*[Enwl-Inf] Fwd: Восстановление воды как экосистемная услуга
ecology
ecology на iephb.nw.ru
Ср Окт 15 03:29:18 MSK 2025
На этой неделе состоится открытие выставки «Против течения: швейцарские
технологии Blue Tech для охраны водных ресурсов» и ознакомительный семинар
«Интернет воды (Швейцария) и вклад ИТМО в защиту водных ресурсов» при
участии Генерального Консула Швейцарии от факультета экотехнологий.
Здесь будут представлены восемь швейцарских решений по эффективному
водоснабжению и рациональному использованию водных ресурсов.
Для вас:
— возможность познакомиться с опытом Швейцарии в области защиты водных
ресурсов, а также с исследованиями Гринтех в этом направлении;
— идеи для собственных проектов и решений для устойчивого развития водного
сектора в России;
— знания о тенденциях и вызовах в области водных ресурсов.
Открытие выставки:
СПб, 16 октября в 15:30, Библиотека (5 этаж), ул. Ломоносова, 9
Семинар:
— 16 октября 16:00-18:30, Медиазона, ул. Ломоносова, 9, аудитория 1303/8;
— пройдет на английском языке;
— количество мест ограничено, поэтому скорее регистрируйтесь по ссылке.
Выставка будет проходить с 16 по 20 октября в Библиотеке на Ломоносова, 9 (5
этаж). Вход свободный.
пн, 13 окт. 2025 г. в 08:43, Bulat Yessekin <bulat.yessekin на gmail.com>:
Интервью с автором Концепции планетарных границ (раздел по пресной воде):
Лан: В настоящее время существует две границы изменения пресной воды. Один
для blue water, который представлен процентом земель, на которых наблюдаются
локальные отклонения от базового уровня речного стока, и один для green
water, который имеет аналогичный показатель, но измеряет влажность почвы в
корневой зоне.
Альфа: Верно. Итак, традиционно гидрология в 20 веке была сосредоточена на
голубой воде, потому что это акведуки, водопроводная вода и все такое. Но
теперь вы говорите, что зеленая вода, то есть вода, доступная через почву,
растения, на самом деле имеет решающее значение. И вы также говорите, что
это возможно благодаря телеконференциям, верно? Подобно тому, как при
подключении к интернету вода в одном районе воздействует, знаете ли, на
другие районы. Континенты, верно? Потому что у вас есть вода, которая
испаряется, и это влияет на крупномасштабную циркуляцию воды в атмосфере и
через нее.
Лан: Да, именно так. Да. Таким образом, вода - это гораздо больше, чем
просто речная вода, не так ли? Так оно и есть, да, это транспорт питательных
веществ или загрязняющих веществ. Это среда обитания жизни или
биоразнообразия, и это климат. Это облако. Это, знаете ли, облако
определяет, сколько солнечного излучения достигает Земли. Итак, это альбедо.
Итак, да, в чем дело, да, я начал с того, что вода является неотъемлемой
частью земной системы. Это водная планета.
Альфа: И вся система атмосферного переноса, мы как бы забываем об этом,
верно? Но на самом деле именно так вода попадает в разные места.
Итак, пытались ли вы работать над тем, чтобы внедрить это в управление и в
политическую систему, чтобы привлечь внимание к важности всего этого
атмосферного водного транспорта?
Лан: Что ж, я полагаю, что в этом направлении предпринимается много
усилий. И мы видим большой интерес со стороны Продовольственной и
сельскохозяйственной организации Объединенных Наций (ФАО), занимающейся
вопросами сельского хозяйства. Вместе с Дэвидом Эллисоном, Пэтти Киз и
другими мы написали статью для журнала FAO, в которой четко описали
круговорот воды, в том числе и атмосферный.
И дело в том, что когда вы обращаетесь к разработчикам политики, важно еще
и то, что все не так просто. Поэтому я думаю, что когда у нас есть статья,
показывающая, что это экосистемная услуга, связанная с обеспечением лесов
влагой. Ученые поймут, что это один из многих процессов и механизмов. И
когда вы обращаетесь к разработчикам политики, вы должны как бы
рассматривать это в контексте. Возможно, выращивать монокультуру в
засушливой местности, как мы знаем, не самая лучшая идея. Таким образом,
контекст - это все. Так что, да, я думаю, когда мы обращаемся к
разработчикам политики, очень важно делать это вместе с другими, и в то же
время учитывать многогранный аспект того, когда лес приносит пользу водному
циклу в целом, позволяя местным рекам не пересыхать. И, в то же время,
способствовать сохранению биоразнообразия. Таким образом, не только
монокультуры в большей степени подвержены влиянию устойчивости, не так ли?
