PhD candidate, Environmental Systems Analysis Group

Project title: Modelling past, present and future nutrient flows from land to sea in China: linking the Global NEWS, NUFER and MAREM models

The main research objective is to better understand nutrient export from land to Chinese coastal waters as affected by human activities and to provide options to reduce coastal water pollution in China. This will be done by linking and applying three complementary models in Chinese river basins to get insights in the whole process of nutrient export from land to sea as affected by human activities. We will also develop new scenarios aimed at identifying nutrient management strategies to reduce nutrient inputs to land,  rivers and coastal waters.

Three research questions will be addressed:

1: How do past, present and future trends in N and P losses in food production and consumption affect coastal water pollution in Chinese seas?

2: How does farmers’ behavior affect future nutrient flows from land to sea in China?

3: What are the strengths and weaknesses of linking existing models?