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Input files for the ForClim model (version 4.0.1) used in the associated paper. They can be used to to reproduce results of the simulation study. The ForClim model, including the source code, executable and documentation, is freely available under an Open Access license from the website of the original developers at https://ites-fe.ethz.ch/openaccess/. The original climatic dataset used to generate the ForClim input climate files at each site in South Tyrol is freely available at https://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.924502 while the CHELSA climate data for future scenarios are available at https://www.chelsa-climate.org. If interested in using this dataset for a research study or a project, please contact Marco Mina ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Hillebrand L, Marzini S, Crespi A, Hiltner U & Mina M (2023) Contrasting impacts of climate change on protection forests of the Italian Alps. Frontiers in Forests and Global Change, 6, 2023 https://doi.org/10.3389/ffgc.2023.1240235 ABSTRACT. Protection forests play a key role in protecting settlements, people, and infrastructures from gravitational hazards such as rockfalls and avalanches in mountain areas. Rapid climate change is challenging the role of protection forests by altering their dynamics, structure, and composition. Information on local- and regional-scale impacts of climate change on protection forests is critical for planning adaptations in forest management. We used a model of forest dynamics (ForClim) to assess the succession of mountain forests in the Eastern Alps and their protective effects under future climate change scenarios. We investigated eleven representative forest sites along an elevational gradient across multiple locations within an administrative region, covering wide differences in tree species structure, composition, altitude, and exposition. We evaluated protective performance against rockfall and avalanches using numerical indices (i.e., linker functions) quantifying the degree of protection from metrics of simulated forest structure and composition. Our findings reveal that climate warming has a contrasting impact on protective effects in mountain forests of the Eastern Alps. Climate change is likely to not affect negatively all protection forest stands but its impact depends on site and stand conditions. Impacts were highly contingent to the magnitude of climate warming, with increasing criticality under the most severe climate projections. Forests in lower-montane elevations and those located in dry continental valleys showed drastic changes in forest structure and composition due to drought-induced mortality while subalpine forests mostly profited from rising temperatures and a longer vegetation period. Overall, avalanche protection will likely be negatively affected by climate change, while the ability of forests to maintain rockfall protection depends on the severity of expected climate change and their vulnerability due to elevation and topography, with most subalpine forests less prone to loosing protective effects. Proactive measures in management should be taken in the near future to avoid losses of protective effects in the case of severe climate change in the Alps. Given the heterogeneous impact of climate warming, such adaptations can be aided by model-based projections and high local resolution studies to identify forest stand types that might require management priority for maintaining protective effects in the future.

Suitability maps (raster format: geotiff) of Quercus frainetto, computed using the ForestFocus European dataset of species presence/absence. The adopted suitability model estimates the optimal environmental conditions for European tree species under present and future climates. Available years: 2000, 2020, 2050, 2080. For year 2000 the observed (WorldClim) climate conditions have been used. For years 2020, 2050, 2080 the climate conditions simulated for the climate change scenarios A2 and B2 have been used (by means of the climate models CCCMA, CSIRO, HANDCM3 and of an ensemble model of them).

The ECOREST_AUV campaign will focus on monitoring restored populations in closed areas and adjacent fishing grounds to assess the evolution of restored populations and monitor the evolution of ecosystem services provided, as well as the provision of habitat, breeding areas or a possible spillover effect of closed areas in adjacent areas. Oceanographic data acquired during the ECOREST_AUV Cruise (29GD20230602) on board the Research Vessel García del Cid in 2023.

This dataset contains spatial predictions of the potential environmental spaces for pingos, ice-wedge polygons and rock glaciers across the Northern Hemisphere permafrost areas. The potential environmental spaces, i.e. conditions where climate, topography and soil properties are suitable for landform presence, were predicted with statistical ensemble modelling employing geospatial data on environmental conditions at 30 arc-second resolution (~1 km). In addition to the baseline period (1950-2000), the predictions are provided for 2041-2060 and 2061-2080 using climate-forcing scenarios (Representative Concentration Pathways 4.5 and 8.5). The resulting dataset consists of five spatial predictions for each landform in GeoTIFF format.The data provide new information on 1) the fine-scale spatial distribution of permafrost landforms in the Northern Hemisphere, 2) the potential future alterations in the environmental suitability for permafrost landforms due to climate change, and 3) the circumpolar distribution of various ground ice types, and can 4) facilitate efforts to inventory permafrost landforms in incompletely mapped areas.