Что монокультура часто не отличается особой устойчивостью, и дело не только
в количестве воды в определенный период времени, но и в том, насколько она
устойчива? И особенно в условиях изменения климата меняется круговорот воды.
Это один из моих других исследовательских проектов, в котором мы
рассматриваем устойчивость мер по смягчению последствий изменения климата,
основанных на использовании лесов. Для восстановления лесных систем
требуется много усилий и политической воли, что приятно. Но насколько это
устойчиво? Где мы должны это делать? И при этом не нанося ущерба местным
сообществам. Когда вы хотите что-то сделать на земле, на этой земле уже
что-то есть. Так что это не так просто.
Полный перевод интервью:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1dnioDK7sU5Ppq9of8bUEOCxUIHkv74DdIlZILLHA3_0/edit?usp=sharing
Сайт по воде и климату: https://climatewaterproject.substack.com/podcast
Best regards,
Bulat K. YESSEKIN
пн, 13 окт. 2025 г. в 00:55, Alpha Lo from Climate Water Project
<climatewaterproject на substack.com>:
Moisture recycling as an ecosystem service
͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏
͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏
͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏
͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏
͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏
͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏
͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏
͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏
͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏
͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏
͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏
͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏
͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏
͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏
͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏
͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏
͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏
͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏
͏ ͏
Forwarded this email? Subscribe here for more
,.
Moisture recycling as an ecosystem service
Alpha Lo
Oct 12
READ IN APP
Lan Wang-Erlandsson is a researcher studying moisture recycling.
She focuses on the large-scale interactions between land, water, and
climate, and their implications for social-ecological and Earth system
resilience. She has conducted work on the planetary boundaries and tipping
points of green water, helped society understand moisture recycling as an
ecosystem service, and collaborated with the FAO (Food and Agriculture
Organization of the United Nations) on reports examining how moisture
recycling intersects with the future of agriculture.
Her work has emerged from two scientific lineages. Science often
evolves through such lineages. Hubert Savenije was working in the Sahel
region of Africa when he wondered why rainfall did not keep decreasing
further inland, as it should if the air rained out water closer to the
coast. He concluded that there had to be moisture recycling, where moisture
evaporated back into the air and then fell again as rain. Other lineages
have called this same phenomenon precipitation recycling, or the small water
cycle.
Two decades later, Ruud van der Ent (who previously appeared on
this podcast), a graduate student of Savenije’s, built on his work to create
a map of global moisture recycling. Lan Wang-Erlandsson would eventually
collaborate with van der Ent, as would Patrick Keys, who would work on
hydrosocial aspects of moisture recycling.
Lan Wang-Erlandsson completed her graduate work at the Stockholm
Resilience Centre, which brought its own scientific lineage. The Stockholm
Resilience Centre (SRC) was founded in 2007 by Johan Rockström and Carl
Folke as part of Stockholm University. Its intellectual roots reach back
over half a century, drawing on ecological economics, systems thinking,
resilience science, Earth system science, and work on sustainability,
tipping points, and the interplay between society, economy, and the
biosphere.
From this foundation, the planetary boundaries framework emerged.
In 2009, Johan Rockström, then director of the Stockholm Resilience Centre,
led a group of 28 scientists to formulate the concept of planetary
boundaries in the paper “A Safe Operating Space for Humanity.” The idea was
to identify critical Earth-system processes (such as climate change,
biodiversity loss, nutrient cycles, land-use change, and freshwater use)
that regulate the stability and resilience of the planet, and to estimate
thresholds or “boundaries” for those systems that should not be crossed if
humanity is to avoid large-scale, abrupt, or irreversible environmental
changes.
Lan: I’m a researcher and team leader of the Anthropocene Dynamics
theme at the Stockholm Resilience Center.
Alpha: And when you say Anthropocene, that the era where people
are affecting the Earth. And so you’re studying how they’re affecting the
water, and how that then affects the whole Earth.
Lan: Yes, exactly. You know, the human impact on the water cycle
is really very severe and widespread now.
Alpha: And the Stockholm Resilience Center is, as I understand it,
a pioneer in this whole planetary boundaries approach to understanding the
Earth systems.
