[Forside] [Hovedområder] [Perioder] [Udannelser] [Alle kurser på en side]
To give the students a theoretical and practical insight into themes and data stored in Geographical Information Systems (GIS) and national monitoring databases as used for conducting a pressure impact analysis of the pollution of surface waters under the EU Water Framework Directive at catchment or regional scale. This includes the assessment of landscape level interactions between agricultural production, various types of nutrient losses, and the ecological effects. The students will gain theoretical and practical insight into the function and application of different hydrological and nutrient models that can be applied as tools for analysing the present state of the terrestrial and aquatic environment within Danish catchments and regions. In addition, parallels to selected examples from other EU countries will be drawn. The students will gain theoretical and practical insight into the methods used to assess ecological conditions in surface waters, the main pressures on surface waters and simple relationships between abiotic variables and biotic indicators. The students will also gain theoretical and practical insight into the content of a suite of mitigation measures that can be adopted in river basin management plans for establishing good ecological conditions in the aquatic environment.
The students will be introduced to relevant information stored in GIS that are needed as basic input data for agro-ecosystem analysis at the regional and catchment scale. The students will be taught the theoretical background and application of different key models. Such models are today essential for agricultural pressure-impact analyses with respect to the terrestrial and aquatic environment. The relevance of scale in the analyses concepts will be discussed. The students will be introduced to a catalogue of mitigation measures available for use to river basin managers that are to establish good ecological quality in surface waters according to the WFD. The students will gain insight into both direct and indirect effects of the different mitigation options, their socio-economic costs and their possible implementation under different physiographic and agricultural conditions. The students will also be introduced to the methods used for monitoring and analysing the ecological conditions in surface waters, learn about the most important links between abiotic and biotic conditions and learn about the pressures on fauna and flora in freshwater bodies and the possible ecological responses to changes in pressures.
The course will start with a theoretical introduction to the different GIS data used in a pressureimpact analyses followed by a theoretical introduction to a suite of different models (empirical, deterministic and process oriented) that can be applied for analysing the hydrology and nutrient cycling at catchments and regional scale.
The students will gain practical insight into and experience with different models by applying them to real life catchments. The students will be working in project groups utilising existing data from various databases. The project groups will be trained in how they can perform a catchment analysis of hydrology and nutrient cycling utilising a combination of GIS data, monitoring data and models. Each project group will as part of the course conduct an exercise where they conduct a pressure-impact analysis of a chosen river basin and develop a proposal for a river basin management plan for the catchment dosing different mitigation options to finally obtain a good ecological quality in surface waters. Each project group shall deliver a 5 ECTS report on their combined results of the catchment analysis including an analysis of the costs of the chosen management plan, the direct and indirect effects and the presumed ecological responses in the surface waters.
Course managers: Brian Kronvang, research professor, AU-NERI (The National Environmental Research Institute) and Tommy Dalgaard, head of research unit, AU-DJF. Experts from AU-NERI and AU-DJF will conduct the teaching.
A combination of theoretical lectures, practical exercises with data and models on two study catchments, field excursions and a project seminar in groups conducting a catchment analysis.
English/Danish, depending on international participation.
The EU Water Framework Directive and part of some of the guidance documemts from EU on the Water Framework Directive.
A few chapters from the book ' Agriculture, Hydrology and Water Quality - .Edited by P.M. Haygarth and S. C. Jarvis - CABI Publishing.
Chapter 30 og 31 from the book *Phosphorus: Agriculture and the Environment' - Agrconomy Monographs No. 46.
Odense Pilot River Basin - Pilot project for river basin management planning - Water Framework Directive Article 13, Danish Ministry of the Environment, Environment Centre Odense, 123 pp.
The NAM manual - a precipitation-runoff model.
Andersen and Kronvang (2005) ‘MODIFYING AND EVALUATING A P INDEX FOR DENMARK, Water, Air, and Soil Pollution (2006) 174: 341-353
Kronvang et al. (2005): 'Nutrient pressures and ecological responses to nutrient loading reductions in Danish streams, lakes and coastal waters' Journal of Hydrology, 274-288.
Baattrup-Pedersen et al. (2008): Can a priori defined reference criteria be used to select reference sites in Danish streams? Implications for implementing the Water Framework Directive. Journal of Environmental Monitoring
Kronvang, B., Bechman, M., Lundekvam, H., Behrendt, H., Rubæk, G.H., Schoumans, O.F., Syversen, N., Andersen, H.E. & Hoffmann, C.C. 2005: Phosphorus Losses from Agricultural Areas in River Basins: Effects and Uncertainties of Targeted Mitigation Measures. - Journal of Environmental Quality 34: 2129-2144
A number of other research papers concerning hydrological and nutrient modelling and implementation of river basin management plans (e.g. a special issue of Journal of Environmental Monitoring coming up soon).
Oral examination based on a project report (weighting two third) and the curriculum (weighing one third) will be assessed jointly, using the Danish 7-point grading scale. The examination lasts 30 minutes. Students may choose to be axamined in either Danish or English. External examiner.
