Modelling Black Poplar (Populus nigra) - Population dynamics of riparian tree communities in a simulated floodplain

My main task within the subproject B10 is the ongoing development and analysis of our integrated ecological-economic land-use change model "Efforts-ABM". The land-use change model in its current form, consists of a socio-economic and an ecological submodel. Within the socio-economic submodel, households make land use decisions by evaluating alternative management options. These decisions indirectly affect the ecological functions, which are part of the ecological submodel.

The model rules and parameterization are mainly based on the results from other sub-projects within the CRC 990. New results and data from other groups will help us to further refine the Efforts-ABM. Model development will focus on the ecological submodel to include additional ecological functions besides carbon storage. Adding heterogenous plant and animal species distributions of different land use types and water quality and water availability will enhance the possibilities to anlayse trade-offs between socio-economic functions and ecological functions.

Besides model development, we perform analyses to understand the interactions and mechanisms of the model system. A sensitivity analysis will be conducted, to identify factors with large impact on the model outputs.