Lan: You could say that in the past 12,000 years, the Holocene, it’s
the only time in history that we know for sure is able to support modern
civilization and agriculture the way as we know it, right? The Earth system
has several tipping points. So the transition could be non-linear. And so
whether we sort of exit this, we call it the safe operating space or
corridor like, that the Holocene-like conditions, if we depart from these
conditions, it could be in an abrupt way, it could be in a more gradual way.
We don’t know that, but sort of the further away you get from the safe
operating space or the more as you transgress the boundaries, there’s a
risk, there’s a higher risk of dangerous conditions, you could say,
progressively more dangerous. So the boundaries, I think you may have some
understanding, is that if you cross the boundary, you are already in the
danger zone. So some people ask, you have nine boundaries and six of them
are crossed, how come we are not all dead? And that’s not what the boundary
is doing, it’s the boundaries are set as guardrails. So you could imagine
that you’re standing at the cliff, you don’t want to stand precisely at the
cliff, but a few meters away, right? So the boundaries are the guardrails.
So now we are somewhere between the guardrails and the cliff, and it’s an
uncomfortable zone we want to get out of.
Alpha: And then one of the nine planetary boundaries is the water,
right? And so that’s what we’re working on.
Lan: Yes, exactly. So the planetary boundaries identify nine Earth
system processes or components that are vital for the system resilience to
function, for the Holocene-like conditions to continue, to support humanity.
And freshwater change, so the quantitative changes in freshwater, is one of
them. And of course, you could say that some other boundaries also relate
very much to water, such as biogeochemical flow that deals with phosphorus
and nitrogen pollution, for example. And eutrophication is a big problem.
You have the novel entities about chemical pollution, and you know,
microplastics in river systems is a big issue. And then the same goes with
land system change, biosphere integrity, that also includes life in aquatic
systems. We know are much threatened. And then climate change, obviously,
that is the main culprit behind the water extremes that we see. So they’re
very much interconnected, I would say. But yes, my work so far focused on
the freshwater change boundary that was previously called freshwater use.
Alpha: How did you get into the whole water field?
Lan: I’ve always been interested in environmental issues. I
remember when I came to Sweden, it’s like 1990. It was a huge transition. So
at the time in China, the water, the environment was very polluted. And the
only place that was green, I grew up in the city of Guiyang, the only place
that was green was the park. So when I came to Sweden, I realized everything
is so green, like the whole country is a park. So I think that’s sort of
where it started. Oh, you can have it this clean. Is that possible? Is that
even possible? So I think that ignited my interest for environmental issues.
So it wasn’t necessarily water, but I was very interested in
sustainability, sort of how we can make the environment more livable. And
also just seeing that it is possible. But then I, yeah, I think the more I
think about it, I find myself kind of obsessed with the thought somehow that
we live on this unique planet Earth in this universe. And we are kind of the
only conscious ensemble of molecules and atoms. And that somehow it comes
somehow with a responsibility or like just so precious that we live, right?
And water somehow is tied to everything that is alive. It was the basic
element that made life possible. If you go on Mars looking for life, you
would look for water. And water is connected to climate, it’s connected to
pollution. It’s very much connected to everything on Earth. So, I guess it
suited me well to work with water as a person who is very interested in our
living conditions as a whole.
My master’s was in civil engineering. Then I did my PhD with water
in Delft University with Hubert Savenije and Ruud van der Ent.
Alpha: So you and Ruud were together in graduate school?
Lan: Yes, and Patrick Keys. So we were kind of a trio working very
closely together on moisture recycling-related issues.
Alpha: What was the issue that you worked on?
Lan: The aim of my PhD was to figure out sort of how land is
quantified, how land-use change affects rainfall. So Ruud has a really cool
model that could track moisture, but it didn’t necessarily tell us a story
of how land-use change affected rainfall. So my PhD started a couple of
years after his. And so the question then was what does this mean in the
time when humans, if we look at historically, humans have affected, well,
affected basically all land systems on Earth, but transformed around half of
the land surfaces, turned it into pasture or agricultural land and with
massive irrigation. So how does that change this water cycle? This was my
thing I was dealing with.
Alpha: And were you looking at for that social-ecological as
opposed to the purely ecological aspects, or you were looking at both?
