Search Results (10)

Efficient water management is increasingly critical in vineyard operations, particularly in the context of climate change and the rising demand for sustainable agricultural practices. Regulated deficit irrigation has emerged as a promising technique that allows significant water savings while sustaining or improving the quality of grapes. However, its effective implementation requires timely and precise information on vine water status and environmental conditions (pluviometry, humidity, radiation, etc.). This study presents the methodology of a decision-support tool that tested the application of several artificial intelligence regression models. Among the algorithms evaluated, an Extreme Gradient Boosting (XGBoost) regression model showed the best performance and was adopted as the core predictive engine of the ViñAI tool to optimize deficit irrigation in vineyards. Based on the developed methodology, the ViñAI tool integrates open-access environmental data such as weather forecasts and satellite-based estimates of evapotranspiration. Furthermore, ViñAI is designed with the potential to integrate sensor-based field data. Overall, the results demonstrate that ViñAI offers a scalable, data-driven approach to support climate-smart irrigation decisions in vineyards, particularly in sensor-sparse or resource-limited contexts, and provides a robust basis for further multi-season and multi-region validation. Full article

In Sicily, many natural water bodies were reclaimed over the last two centuries for malaria control and agricultural expansion, causing widespread habitat loss. Some of these former ponds (still locally called “lakes”) reappear occasionally after extreme rainfall, temporarily restoring aquatic habitats but remaining poorly documented. We confirm the occurrence of such episodic ponds in central Sicily (Sommatino–Riesi) and present one of these ponds (Lago Montagna) as a case study. Combining satellite observations with field surveys conducted during a spring 2025 inundation, we document repeated episodes of flooding and a remarkable aquatic flora, including charophytes and other taxa of conservation interest. Episodic inundation events, therefore, act as transient refugia and stepping stones for regional biodiversity within an otherwise dry landscape. Because these systems commonly escape routine monitoring and legal protection, we argue they should be explicitly recognized in regional conservation planning and long-term monitoring programs. Moreover, the integrated remote-sensing approach used here allows the detection of overlooked temporary wetland ecosystems and provides fine-scale hydrological insights often missed by sparse weather station networks or satellite-derived rainfall data. Full article

The application of natural radioisotope and stable isotope tracing represents a novel, sensitive method for confirming the presence of environmental contamination due to leachate water from solid waste landfills. This study aimed to employ this approach to assess the efficiency of containment measures and the potential environmental impact in the vicinity of a landfill designated for non-hazardous waste disposal. We collected leachate water samples from two distinct areas: one currently active, and another exhausted. In February, May, August, and November 2022, we collected deep water samples from a nearby stream utilizing piezometers, both upstream and downstream from the facility. We examined deuterium and tritium radioisotopes via liquid scintillation, and stable isotope oxygen-18 via ratio mass spectrometry. The results revealed the presence of anthropogenic radioisotopes within the landfill, with higher concentrations in the active site. No radioisotopes or stable isotopes above the natural background were identified in any of the samples obtained from outside. The levels of tritium were found to correlate with rainfall in the samples collected inside, but not in those obtained outside. These findings provide evidence of the effectiveness of the active structural, managerial, and procedural containment measures and the absence of environmental contamination stemming from the studied site, reinforcing the value of the responsible management of non-hazardous waste and its limited impact on the surrounding environment. The reported results highlight the utility of performing radioisotope and stable isotope monitoring not only inside but also outside the landfill, and analyzing the relation via pluviometry. Full article

