by One lesson I bet we can all remember from grade school is the water cycle. Even if you don’t remember exactly what you learned, you probably have memories of some kind of video or diagram that was so colorful and creative that it made the day more fun. For some of us (myself included) it’s hard to forget. Even in the adult world, it feels neat and simple to think of the three components of the water cycle as intended, rinse and repeat: Evaporation, condensation and precipitation.
Our planet could not survive without water, a substance that represents 71% of the total surface of our world and its oceans which has about 97% of this figure. That said, however, the process can become very complicated when you mix in the ever-changing climate, driven by human activity such as burning coal, as well as other everyday impacts we make as a society. As a weather forecaster myself, I know the challenges we face in predicting water-based natural disasters including floods, landslides and droughts.
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But in order for scientists to make the most accurate forecasts possible to better understand how this cycle works, we need to obtain and revise models with as much high-resolution data as possible. Ideally, this data should cover every inch of the planet, from the highest mountain peaks to the water buried deep in the ground.
And, thanks to funding provided by the European Space Agency, scientists are building precisely the following: A digital twin of the Earth, and all its beautiful water, that can be explored .
“It is very complicated to simulate the Earth at high resolution, so the idea is basically to focus on a specific target first,” Luca Brocca of the Italian National Research Council said in a statement. “That is the idea behind what we have developed – double digital case studies for the terrestrial water cycle in the Mediterranean Basin. Our goal is to create a system that allows non-experts, including decision makers and citizens, run interactive simulations.”
Brocca, who was lead author of an in-depth article on the study, worked with colleagues to create the digital twin. By having this model, scientists can consistently input new data to simulate the best and worst case scenarios of a natural disaster in different environments across our planet. For example, by replicating a landslide, the risks and conditions associated with it can be monitored as if they were happening in real time. This may further assist in preparedness for potentially catastrophic events in the future based on what is learned through each trial.
So how are these models created?
It took a lot of work from scientists to make use of as much satellite data as possible, collected through many observations of the Earth. Then they blended together measurements from soil moisture, precipitation, snow depth, evaporation and river discharge, taken in specific time periods, to paint a crisp picture of the dynamics of variables across the planet. Then, the model’s high-resolution data can be used as an interactive tool for scientists.
“This project is a great example of the synergy between pioneering satellite missions and the scientific community,” said Brocca. “Collaborations like these, along with investments in computational infrastructure, will be critical to managing the effects of climate change and other human impacts.”
As with any type of model, working towards perfection takes practice. But you have to start somewhere.
Brocca and colleagues first used the digital twin to model the Po River valley in Northern Italy and other parts of the Mediterranean basin; they have future plans to create similar models across Europe before collaborating with scientists from other continents. The main goal of this project is to help predict where floods and landslides may occur and learn how to better manage our water resources.
“We should start from something we know very well,” said Brocca. “The Po River valley is very complex – we have the Alps, we have snow, which is difficult to imagine, especially in an irregular and complex terrain like mountains. Then there is the valley with all the human activities – industry, irrigation. You have a river and extreme events – floods, droughts. And then we moved to the Mediterranean, a good place to investigate extreme events of too much water and too little water.”
While the team’s modeling focuses on a larger-scale region, there are also plans to look at more local studies. But, for now, scientists continue to focus on the biggest and most persistent challenges in its mechanism. For example, the complex algorithms they have developed will need to be tended to as significant amounts of data continue to be introduced; more ground observations are also needed, they say, to continue to verify the satellite data they used.
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Similarly, to combat any uncertainties that may arise when using satellite data, Brocca hopes to incorporate artificial intelligence into his program to iron out some of the kinks. In a way, the AI would act like an extra set of eyes, if it can be trained well. As we have seen with the use of AI in weather models, such as those related to wildfire prediction, the benefits of such collaboration include minimizing errors that can sometimes occur due to changes in atmospheric conditions when capturing images. Implementing AI can also save time, allowing human engineers to focus on other areas of concern.
“The collaborative efforts of scientists, space agencies and decision-makers promise a future where Digital Twin Earths provide hydrology with valuable insights into sustainable water management and disaster resilience,” said Brocca.
The study was published on March 5 in the journal Frontiers in Science.