Lan: Yes, I guess when I started, it was very biophysical in the
sense of just looking at the quantitative water flows. And of course,
conceptually, Pat and I, we worked a little bit more into sort of conceptual
thinking, how can we conceptualize this as a social-ecological system
because you can imagine that you might have some sociological feedback that
we ever say we haven’t really tested out quantitatively, but you can imagine
that, you know, if you deforest Amazon, you reduce evapotranspiration, the
moisture input to the atmosphere, decreases the moisture transport in the
atmosphere and decreases rainfall. That part we know from the modeling. And
so that decreases again, the rainfall not only over the forest itself, but
also over the cropland that in the first place caused the deforestation. And
the question is how do the people then on the ground want to manage land
given the feedback loop or and/or given the knowledge that this is
happening? Right. So will they try to reduce deforestation and restore the
moisture flow? Or will they sort of, oh, we have less water and the crop
yields are negatively impacted. We should deforest more to have more land,
right? So there are sociological interactions and feedback that, that should
come out of this, but it’s more like a question mark, I think, than precise
answers to that. I have a PhD student now looking into that, but she’s
focusing more in the African continent.T
The Congo rainforest is actually a very important moisture
recycling region. So if you look at the Amazon internally, the moisture
recycling ratio annually is around 25, 30, that’s on different estimates.
And for Congo, it’s almost a double. But the Congo region is also more
interesting because it’s also precisely where the Intertropical Convergence
Zone moves around. So you would say that from different seasons, the
moisture contribution either goes from the Congo towards the north or to the
south. So there are different countries benefitting in different times over
the year, very different, yeah, seasonality.
Alpha: Which are the main countries that benefit from the Congo
rainforest rain, or getting rain from the Congo rainforest?
Lan: That’s a good question. The three recipient countries that
receive most precipitation from the Congo forest are Congo, Gabon, and
Equatorial Guinea on a mean annual basis. They receive around 30% of the
precipitation from Congo, and during the dry season, so June, July, August,
Congo and Gabon receive 50% of the precipitation from the Congo forest. So
it’s really substantial.
Alpha: So you’re framing this as an ecosystem service, right? So
land use is providing rain?
Lan: Yes. Exactly. So that was together with Patrick Keys. And so
as I mentioned before, even if you just look at the moisture, like the
moisture flows themselves, it doesn’t mean that the entire flow is there
because of the vegetation. Even if you remove the vegetation, some
evaporation will happen. And the other thing is that it depends on which
type of vegetation you have. So if you have a forest with a very deep root,
they will be able to provide moisture also during the dry season and dry
spells. So there’s a seasonality to it as well. But you would see that like
the short vegetation like grassland, they wouldn’t transpire as much or at
all in the dry seasons. So in that way, you can regard it as an ecosystem
service that certain types of especially wooded vegetation are providing to
support rainfall. And of course, in the ecosystem service framework, you’ve
been talking about regulating services and support. So conceptually, it’s
kind of there. But I think what we did together with the co-author leading
that work, what we did there was to quantify it. It’s a first attempt to
quantify how much of the, if you would have two scenarios, one with
vegetation as we have today and one without like barren land, what would the
difference be? And that difference we termed ecosystem service. It’s a
simplification, of course, because we know that when you remove vegetation,
more things will happen than just that the evaporation will not be there.
You will change the wind, you will change the temperature. So a lot more
things are going on. But yes, from a water balance perspective, you could
call that quantification the ecosystem service of the moisture-supplying
service from vegetation. And of course, you can combine it with other system
models, runs and all that, compare the difference between barren and
vegetated land. Right.
Alpha: Okay, cool. And so did you look at other places apart from
the Amazon and the Congo rainforests, other continents like the ecosystem
services providing rain for? Like have you also studied by like, say, in
Europe, how land use is providing ecosystem service of rain?
Lan: Yes. So one thing with the ecosystem services, it’s not just
the amount over the year, but it’s also sort of when you want to look at the
ecosystem properly, you actually also need to look at in what way it’s
resulting in actual benefits. Right. So actually, you might want to know to
what extent is it mitigating droughts or heat waves in the downwind area.
And so we had a paper with Agnes Pranindita who looked at it. And so in her
paper, she analyzed heat waves in Europe and found that forests tended to
have a disproportionate influence on moisture supply during those times,
which is very aligned with our understanding of how forests operate that
they are able to be this buffer, they can store the water and then release
it also when it’s dry, which helps mitigate not only locally, we know that
from previous studies that forests have this cooling effect locally, but
also remotely by providing moisture.
