧土壤侵蚀评估（PESERA）模型模拟土耳其气候变化情景下的土壤侵蚀风险，预测土地利用/覆盖和气候变化对该国泥沙输送和土壤侵蚀的可能影响。为此，应用 PESERA 模型估算了土耳其 12 种土地利用/覆盖类型的月和年土壤流失量。模型输入包括从土壤、气候、土地利用/覆盖和地形数据中得出的 128 个变量。据推测，每年从陆地表面流失的土壤总量约为 2.855 亿吨。根据 IPCC 第五次评估报告中的四个气候变化情景，预计从 2060 年到 2080 年，RCP2.6、RCP4.5、RCP6.0 和 RCP8.5 情景下的总土壤损失分别为 3.089 亿、3.235 亿、3.203 亿和 3.553 亿吨。预测目前每年从农业用地流失的肥沃土壤量为 5550 万吨，而在 RCP2.6、RCP4.5、RCP6.0 和 RCP8.5 情景下，分别为 6270 万吨、5990 万吨、6170 万吨和 5810 万吨。这证实了大约 30%的总侵蚀发生在农业土地上。在这方面，退化的森林、灌木丛和耕地受到了总侵蚀率（68%）最高的侵蚀，而果树和浆果种植园则反映出最低的侵蚀率。低土壤有机碳、稀疏的植被覆盖和多变的气候条件极大地加剧了耕地的侵蚀，主要是通过消除生物的潜在食物。最后，基于过程的模型为决策者在改进环境管理计划时提供了宝贵的资源，并在考虑风险时减少了不确定性。
