BIOGEOCHEMICAL MODELLING OF THE MARANO AND GRADO LAGOON (ITALY) WITH A BENTHIC-PELAGIC COUPLING

The Marano and Grado Lagoon is a shallow coastal system of regional and international ecological importance, located in the northeastern coastal area of Italy. The impact of anthropogenic pressures related to local socio-economic activities and to climate variability, including climate change, requires knowledge and tools to understand the lagoon's trophic dynamics and to support comprehensive management strategies. We present a multiannual analysis of the Marano and Grado Lagoon biogeochemistry using observations and a high resolution coupled physical biogeochemical model, with an explicit benthic-pelagic coupling. The model was developed by coupling the transport model SHYFEM ( https://github.com/SHYFEM-model/shyfem) and the biogeochemical model BFM (Biogeochemical Flux Model, bfm-community.eu/). The biogeochemical component of the model includes the simulation of the biogeochemical processes of both water column and sediments and their coupling. Ten-year simulations of physical-chemical properties (2006-2015) and five-year simulations for biogeochemistry (2010-2014) were conducted. Results indicate that the distributions of the pelagic biogeochemical state variables are in reasonably good agreement with the observations. Also, the benthic state variables concentrations are simulated in line with the known characteristics of the Marano and Grado lagoon benthic ecosystem. Sensitivity analysis shows that the inclusion of the explicitly resolved benthic-pelagic coupling improves the model performances highlighting its importance in the biogeochemical model.

Presentation Preference: Oral

Primary Presenter: Isabella Scroccaro, National Institute of Oceanography and Applied Geophysics - OGS (iscroccaro@ogs.it)

Authors:

Isabella Scroccaro, National Institute of Oceanography and Applied Geophysics - OGS  (iscroccaro@ogs.it)

Celia Laurent, National Institute of Oceanography and Applied Geophysics - OGS  (claurent@ogs.it)

Leslie Aveytua Alcazar, National Institute of Oceanography and Applied Geophysics - OGS  (laveytua@ogs.it)

Paolo Lazzari, National Institute of Oceanography and Applied Geophysics - OGS  (plazzari@ogs.it)

Donata Canu, National Institute of Oceanography and Applied Geophysics - OGS  (dcanu@ogs.it)