The 1857–1858 drought in Alsace: from water shortage to a socio-political extreme event

Metzger, Alexis; Jacob-Rousseau, Nicolas

doi:10.1007/s10113-020-01632-7

Cited by 7 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 32 publications

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“…From the 14th to the 18th century, Rouen was a large and flourishing city in Normandy. The city was significant for the political administration of Normandy as well as for the trade of goods between Paris and the Norman coast (Mollat, 1979). However, over the course of the 400 years examined here, the fates of Bern and Rouen changed from time to time, and both cities suffered war, epidemics, and famines during certain periods.…”

Section: Datamentioning

confidence: 89%

Droughts in Bern and Rouen from the 14th to the beginning of the 18th century derived from documentary evidence

Camenisch

Salvisberg

2020

Clim. Past

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Abstract. Droughts derive from a precipitation deficit and can also be temperature driven. They are dangerous natural hazards for human societies. Documentary data from the pre-modern and early modern times contain direct and indirect information on precipitation that allow for the production of reconstructions using historical climatology methods. For this study, two drought indices – the drought index of Bern (DIB) and the drought index of Rouen (DIR) – have been created on the basis of documentary data produced in Bern, Switzerland, and Rouen, France, respectively for the period from 1315 to 1715. These two indices have been compared to a third supra-regional drought index (SDI) for Switzerland, Germany, France, the Netherlands, and Belgium that was synthesised from precipitation reconstruction based on historical climatology. The results of this study show that the documentary data from Bern mainly contain summer droughts, whereas the data from Rouen rather allow for the reconstruction of spring droughts. The comparison of the three above-mentioned indices shows that the DIB and the DIR most probably do not contain all of the actual drought events; however, they detect droughts that do not appear in the SDI. This fact suggests that more documentary data from single locations, such as historical city archives, should be examined in the future and should be added to larger reconstructions in order to obtain more complete drought reconstructions.

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Section: Datamentioning

confidence: 89%

Droughts in Bern and Rouen from the 14th to the beginning of the 18th century derived from documentary evidence

Camenisch

Salvisberg

2020

Clim. Past

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“…Climate change and drought risk is not only limited to the lowlands of the URA but also affects large parts of the forest-covered Graben flanks and the higher mid-altitude mountain ranges. In this context, severe long-term drought periods as experienced during the 19th century AD [86] and in 2018 and 2019 will enhance the hydrological pressure on the ecosystem-not only in summer but also during the early spring growing period. Extensive irrigation in the Alsatian part of the URA will further amplify the water shortages in summer and fall and contribute severely to a dramatic drop in ground-water availability downstream in the lower Rhine basin (Figure 2).…”

Section: Environmental Settings and Landscape Historymentioning

confidence: 99%

Tracing Real-Time Transnational Hydrologic Sensitivity and Crop Irrigation in the Upper Rhine Area over the Exceptional Drought Episode 2018–2020 Using Open Source Sentinel-2 Data

Kempf

Glaser

2020

Water

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Climate and regional land-use and landcover change (LUCC) impact the ecosystem of the Upper Rhine Area (URA) and transform large parts of the landscape into strongly irrigated agricultural cropland. The increase of long-term drought periods and the trend towards low summer precipitation totals trigger an increase in groundwater scarcity and amplify the negative effects of extensive irrigation purposes and freshwater consumption in a hydrologically sensitive region in Central Europe. This article presents qualitative transnational open source remote sensing temporal series of vegetation indices (NDVI) and groundwater level development to tracing near real-time vegetation change and socio-ecological feedbacks during periods of climate extremes in the Upper Rhine Area (2018–2020). Increased freshwater consumption caused a dramatic drop in groundwater availability, which eventually led to a strong degradation of the vegetation canopy and caused governmental regulations in July 2020. Assessing vegetation growth behavior and linking groundwater reactions in the URA through open source satellite data contributes to a rapidly accessible understanding of the ecosystem’s feedbacks on the local to the transnational scale and further enables risk management and eco-political regulations in current and future decision-making processes.

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Societal impacts of historical droughts in a warming world

et al. 2022

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Global climate change has highlighted social and economic challenges associated with water deficits, particularly in regions where demands on freshwater exceed renewable supplies. In view of ongoing global warming, climate models project increased aridity in the twenty-first century over most of Africa, parts of the Americas, Australia, and Southeast Asia, as well as the Mediterranean and the Middle East. Severe recent droughts in human-dominated environments-as experienced in California, Brazil, China, Spain, and Australia-can no longer be seen as purely natural hazards. These droughts have had devastating ecological and economic consequences and are expected to cause more damage by the end of the twenty-first century (Savelli et al. 2022). Moreover, such heat waves are projected to become more intense, more frequent, and longer lasting in a warmer climate (Cook et al. 2018).Drought research has a long history in both the natural and social sciences. Climatologists and hydrologists have made significant progress in understanding the physical processes that underlie droughts. At the same time, historians, economists, geographers, and sociologists have studied societal impacts and perceptions of droughts. However, these * Nicolas Maughan

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The 1857–1858 drought in Alsace: from water shortage to a socio-political extreme event

Cited by 7 publications

References 32 publications

Droughts in Bern and Rouen from the 14th to the beginning of the 18th century derived from documentary evidence

Droughts in Bern and Rouen from the 14th to the beginning of the 18th century derived from documentary evidence

Tracing Real-Time Transnational Hydrologic Sensitivity and Crop Irrigation in the Upper Rhine Area over the Exceptional Drought Episode 2018–2020 Using Open Source Sentinel-2 Data

Societal impacts of historical droughts in a warming world

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