Modelling the combined impacts of climate change and direct anthropogenic drivers on the ecosystem of the northwest European continental shelf

Wakelin, Sarah L. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2081-2693; Artioli, Yuri; Butenschön, Momme; Allen, J. Icarus; Holt, Jason T. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3298-8477. 2015 Modelling the combined impacts of climate change and direct anthropogenic drivers on the ecosystem of the northwest European continental shelf. Journal of Marine Systems, 152. 51-63. 10.1016/j.jmarsys.2015.07.006

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Text © 2015 Elsevier B.V. This is the author’s version of a work that was accepted for publication in Journal of Marine Systems. Changes resulting from the publishing process, such as peer review, editing, corrections, structural formatting, and other quality control mechanisms may not be reflected in this document. Changes may have been made to this work since it was submitted for publication. A definitive version will be published in Journal of Marine Systems (doi:10.1016/j.jmarsys.2015.07.006) MARSYS-D-15-00025_Wakelin_et_al_R2.pdf - Accepted Version Download (2MB) | Preview

Abstract/Summary

The potential response of the marine ecosystem of the northwest European continental shelf to climate change under a medium emissions scenario (SRES A1B) is investigated using the coupled hydrodynamics-ecosystem model POLCOMS-ERSEM. Changes in the near future (2030-2040) and the far future (2082-2099) are compared to the recent past (1983-2000). The sensitivity of the ecosystem to potential changes in multiple anthropogenic drivers (river nutrient loads and benthic trawling) in the near future is compared to the impact of changes in climate. With the exception of the biomass of benthic organisms, the influence of the anthropogenic drivers only exceeds the impact of climate change in coastal regions. Increasing river nitrogen loads has a limited impact on the ecosystem whilst reducing river nitrogen and phosphate concentrations affects net primary production (netPP) and phytoplankton and zooplankton biomass. Direct anthropogenic forcing is seen to mitigate/amplify the effects of climate change. Increasing river nitrogen has the potential to amplify the effects of climate change at the coast by increasing netPP. Reducing river nitrogen and phosphate mitigates the effects of climate change for netPP and the biomass of small phytoplankton and large zooplankton species but amplifies changes in the biomass of large phytoplankton and small zooplankton.

Item Type:	Publication - Article
Digital Object Identifier (DOI):	10.1016/j.jmarsys.2015.07.006
ISSN:	9240-7963
Additional Keywords:	Climatic changes; Man-induced effects; Modelling; Ecosystems; Northwest European Continental Shelf; POLCOMS-ERSEM
NORA Subject Terms:	Marine Sciences
Date made live:	03 Aug 2015 09:12 +0 (UTC)
URI:	https://nora.nerc.ac.uk/id/eprint/511422

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