scholarly journals Assessing the Impact of Land Use and Climate Change on Surface Runoff Response Using Gridded Observations and SWAT+

Hydrology ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 48
Author(s):  
Paul Kiprotich ◽  
Xianhu Wei ◽  
Zongke Zhang ◽  
Thomas Ngigi ◽  
Fengting Qiu ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Land Use ◽  
Land Use Change ◽  
Surface Runoff ◽  
Regional Climate ◽  
Future Climate Change ◽  
Climate Projections ◽  
Gridded Data ◽  
Study Results ◽  
The Impact

The Anthropocene period is characterised by a general demographic shift from rural communities to urban centres that transform the predominantly wild global landscape into mostly cultivated land and cities. In addition to climate change, there are increased uncertainties in the water balance and these feedbacks cannot be modelled accurately due to scarce or incomplete in situ data. In African catchments with limited current and historical climate data, precise modelling of potential runoff regimes is difficult, but a growing number of model applications indicate that useful simulations are feasible. In this study, we used the new generation of soil and water assessment tool (SWAT) dubbed SWAT+ to assess the viability of using high resolution gridded data as an alternative to station observations to investigate surface runoff response to continuous land use change and future climate change. Simultaneously, under two representative concentration pathways (RCP4.5 and RCP8.5), six regional climate models (RCMs) from the Coordinated Regional Climate Downscaling Experiment Program (CORDEX) and their ensemble were evaluated for model skill and systematic biases and the best performing model was selected. The gridded data predicted streamflow accurately with a Nash–Sutcliffe efficiency greater than 0.89 in both calibration and validation phases. The analysis results show that further conversion of grasslands and forests to agriculture and urban areas doubled the runoff depth between 1984 and 2016. Climate projections predict a decline in March–May rainfall and an increase in the October–December season. Mean temperatures are expected to rise by about 1.3–1.5 °C under RCP4.5 and about 2.6–3.5 °C under RCP8.5 by 2100. Compared to the 2010–2016 period, simulated surface runoff response to climate change showed a decline under RCP4.5 and an increase under RCP8.5. In contrast, the combine effects of land use change and climate change simulated a steady increase in surface runoff under both scenarios. This suggests that the land use influence on the surface runoff response is more significant than that of climate change. The study results highlight the reliability of gridded data as an alternative to instrumental measurements in limited or missing data cases. More weight should be given to improving land management practices to counter the imminent increase in the surface runoff to avoid an increase in non-point source pollution, erosion, and flooding in the urban watersheds.

scholarly journals Dynamics of soil organic carbon in the steppes of Russia and Kazakhstan under past and future climate and land use

2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Susanne Rolinski ◽  
Alexander V. Prishchepov ◽  
Georg Guggenberger ◽  
Norbert Bischoff ◽  
Irina Kurganova ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Land Use ◽  
Organic Carbon ◽  
Land Use Change ◽  
Soil Organic Carbon ◽  
Arable Land ◽  
Future Climate ◽  
Future Climate Change ◽  
Climate Scenarios ◽  
The Impact

AbstractChanges in land use and climate are the main drivers of change in soil organic matter contents. We investigated the impact of the largest policy-induced land conversion to arable land, the Virgin Lands Campaign (VLC), from 1954 to 1963, of the massive cropland abandonment after 1990 and of climate change on soil organic carbon (SOC) stocks in steppes of Russia and Kazakhstan. We simulated carbon budgets from the pre-VLC period (1900) until 2100 using a dynamic vegetation model to assess the impacts of observed land-use change as well as future climate and land-use change scenarios. The simulations suggest for the entire VLC region (266 million hectares) that the historic cropland expansion resulted in emissions of 1.6⋅ 1015 g (= 1.6 Pg) carbon between 1950 and 1965 compared to 0.6 Pg in a scenario without the expansion. From 1990 to 2100, climate change alone is projected to cause emissions of about 1.8 (± 1.1) Pg carbon. Hypothetical recultivation of the cropland that has been abandoned after the fall of the Soviet Union until 2050 may cause emissions of 3.5 (± 0.9) Pg carbon until 2100, whereas the abandonment of all cropland until 2050 would lead to sequestration of 1.8 (± 1.2) Pg carbon. For the climate scenarios based on SRES (Special Report on Emission Scenarios) emission pathways, SOC declined only moderately for constant land use but substantially with further cropland expansion. The variation of SOC in response to the climate scenarios was smaller than that in response to the land-use scenarios. This suggests that the effects of land-use change on SOC dynamics may become as relevant as those of future climate change in the Eurasian steppes.

scholarly journals Modeling the Impact of Climate Change and Land Use Change Scenarios on Soil Erosion at the Minab Dam Watershed

