Flow regime alterations under changing climate in two river basins: implications for freshwater ecosystems

We examined impacts of future climate scenarios on flow regimes and how predicted changes might affect river ecosystems. We examined two case studies: Cle Elum River, Washington, and Chattahoochee–Apalachicola River Basin, Georgia and Florida. These rivers had available downscaled global circulation model (GCM) data and allowed us to analyse the effects of future climate scenarios on rivers with (1) different hydrographs, (2) high future water demands, and (3) a river–floodplain system. We compared observed flow regimes to those predicted under future climate scenarios to describe the extent and type of changes predicted to occur. Daily stream flow under future climate scenarios was created by either statistically downscaling GCMs (Cle Elum) or creating a regression model between climatological parameters predicted from GCMs and stream flow (Chattahoochee–Apalachicola). Flow regimes were examined for changes from current conditions with respect to ecologically relevant features including the magnitude and timing of minimum and maximum flows. The Cle Elum's hydrograph under future climate scenarios showed a dramatic shift in the timing of peak flows and lower low flow of a longer duration. These changes could mean higher summer water temperatures, lower summer dissolved oxygen, and reduced survival of larval fishes. The Chattahoochee–Apalachicola basin is heavily impacted by dams and water withdrawals for human consumption; therefore, we made comparisons between pre‐large dam conditions, current conditions, current conditions with future demand, and future climate scenarios with future demand to separate climate change effects and other anthropogenic impacts. Dam construction, future climate, and future demand decreased the flow variability of the river. In addition, minimum flows were lower under future climate scenarios. These changes could decrease the connectivity of the channel and the floodplain, decrease habitat availability, and potentially lower the ability of the river to assimilate wastewater treatment plant effluent. Our study illustrates the types of changes that river ecosystems might experience under future climates. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Effect of urbanization on stream hydraulics

Urbanization results in major changes to stream morphology and hydrology with the latter often cited as a primary stressor of urban stream ecosystems. These modifications unequivocally alter stream hydraulics, but little is known about such impacts. Hydraulic changes due to urbanization were demonstrated using two‐dimensional hydrodynamic model simulations, comparing urban and non‐urban stream reaches. We investigated three ecologically relevant hydraulic characteristics: bed mobilization, retentive habitat, and floodplain inundation, using hydraulic metrics bed shear stress, shallow slow‐water habitat (SSWH) area, and floodplain inundation area. We hypothesized that urbanization would substantially increase bed mobilization, decrease retentive habitat, and due to increased channel size would decrease floodplain inundation. Relative percent area of bed disturbance was 4 times higher, compared with that of the non‐urban stream at bankfull discharge. SSWH availability rapidly diminished in the urban stream as discharge increased, with SSWH area and patch size 2 times smaller than the non‐urban stream for a frequently occurring flow 0.7 times bankfull discharge. Floodplain inundation decreased in frequency and duration. These results demonstrate changes in hydraulics due to urbanization that may impact on physical habitat in streams. New “water sensitive” approaches to stormwater management could be enhanced by specification of hydraulic regimes capable of supporting healthy stream habitats. We propose that a complete management approach should include the goals of restoration and protection of natural hydraulic processes, particularly those that support ecological and geomorphic functioning of streams.     