Suitability maps (raster format: geotiff) of Fraxinus excelsior, computed using the ForestFocus European dataset of species presence/absence. The adopted suitability model estimates the optimal environmental conditions for European tree species under present and future climates. Available years: 2000, 2020, 2050, 2080. For year 2000 the observed (WorldClim) climate conditions have been used. For years 2020, 2050, 2080 the climate conditions simulated for the climate change scenarios A2 and B2 have been used (by means of the climate models CCCMA, CSIRO, HANDCM3 and of an ensemble model of them).

Upwelling processes bring nutrient-rich waters from the deep ocean to the surface. Areas of upwelling are often associated with high productivity, offering great economic value in terms of fisheries. The sensitivity of spring/summer-time coastal upwelling systems to climate change has recently received a lot of attention. Several studies have suggested that their intensity may increase in the future while other authors have shown decreasing intensity in their equatorward portions. Yet, recent observations do not show robust evidence of this intensification. The Senegalo-Mauritanian upwelling system (SMUS) located at the southern edge of the north Atlantic system (12°N–20°N) and most active in winter/spring has been largely excluded from these studies. Here, the seasonal cycle of the SMUS and its response to climate change is investigated in the database of the Coupled Models Inter comparison Project Phase 5 (CMIP5). Upwelling magnitude and surface signature are characterized by several sea surface temperature and wind stress indices. We highlight the ability of the climate models to reproduce the system, as well as their biases. The simulations suggest that the intensity of the SMUS winter/spring upwelling will moderately decrease in the future, primarily because of a reduction of the wind forcing linked to a northward shift of Azores anticyclone and a more regional modulation of the low pressures found over Northwest Africa. The implications of such an upwelling reduction on the ecosystems and local communities exploiting them remains very uncertain.

Hydraulic fracturing drilling technology can cause a high risk of surface spill accidents and thus water contamination. Climate change together with the high water demand and rapid increase in industrial and agricultural activities are valued reasons why we should all care about the availability of water resources and protect them from contamination. Hence, the purpose of this study is to estimate the risk associated with a site contaminated with benzene from oil spillage and its potential impact on groundwater. This study focused on investigating the impact of soil variability and water table depth on groundwater contamination. Temperature-dependent parameters, such as soil water content and the diffusion of pollutants, were considered as key input factors for the HYDRUS 1D numerical model to simulate benzene migration through three types of soil (loamy, sandy clay loam, and silt loam) and evaluate its concentration in the water aquifer. The results indicated that an anticipated increase in earth’s average surface temperature by 4 °C due to climate change could lead to a rise in the level of groundwater pollution in the study area by 0.017 mg/L in loamy soil, 0.00046 mg/L in sandy clay loam soil, and 0.00023 mg/L in silt loam soil. It was found that climate change can reduce the amount of benzene absorbed from 10 to 0.07% in loamy soil, 14 to 0.07% in sandy clay loam soil, and 60 to 53% in silt loam soil. The results showed that the soil properties and solute characteristics that depend on the temperature have a major and important role in determining the level of groundwater pollutants.

Global warming and direct anthropogenic impacts, such as water extraction, are largely affecting water budgets in Mediterranean wetlands, thereby increasing wetland salinities and isolation, and decreasing water depths and hydroperiods (duration of the inundation period). These wetland features are key elements structuring waterbird communities. However, the ultimate and net consequences of these dynamic conditions on waterbird assemblages are largely unknown. We combined a regular sampling on waterbird presence through the 2008 annual cycle with in-situ data on these relevant environmental predictors of waterbird distribution to model habitat selection for 69 individual species in a typical Mediterranean wetland network in south-western Spain. Species association with environmental features were subsequently used to predict changes in habitat suitability for each species under three climate change scenarios (encompassing changes in environment that ranged from 10% to 50% change as predicted by climatic models). Waterbirds distributed themselves unevenly throughout environmental gradients and water salinity was the most important gradient structuring the distribution of the community. Environmental suitability for the guilds of diving birds and vegetation gleaners will be reduced according to future climate scenarios, while most small wading birds will benefit from changing conditions. Resident species and those that breed in this wetland network will be also more impacted than those using this area for wintering or stopover. We provide here a tool that can be used in a horizon-scanning framework to identify emerging issues on waterbird conservation and to anticipate suitable management actions : Datasets as supporting information to article “How will climate change affect endangered Mediterranean waterbirds?” to be published in PLOS ONE. Address questions to Francisco Ramírez: ramirez@ub.edu