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (12) ◽  
pp. 3353 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohammad Reza Azimi Sardari ◽  
Ommolbanin Bazrafshan ◽  
Thomas Panagopoulos ◽  
Elham Rafiei Sardooi
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Land Use ◽  
Soil Erosion ◽  
Land Use Change ◽  
Soil Loss ◽  
Soil Cover ◽  
Future Climate Change ◽  
Future Period ◽  
The Future ◽  
The Impact

Climate and land use change can influence susceptibility to erosion and consequently land degradation. The aim of this study was to investigate in the baseline and a future period, the land use and climate change effects on soil erosion at an important dam watershed occupying a strategic position on the narrow Strait of Hormuz. The future climate change at the study area was inferred using statistical downscaling and validated by the Canadian earth system model (CanESM2). The future land use change was also simulated using the Markov chain and artificial neural network, and the Revised Universal Soil Loss Equation was adopted to estimate soil loss under climate and land use change scenarios. Results show that rainfall erosivity (R factor) will increase under all Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) scenarios. The highest amount of R was 40.6 MJ mm ha−1 h−1y−1 in 2030 under RPC 2.6. Future land use/land cover showed rangelands turning into agricultural lands, vegetation cover degradation and an increased soil cover among others. The change of C and R factors represented most of the increase of soil erosion and sediment production in the study area during the future period. The highest erosion during the future period was predicted to reach 14.5 t ha−1 y−1, which will generate 5.52 t ha−1 y−1 sediment. The difference between estimated and observed sediment was 1.42 t ha−1 year−1 at the baseline period. Among the soil erosion factors, soil cover (C factor) is the one that watershed managers could influence most in order to reduce soil loss and alleviate the negative effects of climate change.

scholarly journals Impact of Urbanization and Land-Use Change on Surface Climate in Middle and Lower Reaches of the Yangtze River, 1988–2008

2015 ◽  
Vol 2015 ◽  
pp. 1-10 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xiaowei Yao ◽  
Zhanqi Wang ◽  
Hua Wang
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Land Use ◽  
Land Use Change ◽  
Yangtze River ◽  
Regional Climate ◽  
Global Environmental Change ◽  
The Yangtze River ◽  
Temperature And Precipitation ◽  
Regional Temperature ◽  
The Impact

Land-use/land cover change (LUCC) is one of the fundamental causes of global environmental change. In recent years, understanding the regional climate impact of LUCC has become a hot-discussed topic worldwide. Some studies have explored LUCC impact on regional climate in specific cities, provinces, or farming areas. However, the quick-urbanized areas, which are highly influenced by human activities, have the most severe land-use changes in developing countries, and their climatic impact cannot be ignored. This study aims to identify the impact of land-use change coupled with urbanization on regional temperature and precipitation in the metropolitan areas of middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River in China by means of spatial analysis and numeric methods. Based on the exploration of land-use change and climate change during 1988–2008, the impact of land-use transition from non-built-up area to built-up area on temperature and precipitation was analyzed. The results indicated that the land-use conversion has affected the regional temperature with an increasing effect in the study area, while the influence on precipitation was not so significant. The results can provide useful information for spatial planning policies in consideration of regional climate change.

Balanced subsampling of future regional climate ensembles of opportunity

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jesús Fernández ◽  
María Dolores Frías
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Global Climate ◽  
Regional Climate ◽  
National Level ◽  
Future Climate Change ◽  
Climate Projections ◽  
Climate Modelling ◽  
Model Intercomparison ◽  
Climate Change Projections ◽  
The Impact

<p>International model intercomparison initiatives, such as CORDEX or CMIP5, along with several relatively recent projects at international and national level, provide a wealth of model simulations of future regional climate. In a recent work, Fernandez et al (2019) collected 196 different future climate change projections over Spain, considering data from ENSEMBLES, ESCENA, EURO- and Med-CORDEX, along with their driving global climate projections from CMIP3 and CMIP5. This ensemble mixed different multi-model initiatives in an ensemble of opportunity, in the sense that it does not respond to any scientific design beyond the exploration of multi-model uncertainty. This ensemble of opportunity is not only the result of the mixture of different initiatives, but also responds to the lack of a balanced experimental design within most of the initiatives. Many of the initiatives -especially those unfunded, such as CORDEX- are carried out on a voluntary basis, with no strong constraint in the global climate models (GCMs) used as boundary conditions or in the number of contributing members per regional climate model (RCM).</p><p>Fernandez et al (2019) found in this ensemble a strong influence of the driving GCM on the regional climate change signal, along with favored GCMs, selected by many regional climate modelling groups to the detriment of GCMs publishing their output later or not at all. In this work, we quantitatively assess the impact of unbalanced GCM-RCM ensembles. For this purpose, we subsampled the ensemble of opportunity to obtain balanced sets of members according to different “what-if” situations: What if all RCMs had contributed a single member to the ensemble? What if each GCM had been dynamically downscaled only once? What if a given GCM/RCM had not contributed to the ensemble? For each hypothesis, there are a number of alternative sub-ensembles, which are used to evaluate uncertainty.</p><p><strong>Acknowledgement:</strong></p><p>This work is partially funded by the Spanish government through MINECO/FEDER co-funded projects INSIGNIA (CGL2016-79210-R) and MULTI-SDM (CGL2015-66583-R). </p><p><strong>References:</strong></p><p>Fernández, J., et al. (2019) Consistency of climate change projections from multiple global and regional model intercomparison projects. Clim Dyn 52:1139. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-018-4181-8</p>