What Drives Warming Trends in Streams? A Case Study from the Alpine Foothills

We investigated the effects of climate warming and land‐use changes on the temperature and discharge of seven Swiss and Italian streams in the catchment of Lake Lugano. In addition, we attempted to predict future stream conditions based on regional climate scenarios. Between 1976 and 2012, the study streams warmed by 1.5–4.3 °C, whereas discharge showed no long‐term trends. Warming trends were driven mainly by catchment urbanization and two large‐scale climatic oscillations, the North Atlantic Oscillation and the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation. In comparison, independent influences by radiative forcing due to increased atmospheric CO₂ were uncertain. However, radiative forcing was predicted to further increase stream temperature (to +3–7 °C), reduce summer discharge (to ?46%) and increase winter discharge (to +96%) between the present and 2070–2099. These results provide new insights into the drivers of long‐term temperature and discharge trends in European streams subject to multiple impacts. The picture emerging is one of transition, where greenhouse‐gas forcing is gaining ground over climate oscillations and urbanization, the drivers of past trends. This shift would impress a more directional nature upon future changes in stream temperature and discharge, and extend anthropogenic warming to rural streams. Diffusing future impacts on stream ecosystems would require adaptation measures at local to national scales and mitigation of greenhouse‐gas emissions at the global scale. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

RESTORING SALMON HABITAT FOR A CHANGING CLIMATE

An important question for salmon restoration efforts in the western USA is ‘How should habitat restoration plans be altered to accommodate climate change effects on stream flow and temperature?’ We developed a decision support process for adapting salmon recovery plans that incorporates (1) local habitat factors limiting salmon recovery, (2) scenarios of climate change effects on stream flow and temperature, (3) the ability of restoration actions to ameliorate climate change effects, and (4) the ability of restoration actions to increase habitat diversity and salmon population resilience. To facilitate the use of this decision support framework, we mapped scenarios of future stream flow and temperature in the Pacific Northwest region and reviewed literature on habitat restoration actions to determine whether they ameliorate a climate change effect or increase life history diversity and salmon resilience. Under the climate change scenarios considered here, summer low flows decrease by 35–75% west of the Cascade Mountains, maximum monthly flows increase by 10–60% across most of the region, and stream temperatures increase between 2 and 6°C by 2070–2099. On the basis of our literature review, we found that restoring floodplain connectivity, restoring stream flow regimes, and re‐aggrading incised channels are most likely to ameliorate stream flow and temperature changes and increase habitat diversity and population resilience. By contrast, most restoration actions focused on in‐stream rehabilitation are unlikely to ameliorate climate change effects. Finally, we illustrate how the decision support process can be used to evaluate whether climate change should alter the types or priority of restoration actions in a salmon habitat restoration plan. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Changes in the flow regimes associated with climate change and human activities in the Yangtze River

Hydrologic regimes are increasingly altered under the impacts of climate change and human activities. Streamflow data from 1960 to 2014 were analysed to investigate changes in the flow regimes in the Yangtze River using multiple hydrologic metrics and the Budyko framework. The long‐term data were separated into two periods: the preimpact period (1960–2002) and the postimpact period (2003–2014), according to the year the Three Gorges Dam began operation. The results showed that both indicators of hydrologic alteration and ecoflow metrics were clearly altered. The highly changed indicators included flow in February, annual minimum 1‐, 3‐, 7‐, 30‐, and 90‐day flows, base flow index, date of annual minimum flow, and low pulse duration. The integrated degree of hydrologic alteration ranged from 41% to 61%, indicating a moderate alteration of the flow regimes in the Yangtze River. The regulation of the Three Gorges Dam increased low flow and weakened peak flow, which resulted in autumn ecodeficit and winter ecosurplus increasing dramatically since the 2000s. The ecoflow metrics were more sensitive to precipitation than to potential evapotranspiration. The joint effects of human activities and climate change varied among the river reaches in the different decades. The streamflow was mainly affected by human activities in the upper reach during the 1970s–1990s, with a contribution ratio ranging from 63% to 77%. Climate change shifted to a major contributor in the middle and lower reaches since the 1980s as well as in the upper reach in 2000–2014, accounting for 50–82% of the streamflow changes. These different responses were primarily caused by the variations of precipitation and intensive human activities, particularly the rapid growth of reservoirs and other large projects since the 1970s in the upper Yangtze River. These results provide interesting insights into the spatio‐temporal hydrologic alteration across the Yangtze River.     

