Report on climate change constraints affecting the Muzza system

This report provides a revision of the literature regarding climate change stressors especially focusing on Italy and regional level when possible (northern Italy and Po Valley). The report includes: (i) identification of main climate change patterns and impacts, with a special focus on temperature and precipitation values, (ii) a selection of main climate change risks according to identified impacts, and (iii) the visualization of main climate change effects on agriculture.

This Deliverable (D2.1) “Report on climate change constraints affecting the Muzza system” is part of Work Package 2 (WP2) “Climate change constraints affecting the Muzza system”. The main objective of this work package is to provide a synthesis of the main climate change impacts and risks affecting agricultural activity in the Muzza system, in the Lombardy region (Italy), by addressing the gap between water scarcity and water demand scenarios. To this purpose, D2.1 aims to provide a review of the literature on climate change stressors, especially focusing on Italy and the regional level (northern Italy and Po Valley), including main impacts and risks. The report (because of Tasks 2.1, 2.2, and 2.3) sets a reference for WP4 (“Key behavioural rules from individual farmer’ perception and key stakeholders’ decision”) and associated tasks 4.1 and 4.2 which will focus on data collection about climate change perception from farmers and managers through semi-structured interviews and survey. Besides, D2.1 will also set the baseline for WP5 (“Behavioural models of individual farmers and key stakeholders using artificial intelligence and machine learning technique”) by integrating those key points (outputs) from the literature as new utility functions and multiobjective problems in the DistriLake model.  

This deliverable reports an assessment of main climate change constraints affecting the Muzza system by considering both meteorological (e.g., historical trends, future scenarios) and socio-economic (e.g., impacts and risks, perception) issues. As a state-of-the-art report, it should be used or consulted by utility managers and operators, local government officials and planners, public interest groups, and end-users, like farmers. Starting with an overview of the project (Section 2), the report is structured in three parts:

• Part I: identification of main climate change patterns and impacts, with a special focus on temperature, precipitation, and soil moisture values (Section 3),
• Part II: a selection of main climate change risks according to identified impacts (Section 4), and
• Part III: visualization of main climate change effects on agriculture (Section 5).

Sections have been built upon the reviewed literature and additional sources such as databases, reports from public and private institutions, outputs from research projects. Key concepts and a set of key indicators have been considered from the review of the literature to provide a brief overview of the current situation of climate change constraints affecting the Muzza system.