scholarly journals Quantifying the potential impacts of land-use and climate change on hydropower reliability of Muzizi hydropower plant, Uganda

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hilary Keneth Bahati ◽  
Abraham Ogenrwoth ◽  
Jotham Ivan Sempewo
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Land Use ◽  
Land Use Change ◽  
Regional Climate ◽  
Hydropower Plant ◽  
Exceedance Probability ◽  
Climate Change Scenarios ◽  
Lulc Change ◽  
Barren Land ◽  
The Impact

Abstract Ugandan rivers are being tapped as a resource for the generation of hydropower in addition to other uses. Studies on the reliability of these hydropower plants due to climate and land-use/land cover changes on the hydrology of these rivers are scanty. Therefore, this study aimed to model the impact of the changing climate and land use/cover on hydropower reliability to aid proper planning and management. The hydropower reliability of River Muzizi catchment was determined from its past (1998–2010) and midcentury (2042–2070) discharge at 75 and 90% exceedance probability under Representative Concentration Pathways (RCPs) of 4.5 and 8.5, respectively. The past and projected hydropower were compared to determine how future climate and land-use changes will impact the discharge and hydropower reliability of River Muzizi catchment. Six LULC scenarios (deforestation, 31–20%; grassland, 19–3%; cropland, 50–77%; water bodies, 0.02–0.01%; settlement, 0.23–0.37%, and Barren land 0.055–0.046% between 2014 and 2060) and three downscaled Regional Climate Model (REMO and RCA4 for precipitation and RACMO22T for temperature from pool of four CORDEX (Coordinated Regional Climate Downscaling Experiment) Africa RCMs) were examined. A calibrated SWAT simulation model was applied for the midcentury (2041–2060) period, and a potential change in hydropower energy in reference to mean daily flow (designflow ≥ 30% exceedance probability), firm flow (flow ≥ 95% exceedance probability), and mean annual flow was evaluated under the condition of altered runoff under RCP4.5 and RCP8.5 climate change scenarios for an average of REMO and RCA4 RCM. The future land use (2048) was projected using the MOLUSCE (Module for Land Use Change Evaluation) plugin in QGIS using CA-ANN. Three scenarios have been described in this study, including LULC change, climate change, and combined (climate and LULC change). The results suggest that there will be a significant increase in hydropower generation capacity (from 386.27 and 488.1 GWh to 867.82 and 862.53 GWh under RCP4.5 and RCP8.5, respectively, for the combined future effect of climate and land-use/cover changes. Energy utilities need to put in place mechanisms to effectively manage, operate, and maintain the hydropower plant amidst climate and land-use change impacts, to ensure reliability at all times.

scholarly journals Assessing the Impact of Floods Disaster on Soil Erosion Risk Based on the RUSLE-GloSEM Approach in Western Iran

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Morteza Akbari ◽  
Ehsan Neamatollahi ◽  
Hadi Memarian ◽  
Mohammad Alizadeh Noughani
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Land Use ◽  
Soil Erosion ◽  
Land Use Change ◽  
Agricultural Development ◽  
Erosion Risk ◽  
Before And After ◽  
Global Soil ◽  
Major Floods ◽  
The Impact