气候变化对滇中引水工程取水影响分析

气候变化正在逐渐改变全球的水循环现状,并对水文水资源及其应用产生重大影响。在联合国政府间气候变化专门委员会(IPCC)对气候变化趋势进行分析的基础上,优选近期、远期气候变化情景,并模拟在未来气候变化情景下金沙江流域干流主要断面的逐日流量过程,用以分析气候变化对金沙江干流石鼓断面水文干旱以及对滇中引水工程取水的影响。研究结果表明:受未来可能的气候变化影响,金沙江干流石鼓断面的水文干旱发生强度和发生频率都将有所增加,远期较近期具有高的不确定性;滇中引水工程不可取水天数和可调水量将会增加,但总体而言对工程的不利影响较小。     

Grid-Based Land-Use Composition and Configuration Optimization for Watershed Stormwater Management

This paper demonstrates a new method of optimizing land-use patterns to reduce the negative impacts of urbanization on watershed stormwater systems. The Yong-Ding watershed in western Beijing, China, serves as a case study for this research. A regression model that estimates watershed hydrology response to land use pattern changes is integrated with a land-use allocation model to determine the optimal landuse pattern for minimizing peak flow or total volume at the watershed outlet. This system also uses the CLUE-S model to generate empirical land-use patterns under different development intensities and then determines the land use pattern change constraints for each optimization process. The impacts of optimization are detected by comparing the land use pattern characteristics and watershed hydrology of empirical and optimal scenarios under the same development intensity. The results of the hydrological evaluation suggest that, compared to land-use location control, land-use composition and configuration control may be a more powerful method for minimizing the negative hydrological impact of urbanization.     

Reducing current and future risks: Using climate change scenarios to test an agricultural conservation framework

Evaluating the potential effects of changes in climate on conservation practices can help inform strategies to protect freshwater biodiversity that are robust, even as conditions change. Here we apply a climate change “test” to a framework for estimating the amount of agricultural conservation practices needed to achieve desired fish conservation outcomes for four watersheds in the Saginaw Bay region of Michigan, USA. We developed three climate scenarios from global climate model outputs (high emissions scenario, “2080s” timeframe) to provide insight on potential impacts of a climate driver that represents a key uncertainty for this management system, the amount and timing of spring and summer precipitation. These scenarios were used as inputs to agricultural watershed models, which produced water quality outputs that we compared to thresholds in fish biodiversity metrics at the subwatershed scale. Our results suggest that impacts of climate change on evaporation rates and other aspects of hydrology will shift the relative importance of key stressors for fish (i.e., sediment loadings vs. nutrient concentrations) across these different watersheds, highlighting the need to design resilient implementation plans and policies. Overall, we found that changes in climate are likely to increase the need for agricultural conservation practices, but that increasing the implementation rate above current levels will likely remain a good investment under current and future climate conditions.     

Analysis of the effect of climate change on the Nakdong river stream flow using indicators of hydrological alteration

This study models the effect of climate change on runoff in southeast Korea using the TANK conceptual rainfall-runoff model. The results are assessed using the indicators of hydrological alteration (IHA) developed by U.S. Nature Conservancy. Future climate time series are obtained by scaling historical series, provided by four global climate models (GCMs, IPCC, 2007) and three greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions scenarios (IPCC, 2000), to reflect a maximum increase of 3.6 °C in the average surface air temperature and 33% in the annual precipitation. To this end, the spatio-temporal change factor method is used, which considers changes in the future mean seasonal rainfall and potential evapotranspiration as well as the daily rainfall distribution. In this study, the variance range for precipitation is from +3.55% to +33.44% compared to the present for years between 2071 and 2100. The variance range for the daily mean temperature is estimated between +1.59 °C and +3.58 °C. Although the simulation results from different GCMs and GHG emissions scenarios indicate different responses of the flows to the climate change, the majority of modeling results show that there will be more runoff in southeast Korea in the future. According to the analysis results, the predicted impacts of hydrological alteration caused by climate change on the aquatic ecosystem are as follows: 1) an increase in the availability of aquatic ecosystem habitats in Nakdong River in future summers and winters, 2) an increase in stress on the aquatic ecosystem due to extremely high stream flow, 3) an increase in the stress duration of flood events for the Nakdong River downstream and 4) an increase in aquatic ecosystem stress caused by rapid increases or decreases in stream flow.     