Alpha: So how does this all connect? So you’ve been doing work on
this tipping point, right, on all the planetary boundaries? So how does the
ecosystem services of the atmospheric water play into the planetary
boundary?
Lan: So the, there are several parts to this. If you look at the
planetary boundaries in terms of tipping elements, for example, the Amazon
forest or the tropical rainforest, they are massive land carbon sinks,
right? So they are helping us currently, they are doing this as a service of
absorbing CO2 emissions from fossil fuels. And but when they die, they will
instead be releasing carbon to the atmosphere. So instead of helping us,
they will make our efforts to come down to the 1.5 degrees, Paris Agreement
more difficult.
So the moisture cycle of course plays a role in stabilizing those
important carbon sinks. There are estimates. If you look at the carbon sink
strength of the Amazon, and if you continue to extrapolate that, there are
estimates that say that this switch might happen already over the next
decade, depending on deforestation rates, not only on moisture recycling,
but moisture recycling kind of amplifies that effect, right? So if you cut
down the forest, you not only cut down the forest, but also remove the extra
moisture supply that comes with the forest. So it certainly plays a huge
role there.
And you also have the irrigation effect. You have the massive
irrigation in India that is depleting groundwater to start with, but also
modifying. So you could say that you have the important monsoons in the
Asian continent there that is supporting agriculture. So you have the dry
period and then you wait for the monsoon for the crop to grow. So it’s very
important. But there are also research that has shown that if you pump that
much water into the atmosphere, by irrigating the crop lands, you are
decreasing the temperature over land, right? So there is then a less
difference between the land and ocean temperature. So the monsoon is drawn
into the land because of the temperature gradient, but it’s warmer over land
and cooler over ocean. And the warm air over land is rising and therefore
sort of driving the monsoon into the Asian continent. But if you reduce the
temperature gradient, you might have an effect on the monsoon. So some
research has pointed out that it’s actually delaying the monsoon onset, for
example, which is a continental to planetary scale change.
These are two examples where this kind of land-atmosphere
interaction come into the planetary boundaries framework. And of course, the
planetary boundary framework, the way we represent it, we only looked at the
percentage of land areas that experience a departure in either stream flow
or soil moisture, root-zone soil moisture. So it’s a simplification, but you
could say that we looked closely into many, many more. So under the hood,
the planetary boundaries conceptually is trying to account for all these
things that are happening. And then we provide a simple metric as percentage
of land, they’re waiting for those. But the understanding is that all those
things are connected.
Alpha: Right. It’s a very complex non-linear process that you’re
trying to simplify enough so it’s a useful governance thing. So like in the
Amazon, if the forest is providing rain, but that rain is needed to grow the
trees to sequester the carbon. And so if there’s that feedback loop that if
you get past, you’ve crossed the rain cycle, you’ve crossed the carbon
sequestration, and then it has all these ripple effects throughout the
whole. And the whole Indian continent, if you shift the temperature gradient
by what are we doing with the water, then that shifts the whole way that
rain cycle gets driven.
Lan: Yeah, so these are large-scale processes. And we don’t know
all the answers. And there’s quite some uncertainty, which is partly where
the planetary boundaries are coming to also just not knowing the large risk
or risk in itself.
Alpha: And then you also, in this whole planetary boundary
framework, you’re looking at green water, right? Can you explain the green
water framework for water?
Lan: Professor Malin Falkenmark was the one who coined, or colored
the water cycle. So she termed the blue water and green water decades ago in
an effort to help policy makers to understand the issues particularly
related to green water. Because I think maybe still, but particularly
decades ago, a lot of the focus on water resources management was on
so-called blue water. So the liquid water, visible water in rivers, lakes,
and groundwater and much less attention is put into the green water. So the
water in soil and that contributes to transpiration. The water that is
actually used in most photosynthesis processes by both ecosystem and grown
crops.
So her point was like, look, we have blue water resources,
everyone seems to understand that. We have infrastructure, all the water
resource management is looking into that. But how about green water, which
is actually over 80, 90 percent in many places. Thinking in South America,
Africa, it is still over 90 percent of the agriculture that relies on green
water only. So only rain-fed, using very little, our known irrigation water,
right? So, yeah, so that’s the difference between green and blue water. So
this was actually originally coming from there. And before we, before I
worked with the green water of the planetary boundaries framework, the
planetary boundary for water was called freshwater use. So also focusing on
blue water. The interesting thing is that if you look into the supplementary
material of the 2009 paper by Rockström et al., there’s a whole page on
green water, on the green water’s role for monsoon system, for Amazon, for
tipping elements, for sustainability, you know. So everything is there, but
it was under the hood. So somehow it didn’t communicate. And there was lots
of misunderstanding on if we just look at freshwater use, how much we use,
that it doesn’t really reflect the planetary risk we are facing.
