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

Abstract

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.