Integrated Reservoir Management System for Flood Risk Assessment Under Climate Change

Operations of existing reservoirs will be affected by climate change. Reservoir operating rules developed using historical information will not provide the optimal use of storage under changing hydrological conditions. In this paper, an integrated reservoir management system has been developed to adapt existing reservoir operations to changing climatic conditions. The reservoir management system integrates: (1) the K-Nearest Neighbor (K-NN) weather generator model; (2) the HEC-HMS hydrological model; and (3) the Differential Evolution (DE) optimization model. Six future weather scenarios are employed to verify the integrated reservoir management system using Upper Thames River basin in Canada as a case study. The results demonstrate that the integrated system provides optimal reservoir operation rule curves that reflect the hydrologic characteristics of future climate scenarios. Therefore, they may be useful for the development of reservoir climate change adaptation strategy.     

Flood Vulnerability to Climate Change through Hydrological Modeling

Abstract

Determination of flood vulnerability to climate change is one of the most critical issues for regional water management. Most of the previous studies related to system vulnerabilities to climate change were either a qualitative assessment without the support of hydrological modeling or too complex to apply them to real-world systems. In this study, a modeling and assessment system is proposed to tackle flood vulnerability to the climate change through the incorporation of future climate change scenarios, rainfall-runoff simulation, and vulnerability estimation within an integrated frame. The developed approach is applied to provide decision support for flood management of the Swift Current Creek watershed in Western Canada. The approach not only is useful to determine relative flood vulnerabilities to climate change for supporting flood control planning in the watershed, but also can be extended to estimate vulnerabilities of water quality and water supply to climate change.     

HYDROGEOMORPHIC CLASSIFICATION OF WASHINGTON STATE RIVERS TO SUPPORT EMERGING ENVIRONMENTAL FLOW MANAGEMENT STRATEGIES

As demand for fresh water increases in tandem with human population growth and a changing climate, the need to understand the ecological tradeoffs of flow regulation gains greater importance. Environmental classification is a first step towards quantifying these tradeoffs by creating the framework necessary for analysing the effects of flow variability on riverine biota. Our study presents a spatially explicit hydrogeomorphic classification of streams and rivers in Washington State, USA and investigates how projected climate change is likely to affect flow regimes in the future. We calculated 99 hydrologic metrics from 15 years of continuous daily discharge data for 64 gauges with negligible upstream impact, which were entered into a Bayesian mixture model to classify flow regimes into seven major classes described by their dominant flow source as follows: groundwater (GW), rainfall (RF), rain‐with‐snow (RS), snow‐and‐rain (SandR), snow‐with‐rain (SR), snowmelt (SM) and ultra‐snowmelt (US). The largest class sizes were represented by the transitional RS and SandR classes (14 and 12 gauges, respectively), which are ubiquitous in temperate, mountainous landscapes found in Washington. We used a recursive partitioning algorithm and random forests to predict flow class based on a suite of environmental and climate variables. Overall classification success was 75%, and the model was used to predict normative flow classes at the reach scale for the entire state. Application of future climate change scenarios to the model inputs indicated shifts of varying magnitude from snow‐dominated to rain‐dominated flow classes. Lastly, a geomorphic classification was developed using a digital elevation model (DEM) and climatic data to assign stream segments as either dominantly able or unable to migrate, which was cross‐tabulated with the flow types to produce a 14‐tier hydrogeomorphic classification. The hydrogeomorphic classification provides a framework upon which empirical flow alteration–ecological response relationships can subsequently be developed using ecological information collected throughout the region. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Impacts of Climate Change and Seasonal Variability on Economic Treatment Costs: A Case Study of the Nitra River Basin,Slovakia