What is the Earth system impact of using, you know, a little bit
more water in total over the globe? So different kinds of critique. That was
one. In other words, that, well, if you lump it into a volume of water that
you can use globally, what happens if you use a lot of water in India and
none in Europe or US? Is it still safe or not? And of course, what we see is
that water changes. The impact on Earth system are much more widespread. It’s
not just about water use. It’s not just about how much water you withdraw
from rivers. That matters. And it’s there. It’s all there in the 2009 paper,
but they just didn’t come out clearly. And by not presenting it clearly, a
lot of those things were sort of lost in the margin. So what we did was to
say, you know, we’re not interested in maybe freshwater use per se from an
Earth system perspective, but we’re interested in freshwater change. And we
want to have a sub-boundary for blue water and a sub-boundary for green
water. Yes, it was years of discussions with many colleagues. Yeah, as you
can imagine, this kind of work really needs interdisciplinary and
collaborative work. It was fun.
Alpha: The freshwater is made up of both blue and green water,
right?
Lan: There are two sub-boundaries to the freshwater change
boundary now. One on blue water, which is represented by the percentage of
land that experiences local deviations from baseline of stream flow, and one
for green water that has a similar but measures root-zone soil moisture.
Alpha: Right. And so traditionally hydrology in the 20th century
was focused on blue water because that’s aqueducts and piping water and
everything. But so now you’re saying, the green water, which is the water
that’s accessible through the soil, the plants, is actually really key. And
you’re also saying this is through teleconnections, right? Like
teleconnections being like the water in one area impacts, you know,
somewhere else. Continents, right? Because you have the water being
transpired and it affects large-scale atmospheric circulation of water and
through the atmosphere.
Lan: Yes, exactly. Yeah. So water is so much more than just river
water, right? So it is, yes, it is the transport of nutrients or pollutants.
It is the habitat of life or biodiversity and it is climate. It is the
cloud. It is the, you know, and the cloud decides how much of the, it
regulates how much of the sun’s radiation reaches the Earth. So it is
albedo. So, yeah, what’s the, yeah, I started with like water is so much of
the identity of the Earth system. It’s a water planet.
Alpha: And the whole atmospheric transport system, we kind of
forget about it, right? But like it is actually how water is getting to
different places.
So have you,been trying to work to try and get this into
governance and try to get this into the political system to awareness of the
importance of all this atmospheric water transport?
Lan: Well, I guess there are many efforts on that front. And we
see a lot of interest from the UN agricultural extension FAO (Food and
Agricultural Organization of the United Nations). We were with David
Ellison, Patty Keys, and others, we wrote an article for the FAO journal
clearly describing the water cycle, also including the atmospheric one.
And the thing is that when you reach out to policy makers, one
thing that is important is also that it’s not that simple. So I think when
we have an article showing this is the ecosystem service of the moisture
supply of forest. Scientists will understand that this is one of many
processes and mechanisms. And when you reach policy makers, you have to sort
of put it in the context. It might not be the best idea to plant a
monoculture plantation in a dry area, as we know. So context is everything.
So, yeah, it’s very important to, I think, when we reach out to policy
makers to do it together with others and both sort of accounting for the
multifaceted sort of when is forest benefiting the water cycle as a whole,
both allowing local rivers to not dry out. And also, at the same time,
promoting biodiversity. So it’s not just monocultures that are more subject
to the resilience comes in there again, right? That a monoculture is often
not particularly resilient and it’s not just about the amount of water in a
particular time, but also how sustainable is it? And especially under
climate change, the water cycle is changing. So that’s one of my other
research projects where we look at the resilience of forest-based climate
mitigation measures. There’s a lot of effort and political will, which is
nice, to restore forest systems. But how resilient is it? Where should we do
it? And also without harming local communities. Whenever you want to do
something on land, there is something on that land already. So it’s not so
simple.
Alpha: So the FAO, that’s one of the leading agricultural global
entities, right? It’s a big deal that they’re actually recognizing this.