The watershed of the Peixe River lies in central Minas Gerais state, close to Belo Horizonte city, a densely populated area. The area is located in the geological context of Quadrilátero Ferrífero, one of the most prominent mineral provinces in Brazil. To better recognize surface and groundwater availability, some methodologies have been applied to evaluate the minimal surface flow rates, groundwater recharge, and water reserves. The basin includes three main aquifer systems: Cauê (porous and fissured aquifer), related to iron formations; Gandarela, related to karst-fissured rocks; and Cercadinho, related to metapelite rocks. The Cauê aquifer presented the highest effective porosity and hydraulic conductivity. In contrast, the Cercadinho aquitard shows the lowest hydrodynamic parameters. Data between the years of 2004 and 2024 from 21 pumping tests from wells associated with the three aquifer systems were obtained to estimate the respective recharge rate. The recharge was evaluated by numeric recursive filter and recession-curve displacement methods. The recharge results with the numeric filter method showed underestimated values. Regarding the recession-curve displacement method, the results were more consistent with other studies in the surroundings. The average recharge estimated for the basin represents 24% to 54% of annual pluviometry in the hydrological periods of analysis. The recharge data were accounted for in the reserves calculation, including permanent and renewable reserves. Total permanent reserves were estimated to be 3.16 × 10⁹ m³, including the prior aquifer systems of Cauê, Gandarela, and Cercadinho. The total mean renewable reserves of the basin were calculated to be 4.55 × 10⁷ m³/year in the analyzed period. The high BFImax indexes found in baseflow separation, above 90%, suggest a relevant contribution of the karstic Gandarela aquifer on the watershed surface flow. Although in some years it has been concluded that groundwater exploitation outlines the renewable resources availability, in 2024’s scenario, the granted water volume was lower than the estimated availability and reserves. The best methodologies for coupling surface and groundwater are the Weibull distribution for reference surface flows and the recessive-curve displacement for baseflow separations. This research will be a contribution to water resources management strategies for regions with high population growth and water demand increase. Full article

Monitoring rainfall in the Brazilian Legal Amazon (BLA), which comprises most of the largest tropical rainforest and largest river basin on the planet, is extremely important but challenging. The size of the area and land cover alone impose difficulties on the operation of a rain gauge network. Given this, we aimed to evaluate the performance of nine databases that estimate rainfall in the BLA, four from gridded analyses based on pluviometry (Xavier, CPC, GPCC and CRU), four based on remote sensing (CHIRPS, IMERG, CMORPH and PERSIANN-CDR), and one from reanalysis (ERA5Land). We found that all the bases are efficient in characterizing the average annual cycle of accumulated precipitation in the BLA, but with a predominantly negative bias. Parameters such as Pearson’s correlation (r), root-mean-square error (RMSE) and Taylor diagrams (SDE), applied in a spatial analysis for the entire BLA as well as for six pluviometrically homogeneous regions, showed that, based on a skill ranking, the data from Xavier’s grid analysis, CHIRPS, GPCC and ERA5Land best represent precipitation in the BLA at monthly, seasonal and annual levels. The PERSIANN-CDR data showed intermediate performance, while the IMERG, CMORPH, CRU and CPC data showed the lowest correlations and highest errors, characteristics also captured in the Taylor diagrams. It is hoped that this demonstration of hierarchy based on skill will subsidize climate studies in this region of great relevance in terms of biodiversity, water resources and as an important climate regulator. Full article

Water scarcity is a problem in Brazil’s northern semi-arid domain. Montes Claros is the most populated Minas Gerais city in this context, and its socio-economic problems are related to water consumption and management. Aiming to help assess these problems, this study presents a new hydrogeological characterization. The 3D geological model was developed using drilling data from 125 public wells, field campaigns and satellite images for hydrogeological interpretation. The area has two main different aquifer systems underlying the Vieira River Watershed. The first is a karstic fissured aquifer, located in the Lagoa do Jacaré limestone Formation. The second is fissured aquifer systems in metapelites from the Serra da Santa Helena and Serra da Saudade Formations, which are characterized by low hydraulic transmissivity and locally higher specific capacity zones related to their structural features or carbonate intercalations. Monitoring data from new manual and automatic methods carried out in 16 selected points highlight that variations are related to (1) hydrogeological domains, (2) oscillations related to interference from neighboring wells, and (3) seasonal variation and irregular pluviometry in the region. This is important information that can help update our hydrogeological knowledge, provide information on surface and groundwater flow dynamics, and improve water resource management, with the aim of ensuring sustainability in exploitation. Full article

