View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by B-Digital Biogeochemical Modelling of Ria Formosa (South Portugal) Duarte, P. 1*, Azevedo, B. 1, Guerreiro, M. 1, Ribeiro, C. 1 , Bandeira, R., Pereira, A. 1, Falcão, M. 2, Serpa, D 2 & Reia, J. 3 1Center for Modelling and Analysis of Environmental Systems, Faculty of Science and Technology, Fernando Pessoa University, Praça 9 de Abril 349, P-4200 Porto, Portugal.
[email protected] 2Portuguese Marine Research Institute (IPIMAR), CRIP Sul, Av. 5 de Outubro, 2700 Olhão, Portugal 3Parque Natural da Ria Formosa, Centro de Educação Ambiental do Marim, Quelfes, 8700 Olhão, Portugal *Author for correspondence Abstract Ria Formosa is a large (c.a. 100 km 2) mesotidal lagunary system with intertidal areas with conflicting uses such as fisheries, aquaculture, tourism and nature conservation. Its watersheds cover an area of approximately 864 km 2, with a perimeter of 166 km and a maximum altitude of 522 m. Land use may be classified into six major groups: 1) urban, 2) agricultural, 3) forest, 4) rangeland and pastures, 5) wetlands and 6) water bodies. The main objectives of this work are to: (i) Evaluate the relative importance of land drainage, waste water treatment plants (WTP) and water exchanges across the lagoon inlets, for nutrient dynamics; (ii) Analyse management scenarios related to changes in lagoon bathymetry and their potential effects on system dynamics. The Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT model) has been applied to the catchment areas in order to simulate water discharges into Ria Formosa providing forcing to a two- dimensional vertically integrated coupled physical-biogeochemical model, implemented with EcoDynamo – an object oriented modelling software.