Department Water Resources and Drinking Water

RECORD – Restored Corridor Dynamics

Record field site near Neunforn. (A) observation towers, (B) piezometers/wells (approx. 80), (C) groundwater measurements, (D) meteorological measurements (3 stations), (E) ecological monitoring and soil measurements. (© Schirmer et al. (2014), HESS, 18, 1-14)

River restoration is an essential tool to achieve “good ecological status” of water courses as required by European and Swiss legislation. Although the number of restoration projects has increased in recent years, scientific understanding of the underlying principles determining how hydromorphological variability in restored corridors of rivers relates to ecosystem functioning, to biodiversity and to water quality is still limited.

The objective of the interdisciplinary RECORD-project was to increase mechanistic understanding of coupled hydrological and ecological processes in near-river corridors. For this purpose, the following was accomplished: 1) Instrumenting a restored and a channelized section of Swiss River Thur as large-scale field experimental sites, where we quantify how the relevant variables influence (ground)water quality, ecosystem functioning and biodiversity; 2) Performing controlled experiments at the field sites and in the lab; and 3) Developing process-based models of coupled hydrological, biogeochemical and ecological processes, facilitating transfer to other river systems undergoing restoration.

Contact

Prof. Dr. Mario Schirmer Tel. +41 58 765 5382 Send Mail

Team

RECORD was an interdisciplinary project with the involvement and integration of different scientific fields like hydrogeology, hydrology, hydrochemistry, biochemistry, engineering geology, but also social sciences. At Eawag, the following departments were involved in the project:

Key collaborators in the project, next to Eawag, are:

Funding

ETH board through the Competence Center Sustainability and Environment, Eawag, ETHZ, EPFL, WSL, SNF, EU, FOEN