Analysis of climate change impacts upon water resources has focused prim arily on water quantity issues. The impacts upon water qu ality and water quality management have had little attention. This paper presents a framework for assessing climate change impacts upon stream water quality and the management costs associated with adaptation to the new hydroclim atic conditions resulting in changes in streamflow and stream temperature. W ater quality indicators as well as chemical and biological processes important to water quality are a fu nction of stream temperature. This paper reports not on ly on how water quality indices will be im pacted by alternative climate change scenarios, but on the econom ic cost of maintaining water quality stan dards. The costs of maintaining water quality standards result from increased treatm ent of waste loads due to decreased waste assimilation capacity of warmer streams. A case study based on regionally developed climate change scenarios shows that water quality levels are greatly impacted in the low flow periods (by as m uch as 14 times), while average annual conditions are n ot impacted significantly.     

Climate-change impact assessment using GIS-based hydrological modelling

A GIS-based Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) model is used to assess the impacts of climate change on the hydrological regime of the Cauvery river basin. First, the impact of changes in land-management practices on water availability under present conditions is modelled. Then, the same analysis is carried out under the future climatic scenarios. Finally, annual and monthly precipitation variability is compared under present, as well as future, climate-change scenarios. The results indicate an intensification of the hydrological cycle in the future climate-change scenario that appears to be significant on an annual basis.     

气候变化下水文模拟不确定性若干问题讨论

在阐释水文不确定性定义的基础上,根据气候变化下水文模拟不确定性的分类,总结了气候变化情景、水文模型和评估过程方面不确定性研究的基本范式,概述了每种不确定性的来源及影响,综述了气候变化下水文模拟不确定性研究进展。指出了未来水文系统模拟不确定性研究的重点和方向：结合复杂网络,增强对极端气候事件预估的可靠性;科学处理数据时间窗问题和冗余性,为无资料地区径流预测提供支撑;揭示变化环境下非平稳异方差性水文序列的发生规律。     

若尔盖湿地流域径流变化及其对气候变化的响应

为探索未来气候变化情景下若尔盖高寒湿地水文过程和水循环演变规律,利用分布式水文模型,研究2020—2050年不同气候变化情景下若尔盖湿地流域径流变化趋势以及气候变化对湿地径流的影响。结果表明:在未来气候变化情景下,若尔盖湿地流域径流呈减少趋势,玛曲站径流减少比率最大,其次为若尔盖站,最后为唐克站;非汛期径流量减少幅度明显高于汛期,若尔盖湿地2020—2050年非汛期径流在未来气候变化情景下径流减少比率大部分在25%以上。非汛期径流的锐减可能会进一步加剧若尔盖湿地的退化和萎缩,导致黄河中下游区域的可利用水资源量减少。     

Climatic change and the effect on hydrology and water management in the Rhine basin.

There has been a marked increase in recent years in the resources dedicated to investigating the problems arising from climate change with respect to hydrology and to some extent to water resource management. Many of these studies are concentrated on the river Rhine basin. In order to review the actual state of scientific findings a workshop, organised by the International Commission for the Hydrology of the Rhine (CHR), was held on 24 and 25 June 2003. The invited experts discussed the following topics: observed variability in climatic and hydrological data, the development and interpretation of climate scenarios, and assessment of changes in the discharge regimes and the occurrence of hydrological extremes. Based on the workshop the question of whether or not current knowledge and procedural strategies can be used as a basis for future water management was evaluated by an expert group of the CHR. In this paper the process of decision-making with regard to flood management is analysed. Hints are given to convince the decision-makers to take into account the impacts of climate change in water resources management. The special challenges arising in international river basins are discussed.     

