The Modelling of the Evapotranspiration Portion of the Water Footprint: A Global Sensitivity Analysis in the Brazilian Serra Gaúcha
Gustavo Mendes Platt,
Vinícius Kuczynski Nunes,
Paulo Roberto Martins,
Ricardo Gonçalves de Faria Corrêa,
Francisco Bruno Souza Oliveira
Affiliations
Gustavo Mendes Platt
Graduate Program in Agroindustrial Systems and Processes, School of Chemistry and Food, Federal University of Rio Grande (PPGSPA/FURG), Santo Antônio da Patrulha 95500-000, Brazil
Vinícius Kuczynski Nunes
Graduate Program in Agroindustrial Systems and Processes, School of Chemistry and Food, Federal University of Rio Grande (PPGSPA/FURG), Santo Antônio da Patrulha 95500-000, Brazil
Paulo Roberto Martins
Graduate Program in Agroindustrial Systems and Processes, School of Chemistry and Food, Federal University of Rio Grande (PPGSPA/FURG), Santo Antônio da Patrulha 95500-000, Brazil
Ricardo Gonçalves de Faria Corrêa
Graduate Program in Agroindustrial Systems and Processes, School of Chemistry and Food, Federal University of Rio Grande (PPGSPA/FURG), Santo Antônio da Patrulha 95500-000, Brazil
Francisco Bruno Souza Oliveira
Graduate Program in Computational Modelling in Science and Technology, Department of Engineering and Computing, State University of Santa Cruz (PPGMC/UESC), Ilhéus 45662-900, Brazil
Water footprints have been widely used to illustrate the consumption of water in many situations, for instance, in products, processes, or regions of interest. In this work, we analyzed—using a sensitivity analysis approach—the effect of some variables in the calculation of the water footprint in the viticulture in the Brazilian Serra Gaúcha (the major producing region of Brazilian wine). The classical Penman–Monteith model for evapotransporation was considered, with uncertainties in some parameters (dead mulch covering a fraction of the vineyard, maximum temperatures for some months, the altitudes and latitudes of the site). A sensitivity analysis was conducted using the SAFE toolbox under Octave framework. The results indicated that the the portion of the water footprint corresponding to evapotranspiration is more sensitive to the values of the mulch-covered fraction and the altitude of the site in comparison with the latitude and the maximum temperatures.
