A simplified procedure to assess the effects of climate change on landslide hazard in a small area of the Southern Apennines in Italy

Several impacts of climate change are becoming evident and will be more and more apparent in the future. The threats and challenges posed by weather patterns variations can change according to the variables of interest, geography, and socio-economic contexts. At the moment, we are compelled to assess their impacts, so as to identify priorities and devise effective countermeasures. A major concern is that of geo-hydrological risks, including the potential effects of landslide evolution in unstable areas. Based on available data on the relationship between soil-atmosphere interaction and mobility of a slow active earthflow in Southern Italy, the paper tries to correlate the expected future precipitation potential evapotranspiration balance and the water level fluctuations that govern landslide mobility. The investigation is carried out in the framework of the bottom-up approach known as decision scaling, which lets us evaluate landslide dynamics sensitivity to the variations in soil water budget by means of a simple abacus. Such a tool will make it possible to obtain fast updates on assessing landslide trends when new generations of climate projections become available.