Abstract Floods cause great damage to ecosystems and are among the main agents of soil erosion. Given the importance of soils for the functioning of ecosystems and development and improvement of bio-economic conditions, the risk and rate of soil erosion was assessed using the RUSLE model in Iran’s Lorestan province before and after a period of major floods in late 2018 and early 2019. Furthermore, soil erosion was calculated for current and future conditions based on the Global Soil Erosion Modeling Database (GloSEM). The results showed that agricultural development and land use change are the main causes of land degradation in the southern and central parts of the study area. The impact of floods was also significant since our evaluations showed that soil erosion increased from 4.12 t ha-1 yr-1 before the floods to 10.93 t ha-1 yr-1 afterwards. Field surveying using 64 ground control points determined that erodibility varies from 0.17 to 0.49% in the study area. Orchards, farms, rangelands and forests with moderate or low vegetation cover were the most vulnerable land uses to soil erosion. The GloSEM modeling results revealed that climate change is the main cause of change in the rate of soil erosion. Combined land use change-climate change simulation showed that soil erosion will increase considerably in the future under SSP1-RCP2.6, SSP2-RCP4.5, and SSP5-RCP8.5 scenarios. In the study area, both natural factors, i.e. climate change and human factors such as agricultural development, population growth, and overgrazing are the main drivers of soil erosion.

Human-induced climate change: the impact of land-use change

2018 ◽  
Vol 135 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 1031-1044 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Gries ◽  
Margarete Redlin ◽  
Juliette Espinosa Ugarte
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Land Use ◽  
Land Use Change ◽  
The Impact

scholarly journals Climate Perspectives in the Intra–Americas Seas

Atmosphere ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (9) ◽  
pp. 959
Author(s):  
Ana María Durán-Quesada ◽  
Rogert Sorí ◽  
Paulina Ordoñez ◽  
Luis Gimeno
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Extreme Events ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Negative Impact ◽  
Current Knowledge ◽  
Regional Climate ◽  
Climate Projections ◽  
Economic Activities ◽  
Weather And Climate ◽  
The Impact

The Intra–Americas Seas region is known for its relevance to air–sea interaction processes, the contrast between large water masses and a relatively small continental area, and the occurrence of extreme events. The differing weather systems and the influence of variability at different spatio–temporal scales is a characteristic feature of the region. The impact of hydro–meteorological extreme events has played a huge importance for regional livelihood, having a mostly negative impact on socioeconomics. The frequency and intensity of heavy rainfall events and droughts are often discussed in terms of their impact on economic activities and access to water. Furthermore, future climate projections suggest that warming scenarios are likely to increase the frequency and intensity of extreme events, which poses a major threat to vulnerable communities. In a region where the economy is largely dependent on agriculture and the population is exposed to the impact of extremes, understanding the climate system is key to informed policymaking and management plans. A wealth of knowledge has been published on regional weather and climate, with a majority of studies focusing on specific components of the system. This study aims to provide an integral overview of regional weather and climate suitable for a wider community. Following the presentation of the general features of the region, a large scale is introduced outlining the main structures that affect regional climate. The most relevant climate features are briefly described, focusing on sea surface temperature, low–level circulation, and rainfall patterns. The impact of climate variability at the intra–seasonal, inter–annual, decadal, and multi–decadal scales is discussed. Climate change is considered in the regional context, based on current knowledge for natural and anthropogenic climate change. The present challenges in regional weather and climate studies have also been included in the concluding sections of this review. The overarching aim of this work is to leverage information that may be transferred efficiently to support decision–making processes and provide a solid foundation on regional weather and climate for professionals from different backgrounds.

scholarly journals Drought Risk under Climate and Land Use Changes: Implication to Water Resource Availability at Catchment Scale

Water ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (9) ◽  
pp. 1790 ◽  
Author(s):  
Muhammad Afzal ◽  
Ragab Ragab
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Land Use ◽  
Water Resources ◽  
Groundwater Recharge ◽  
Land Use Changes ◽  
Future Climate Change ◽  
Emission Scenarios ◽  
Catchment Scale ◽  
High Emission ◽  
The Impact

Although the climate change projections are produced by global models, studying the impact of climatic change on water resources is commonly investigated at catchment scale where the measurements are taken, and water management decisions are made. For this study, the Frome catchment in the UK was investigated as an example of midland England. The DiCaSM model was applied using the UKCP09 future climate change scenarios. The climate projections indicate that the greatest decrease in groundwater recharge and streamflow was projected under high emission scenarios in the 2080s. Under the medium and high emission scenarios, model results revealed that the frequency and severity of drought events would be the highest. The drought indices, the Reconnaissance Drought Index, RDI, Soil Moisture Deficit, SMD and Wetness Index, WI, predicted an increase in the severity of future drought events under the high emission scenarios. Increasing broadleaf forest area would decrease streamflow and groundwater recharge. Urban expansion could increase surface runoff. Decreasing winter barley and grass and increasing oil seed rape, would increase SMD and slightly decrease river flow. Findings of this study are helpful in the planning and management of the water resources considering the impact of climate and land use changes on variability in the availability of surface and groundwater resources.

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