Over the last three decades, almost half of the Brazilian tropical savanna (Cerrado biome) has been converted into cropland and planted pastures. This study aims to understand the implications of the expansion of the agricultural frontier for water resources in western Bahia state. We use an interdisciplinary approach that combines quantitative and qualitative data (spatial and hydrological analysis, interviews) to tie together land use changes in the Corrente basin, the streamflow and precipitation time series in the Pratudão River sub-basin (part of the Corrente basin), and the perceptions of soybean farmers and smallholder communities about the transformations of the hydrological cycle over the last few years. We observed an almost 10-fold increase in agricultural surface area in the Corrente River basin over the last three decades (1986–2018), going on from 57,090 ha to 565,084 ha, while center-pivot irrigated areas increased from 240 ha to 43,631 ha. Over this period, the streamflow has reduced by 38% in the Pratudão River. Our hydrological analyses, based on the Mann-Kendall test, of seven fluviometric stations and 14 pluviometry stations showed a statistically significant streamflow trend in the Pratudão River sub-basin for both minimum and mean streamflow series (p ≤0.05). Surface runoff coefficient, which relates streamflow and precipitation annual data coefficient, decreased from around 0.4 in the late 1990s to less than 0.2 in 2015. In addition, most precipitation time series analysis (number of annual rainy days) showed no statistically significant trend (p > 0.05). Our results indicate that agricultural changes rather than climate change may be the main driver of downward streamflow trends in the Pratudão River sub-basin that is part of Corrente River basin. Full article

Badlands are typical erosional landforms of the Apennines (Northern Italy) that form on Plio-Pleistocene clayey bedrock and rapidly evolve. The present study aimed at identification and assessment of the areal and temporal changes of badlands within a pilot area of the Modena Province (Emilia Apennines), where no previous detailed investigation has been carried out. For this purpose, a diachronic investigation was carried out to map the drainage basin and the drainage networks of the linear erosion features in the study area during the last 40 years, and to evaluate changes in badlands drainage basins morphometry and surface, land use and pluviometry. The investigation carried out indicated a general stabilisation trend of the badlands in the study area. In fact, a reduction in the bare surface area from 6187.1 m² in 1973 to 4214.1 m² in 2014 (31%), due to an intensified revegetation process around the badland areas, has been recorded. This trend, in line with the results of research carried out in other sector of the Northern Apennines, is mainly due to intensive land use changes, mostly the increase in forest cover and the reduction of agricultural land, that occurred in the study area from the 1970s onwards. Full article

A generalized methodology applicable to any urban sub-catchment to calculate the pollution curve due to combined sewer overflows would help to implement integrated management policies to reduce urban impacts on the environment. An existing methodology to predict the pollutographs associated to rainfall events is tested in five different sub-catchments with very different pluviometry. Ninety-three rainfall events have been considered by measuring the in-sewer turbidity along the runoff episodes. Such data is then evaluated to obtain two prediction indices: the time to peak of pollutograph I_TPP, and the maximum turbidity concentration I_CMAX. These indices may be used with linear regressions to calculate the characteristics of pollutographs, such as the time to the peak, TPP, the maximum concentration of turbidity, C_MAXtb, and the time to descent, TDP. These parameters allow to estimate the pollutographs of a sub-catchment. The comparison between pollutographs measured in the Ensanche sub-catchment and those calculated with the methodology shows a good agreement in terms of the root mean square deviation between samples and estimated values with the model proposed. Hence, the methodology could be a key way to find synthetic pollutographs for any sub-catchment. Full article

Cyanobacteria are a component of public health hazards in freshwater environments because of their potential as toxin producers. Eutrophication has long been considered the main cause of cyanobacteria outbreak and proliferation, whereas many studies emphasized the effect of abiotic parameters (mainly temperature and light) on cell growth rate or toxin production. In view of the growing concerns of global change consequences on public health parameters, this study attempts to enlighten climate influence on cyanobacteria at regional scale in Brittany (NW France). The results show that homogeneous cyanobacteria groups are associated with climatic domains related to temperature, global radiation and pluviometry, whereas microcystins (MCs) occurrences are only correlated to local cyanobacteria species composition. As the regional climatic gradient amplitude is similar to the projected climate evolution on a 30-year timespan, a comparison between the present NW and SE situations was used to extrapolate the evolution of geographical cyanobacteria distribution in Brittany. Cyanobacteria composition should shift toward species associated with more frequent Microcystins occurrences along a NW/SE axis whereas lakes situated along a SW/NE axis should transition to species (mainly Nostocales) associated with lower MCs detection frequencies. Full article