Quantifying the Role of Agricultural Management Practices on Erosion and Runoff in Minnesota Under Future Climate Scenarios

ABSTRACT There is still uncertainty about how agricultural watersheds will respond to changing future climate. This modeling study aims to evaluate different agricultural strategies for reducing runoff and hillslope soil losses in two Minnesota watersheds. The Water Erosion Prediction Project (WEPP) model was implemented to simulate various strategies and adoption rates of cover crops, reduced tillage systems, and perennial crops across the watersheds. Daily weather was simulated for 1965–2019, 2020–2059, and 2060–2099 in CLImate GENerator (CLIGEN) using climate projections from two Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 5 models and three relative concentration pathway (RCP) emission scenarios. Results indicate that the modeled future scenarios will maintain or slightly decrease both runoff and hillslope soil losses in the two simulated watersheds, while steeper agricultural fields will remain at high risk based on the modeled unsustainable erosion rates. Among the agricultural strategies analyzed, the study revealed that integrating perennials into 50%–70% of fields decreased future watershed runoff by 2%–5% and hillslope soil losses by 24%–46%. Reduced tillage also proved substantial reductions in contrast to the negligible effects observed with cover crops. Given the uncertainty in future climate, further research is warranted to expand this type of scenario analysis to other parts of Minnesota and the Midwest USA, helping build better climate resilience into cropping systems.