Lan: Yes, I do see that. And also in conferences, more
organizations are talking about it. Johan Rockström is the co-chair of the
Earth Commission and the Global Commission on the Economics of Water. And
they had a couple of reports now quantifying the moisture exchange between
countries and frame it in the way that policy makers understand. So if you
frame it in terms of the economics of water, if you frame it in terms of a
trans-boundary issue. I think it’s really being taken up by people who are
understanding it. I’m not sure if it’s been taken up in policy but I see it
coming.
Alpha: Okay, so it’s being recognized, but there’s not necessarily
policy passed to restore land use to increase the rain.
Lan: Not that I know of. Okay. Not like particular policies. I don’t
know if it’s good or bad because, you know, you don’t want it to be misused.
I really hope it’s taken up in a good way and used in the right way.
Alpha: In the whole hydrology or climate movement, is it just a
very small section of scientists talking with governance people, or is there
more. Is it growing?
Lan: Sophie te Wierik’s finished a PhD now a couple of years ago.
And so she was really focusing on the governance of atmospheric moisture.
She’s at Potsdam Institute. I also just generally see more governance people
being interested, which is always good because we can only do as much as
with our more biophysical background. We can try to reach out, but
ultimately you need to work together with governance scholars. We had a
collaboration with a number of people who worked on implementing moisture
recycling in life cycle assessment. That was one example of trying to
implement it in actual thing that are being used by companies. And we have
another project working on the Earth System Impact Score, led by Steve Lade
in Australia. Who is trying to create a score of planetary boundaries
interactions, and we’re not there yet, but eventually we will hope to
integrate moisture recycling considerations also in this metric, which is
something that can be used by companies and investors to assess not only
their local impact, but the normal metric will do the job for, but also how
their operations affect a large-scale kind of planetary scale. And it’s a
continent or the planetary scale impact.
Alpha: Do you personally talk to people at FAO?
Lan: I talked to them. We just had put together a a report with
FAO together. So I think this organization also is really happy to work
together with researchers. And of course, the majority of my time goes to
research, but I do try to make a good chunk of time to contribute to reports
and policy briefs to the extent that they also reach the policy makers and I
think that’s a part of me fearing that our concepts will not be used in the
right ways. I can’t keep my fingers away from yeah, at least reviewing those
reports. Okay, yes, it’s formulated in a nuanced way. But I don’t know if
policy makers like that. I think they kind of prefer maybe the simplest
straightforward recommendations and here I come with the more nuanced
recommendations.
Alpha: Do you have any last words to share?
Lan: I think this field will continue to move forward and
hopefully go more interdisciplinary so that it can have a real impact. I
think we are starting to recognize and realize that the water cycle is not
just a function of the climate, but a part of the living system. So those
that live on earth depend on the movement of water. It’s a tiny fraction of
earth water that is fresh that is used for all life on land and the reason
it can be used is because it’s in movement. So it’s a renewable resource
really. And this water cycle is also then dependent on life. So at the same
time that the water is giving life, the life is also giving water.
We really need to think
of the water as an intertwined thing. The water cycle we have
today is not just a biophysical abstract thing, but it’s something that is
shaped by the whole evolution of life on earth and a result of co evolution
with life. And now we are part of as a species, we are part of shaping the
water cycle. And I think we need to be really careful thinking about how we
are shaping it, whether it’s in a way that is good for us or in a way that
is practically self harm. And we are the only species that is doing this
knowingly and consciously. So I think with that lies a big responsibility.
………….
Lan Wang Erlandsson’s web page, which includes her key
publications
Upgrade to paidShare
You're currently a free subscriber to Climate Water Project. For
the full experience, upgrade your subscription.
Upgrade to paid
Like
Comment
Restack
© 2025 Alpha Lo
548 Market Street PMB 72296, San Francisco, CA 94104
--
Вы получили это сообщение, поскольку подписаны на группу
"seu-international".
From: Sasha Shkrebets <sasha на teia.org>
Date: вт, 14 окт. 2025 г. в 13:28
Subject: Re: Восстановление воды как экосистемная услуга
Коллеги, возможно кому-то будет интересно поучаствовать ...
----------- следующая часть -----------
Вложение в формате HTML было извлечено…
URL: <http://lists.enwl.net.ru/pipermail/enwl-inf/attachments/20251015/0cf68255/attachment-0001.html>
Подробная информация о списке рассылки Enwl-Inf