Flooding Control and Hydro-Energy Assessment for Urban Stormwater Drainage Systems under Climate Change: Framework Development and Case Study

Flooding issue and energy shortage have become the common concerns impeding the urban development under climate change scenarios. Exploiting potential hydro-energy from urban stormwater drainage system (USDS) has multiple beneficial perspectives for controlling flooding, relieving energy shortage and mitigating the greenhouse gases emission, which has not yet been systematically investigated in previous works. In this paper, a systematical analysis framework is developed to design the flooding risk control measures and to assess the feasibility and capacity of the hydro-energy development in USDS. The GCMs and HBV models, integrated within the SWMM computation platform, are adopted to simulate the hydrological and hydraulic processes during rainfall events, with the results used to manage the flooding situation and evaluate the energy generation capacity under the influences of both historical and future climate changes. The framework is then applied to a practical case in Tung Chung town of Hong Kong. The analysis result shows that, in the studied area, it is significant and worthwhile to develop the hydro-energy in USDS, which is evidenced to be beneficial to the energy generation and the flooding risk control as well as water resources management in the urban drainage system. The developed method and obtained results of this study may provide a new perspective and technical guide for effective USDS management and operation.

     

Modelling the impacts of grassland to cropland conversion on river flow regimes in Skunk Creek watershed,Upper Midwest United States

Conversion of grassland to cultivated cropland has been linked to downstream alteration of flow regimes. This study used the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) to construct seven “what if” scenarios for quantifying the impacts of grassland to cropland and vice versa conversion (i.e., replacement of grassland with selected agricultural crops) on river flow regimes in Skunk Creek watershed. The Cropland Data Layer for the year 2011 in conjunction with historical climate data was used to create SWAT models for scenario simulations over 19 years, from 1996 to 2014. The model developed for the historical climate records (baseline) was compared with the scenarios examined using stream flow metrics for a range of flow regimes, including magnitude, duration, frequency, and timing of annual low‐ and high‐flow conditions. The simulation results suggest that grassland conversion to cultivated cropland would generally increase river flows compared with conversion of cultivated cropland to grassland, which may reduce flows in the watershed. Low and moderate flows increased by 2–8% from the baseline scenario with conversion of grass crop and by 1–20% decreases with crop–grass conversion. High flows increased by 3–7% and decreased by 1–18% when grass is converted to crop and crop to grass, respectively. The analysis also suggests that grassland establishment may attenuate the peaks of prolonged small floods and shorter but earlier large floods.     

Hydrology under climate change in a temporary river system: Potential impact on water balance and flow regime

The potential impacts of future climate scenarios on water balance and flow regime are presented and discussed for a temporary river system in southern Italy. Different climate projections for the future (2030–2059) and the recent conditions (1980–2009) were investigated. A hydrological model (Soil and Water Assessment Tool) was used to simulate water balance at the basin scale and streamflow in a number of river sections under various climate change scenarios, based on different combinations of global and regional models (global circulation models and regional climate models). The impact on water balance components was quantified at the basin and subbasin levels as deviation from the baseline (1980–2009), and the flow regime alteration under changing climate was estimated using a number of hydrological indicators. An increase in mean temperature for all months between 0.5–2.4 °C and a reduction in precipitation (by 4–7%) was predicted for the future. As a consequence, a decline of blue water (7–18%) and total water yield (11–28%) was estimated. Although the river type classification remains unvaried, the flow regime distinctly moves towards drier conditions and the divergence from the current status increases in future scenarios, especially for those reaches classified as I‐D (ie, intermittent‐dry) and E (ephemeral). Hydrological indicators showed a decrease in both high flow and low flow magnitudes for various time durations, an extension of the dry season and an exacerbation of extreme low flow conditions. A reduction of snowfall in the mountainous part of the basin and an increase in potential evapotranspiration was also estimated (4–4.4%). Finally, the paper analyses the implications of the climate change for river ecosystems and for River Basin Management Planning. The defined quantitative estimates of water balance alteration could support the identification of priorities that should be addressed in upcoming years to set water‐saving actions.