Publications

  • Schirmer, M., Luster, J., Linde, N., Perona, P., Mitchell, E.A.D., Barry, D.A., Hollender, J., Cirpka, O.A., Schneider, P., Vogt, T., Radny, D., Durisch-Kaiser, E. 2014. Morphological, hydrological, biogeochemical and ecological changes and challenges in river restoration – The Thur River case study. Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 18, 1-14. hess.copernicus.org/articles/18/2449/2014/.
  • Diem, S., Renard, P., and Schirmer, M.: New methods to estimate 2D water level distributions of dynamic rivers, Ground Water, 51(6), 847-854, 2013.
  • Diem, S., Cirpka, O. A., and Schirmer, M.: Modeling the dynamics of oxygen consumption upon riverbank filtration by a stochastic-convective approach, Journal of Hydrology, 505, 352–363, 2013.
  • Huntscha, S., Rodriguez, D., Schroth, M., Hollender, J.: Degradation of polar organic micropollutants during riverbank filtration: complementary results from spatiotemporal sampling and push−pull tests, Environm. Sci. Technol., 47, 11512−11521, 2013.
  • Schirmer, M. 2013. Das RECORD-Projekt - Flussrevitalisierung, eine ökologische Massnahme in einem komplexen Umfeld, Aqua & Gas, 3, 22-28.
  • Batlle-Aguilar, J., Brovelli, A., Luster, J., Shrestha, J., Niklaus, P. A., and Barry, D. A.: Analysis of carbon and nitrogen dynamics in riparian soils: Model validation and sensitivity to environmental controls, Sci. Total Env. 429, 246-256, 2012.
  • Coscia, I., Linde, N., Greenhalgh, S., Günther, T., and Green, A.: A filtering method to correct 3D ERT data and improve imaging of natural aquifer dynamics, Journal of Applied Geophysics, 80,12-24, 2012.
  • Coscia, I., Linde, N., Greenhalgh, S., Vogt, T., and Green, A.: Estimating travel times and groundwater flow patterns using 3D time-lapse crosshole ERT imaging of electrical resistivity fluctuations induced by infiltrating river water, Geophysics, 77, E239-E250, 2012.
  • Crouzy, B. and Perona, P.: Biomass selection by floods and related timescales: Part 2. Stochastic modeling, Adv. Water Resour, 39, 97-105, 2012.
  • Doetsch, J., Linde, N., Pessognelli, M., Green, A. G., and Gunther, T.: Constraining 3-D electrical resistivity inversions with GPR data for improved aquifer characterization, Journal of Applied Geophysics, 78, 68-76, 2012.
  • Doetsch, J., Linde, N., Vogt, T., Binley, A., and Green, A. G.: Imaging and quantifying salt tracer transport in a riparian groundwater system by means of 3-D ERT monitoring, Geophysics, 77, B207-B218, 2012.
  • Fournier, B., Malysheva, E., Mazei, Y., Moretti, M., and Mitchell, E. A. D.: Toward the use of testate amoeba functional traits as indicator of floodplain restoration success, European Journal of Soil Biology, 49, 85-91, 2012.
  • Fournier, B., Samaritani, E., Shrestha, J., Mitchell, E. A. D., and Le Bayon, R.C.: Patterns of earthworm communities and species traits in relation to the perturbation gradient of a restored floodplain, Applied Soil Ecology, 59, 87-95, 2012.
  • Huber, B., Bernasconi, S. M., Graf Pannatier, E., and Luster J.: A simple method for the DOM removal and δ15N analysis of NO3- from freshwater, Rapid Comm. Mass Spectr., 26, 1475-1480, 2012.
  • Pasquale, N., Perona, P., Francis, R., and Burlando, P.: Effects of streamflow variability on the vertical root density distribution of willow cutting experiments, Ecological Engineering, 40, 167-172, dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.advwatres.2011.09.018, 2012.
  • Perona, P., Molnar, P., Crouzy, B., Peruccac, E., Jiangb, Z., McLellandd, S., Wüthricha, D., Edmaier, K., Francise, R., Camporealec, C., and Gurnell, A.: Biomass selection by floods and related timescales: Part 1. Experimental observations, Adv. Water Resour., 39, 85-96, 2012.
  • Peter, S., Koetzsch, S., Traber, J., Traber, J., Bernasconi, S. M., Wehrli, B., and Durisch-Kaiser, E.: Intensified organic carbon dynamics in the groundwater of a restored riparian zone, Freshwater Biology,57, 1603-1616, 2012.
  • Peter, S., Rechsteiner, R., Lehmann, M. F., Brankatschk, R., Vogt, T., Diem, S., Wehrli, B., Tockner, K., and Durisch-Kaiser, E.: Nitrate removal in a restored riparian groundwater system: Functioning and importance of individual riparian zones, Biogeosciences, 9(11), 4295-4307, Doi: 10.5194/bg-9-4295-2012, 2012.
  • Shrestha, J., Niklaus, P. A., Frossard, E., Samaritani, E., Huber, B., Barnard R. L., Schleppi, P., Tockner, K., and Luster, J.: Soil nitrogen dynamics in a river floodplain mosaic, J. Env. Qual., 41(6), 2033-2045, doi: 10.2134/jeq2012.0059, 2012.
  • Coscia, I., Greenhalgh, S. A., Linde, N., Doetsch, J., Marescot, L., Gunther, T., Vogt, T., and Green A. G.: 3D crosshole ERT for aquifer characterization and monitoring of infiltrating river water, Geophysics, 76(2), G49-G59, 2011.
  • Edmaier, K., Burlando, P., and Perona P.: Mechanisms of vegetation uprooting by flow in alluvial non-cohesive sediment, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 15, 1615-1627, 2011.
  • Huber, B., Bernasconi, S. M., Luster, J., and Graf Pannatier, E. A.: A new isolation procedure of nitrate from freshwater for nitrogen and oxygen isotope analysis, Rapid Comm. Mass Spectr., 25, 3056-3062, 2011.
  • Linde, N., Doetsch, J., Jougnot, D., Genoni, O., Dürst, Y., Minsley, B., Vogt, T., Pasquale, N., and Luster, J.: Self-potential investigations of a gravel bar in a restored river corridor, Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 15, 729-742, 2011
  • Pasquale, N., Perona, P., Schneider, P., Shrestha, J., Wombacher, A., and Burlando, P.: Modern comprehensive approach to monitor the morphodynamic evolution of restored river corridors, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 15, 1197-2011, 2011.
  • Samaritani, E., Shrestha, J., Fournier, B., Frossard, E., Gillet, F., Guenat, C., Niklaus, P. A., Tockner, K., Mitchell, E. A. D., and Luster, J.: Heterogeneity of soil carbon pools and fluxes in a channelized and a restored floodplain section (Thur River, Switzerland), Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 15(6), 1757-1769, doi: 10.5194/hess-15-1757-2011, 2011.
  • Schneider, P., Vogt, T., Schirmer, M., Doetsch, J. A., Linde, N., Pasquale, N., Perona, P., and Cirpka, O. A. Towards improved instrumentation for assessing river-groundwater interactions in a restored river corridor, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 15, 2531-2549, doi: 10.5194/hess-15-2531-2011, 2011.
  • Doetsch, J., Coscia, I., Greenhalgh, S., Linde, N., Green, A. G., and Günther, T.: The borehole-fluid effect in electrical resistivity imaging, Geophysics, 75, F107-F114. doi:10.1190/1.3467824, 2010.
  • Doetsch, J., Linde, N., Coscia, I., Greenhalgh, S. A., and Green, A. G.: Zonation for 3D aquifer characterization based on joint inversions of multi-method crosshole geophysical data, Geophysics, 8, G53-G64, 2010.
  • Schäppi, B., Perona, P., Schneider, P., and Burlando, P.: Integrating river cross section measurements with digital terrain models for improved water surface modelling applications, Computers & Geosciences,36, 707-716, 2010.
  • Vogt, T., Hoehn, E., Schneider, P., Freund, A., Schirmer, M., and Cirpka, O.A.: Fluctuations of electrical conductivity as a natural tracer for bank filtration in a losing stream, Advances in Water Resources, 33, 1296-1308, 2010.
  • Vogt, T., Schneider, P., Hahn-Woernle, L., and Cirpka, O. A.: Estimation of seepage rates in a losing stream by means of fiber-optic high-resolution temperature profiling, Journal of Hydrology, 380, 154-164, 2010.
  • Perona, P., Camporeale, C., Perucca, E., Savina, M., Burlando, P. and Ridolfi, L.: Modelling river and riparian vegetation and related importance for sustainable ecosystem management, Aquat. Sci., 71, 266-278, 2009.
  • Perona, P., Molnar, P., Savina, M., and Burlando, P.: An observation-based stochastic model for sediment and vegetation dynamics in the floodplain of an Alpine braided river, Water Resour. Res., 45, W09418, doi: 10.129/2008WR007550, 2009.