VULCAN - the project          

Goal   Potential

VULCAN - Vulnerability assessment of shrubland ecosystems in Europe under climatic changes - is a EU project investigating the effects of changes in the climate on the functioning of shrublands in order to support political decissions as well as management practices to sustain the quality of this habitat type in Europe.

The overarching goal of the VULCAN project is to:

Assess the vulnerability of European shrubland ecosystems and the rate and extent of changes in these ecosystems as affected by climate change. Specifically VULCAN will:

• assess shrubland ecosystem responses (productivity, biogeochemical cycling, species change) to realistic changes in climatic variables (increased temperature and extended drought) in the long term using a newly developed and tested experimental approach.
• investigate the interaction between climate change and other stress factors such as N pollution, management and land use practices in shrublands.
• conduct and assess the impacts of changes in climatic factors at lower latitudes (central and southern Europe) which has been little investigated
• undertake a risk assessment and construct vulnerability scenarios for shrublands in order to evaluate the impacts of future hazards on these communities. This assessment will consider the impacts of loss of shrublands on regional biodiversity, ecosystem functioning and social and economic factors (e.g. profitability, employment, recreation)
• develop a simple expert system for shrubland management based on a risk assessment and existing knowledge and experiences on shrubland management gained from land users and managers in order to provide a tool for shrubland management.
• develop an "end user" group of shrubland managers representing various regions and interests in order to formulate and prioritise management actions for shrublands that may counteract the effects of climate change

The innovative potential of VULCAN lies in 3 main areas:

Field scale experimental climatic treatments by a newly developed and tested approach over the long term.
Global warming is basically caused by a reduction in the loss of long wave IR-radiation from the earth back into the atmosphere because of the green house gas accumulation in the atmosphere. The temperature increase observed so far has been due to increased minimum temperatures (night) rather than a general temperature increase. A new method has been developed which mimics this global warming by covering the ecosystem at night by IR-reflective material - i.e. passive night time warming. Night-time warming mimics global change and has been applied recently in grassland in US and in heath- and moorland in Europe with an effect of warming the soil and plants by up to 2oC. VULCAN will apply this method on European shrublands over a relatively long time period to assess climate change effects on ecosystem driving processes.

Experimental studies of climate change effects in both northern and southern regions of Europe
The mean surface temperature is predicted to increase more in northern latitudes than in other climate zones. Therefore, most studies on effects of warming on ecosystem behaviour have been conducted in the arctic and sub-arctic regions resulting in a lack of knowledge about the effects of warming on ecosystem functioning at lower latitudes and warmer climates. This geographic bias has already led to problems in up-scaling results from soil warming projects to a larger scale. Furthermore, extended drought may affect the southern latitudes to a greater extent than northern latitudes, and make ecosystems more vulnerable to risks of less concern in northern latitudes such as fire. VULCAN will conduct ecosystem studies in shrubland ecosystems in central and southern Europe, which correct the current geographical bias and increase our knowledge on the response of ecosystems at warmer climates to climate change.

Developing a risk assessment for a widespread community type.
Whilst risk assessments have been undertaken in other sectors for many years, they are only recently being utilised to aid conservation management. The work in VULCAN represents the first attempt to formulate a comprehensive risk assessment for shrub and heath lands at a European scale.