EU-scale maps of ecosystem services provision

This dataset is supplement to project deliverable "D4.2 - EU-scale maps of ecosystem services provision" from project "DRYvER - Securing biodiversity, functional integrity and ecosystem services in DRYing riVER networks" funded by European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 869226. This dataset includes map layers of ecosystem services provision in rivers at the European scale. We modelled the provisioning of 4 ecosystem services: water provisioning, dilution capacity, flood regulation in slopes, and drought regulation, in the European river networks, including both perennial and intermittent rivers. Water provisioning refers to the amount of water provided by freshwater ecosystems for consumptive and non-consumptive use. We calculated water provisioning in cubic hectometres in 2019 for the most downstream river reaches in the European river network (87,165 reaches) for 3 hydrological phases, which we defined a priori as pre-dry (March-April), dry (July-August), and post-dry (November-December), and for the whole year. Dilution capacity, measured by dilution factor (DF), is the river's capacity to dilute effluents from wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs). We calculated DF as the ratio between river flow and WWTP discharge. We calculated DF for 15,081 river reaches: 11,443 of them were perennial and 3638 intermittent. Flood regulation is the capacity of catchment to prevent or mitigate the impact of floods. We modelled the flood regulation in slopes as Hydrological Regulation Index (HRI). HRI is an estimation of the potential capacity of catchment to generate surface runoff; and it is based on slope, soil permeability, and average annual precipitation. Drought regulation is the ability of catchment to hold or store water resources and subsequently support river flow during drought. We calculated drought regulation as Local Recharge Index (LRI) and Surface Storage Index (SSI). Local Recharge Index (LRI) is an estimation of the amount of water (mm) that infiltrates into soil over a year and could then potentially recharge groundwater. Surface Storage Index (SSI) is an estimation of the suitability of different areas in the catchment to operate as surface water retention and storage. We calculated HRI, LRI, and SSI for catchments based on HydroBASINS level 3 sub-units: for 17 catchments of the European river network.