Climatrentino

Environmental Meteorology Seminar

Thursday 19 October 2023 - 14:30 (UTC+2)

Lecture Room 1P (1st floor) - DICAM - University of Trento, Via Mesiano 77 Trento and online https://unitn.zoom.us/j/88489623830 (Meeting ID: 884 8962 3830, Passcode: 111582)

Valentina Pavan - Hydro-meteo-climatological Service, Environmental Agency of Emilia-Romagna Region (Arpae-Simc)

"Sub-seasonal ensemble irrigation predictions in Emilia-Romagna"

Abstract

Within the project "Highlander", Arpae Simc set up an operational climate service addressed to support irrigation water management in agriculture, by providing mid-term information between probabilistic seasonal forecasts and short-term view of deterministic +7-day forecasts.

The product take as input the sub-seasonal (+4 weeks) forecasts operationally produced, interpolated over Emilia Romagna at 5 km resolution and calibrated using the EcPoint technique by ECMWF, together with information on agricultural land use from satellite data, soil map and observed weather data from Arpae Simc. All these data are taken as inputs of the agro-hydrological model CRITERIA-1D (https://github.com/ARPA-SIMC/CRITERIA1D), computing the crop development and crop water needs.

The sub-seasonal irrigation forecasts are operationally produced since 2021 for three Land Reclamation and Irrigation Boards (Consorzi di Bonifica in Italian), which are the authorities in charge of water management for agriculture (water storage, transportation and distribution): the Burana, Renana and Romagna Irrigation Consortia.

Operational output data are +4 weeks irrigation and precipitation forecasts expressed as a statistical distribution. The results obtained validating irrigation probabilistic forecasts for summer 2022 against observed water use in a group of farms are described and analysed.