A Piecewise Grey System Model for Study the Effects of Anthropogenic Activities on Karst Hydrological Processes

Sustainable groundwater development must rely on a good understanding of hydrological processes, especially under effects of anthropogenic activities. This paper develops a piecewise analysis based on grey system model for study effects of anthropogenic activities on hydrological processes. The time series of precipitation and spring discharge were segmented into three time periods depending on whether variations are due to climate variation: the predevelopment stage, the transition stage, and the new equilibrium stage. Then we modeled hydrological process of the predevelopment stage and new equilibrium stage by the grey system model. By comparing the model results, we can quantify the effects of human activities on hydrological processes. We applied the model to Liulin Springs China. The results indicated that the hydraulic response time of the spring discharge to precipitation from the predevelopment stage to the new equilibrium stage, ranges from less than 1 year to up to 4 years. The results revealed that human activities slow the groundwater flow. GM (1,N) models of Liulin Springs discharge showed that the driving coefficients of precipitation to the spring discharge decreased from 0.012272 in the predevelopment stage to 0.007753 in the new equilibrium stage, which means that groundwater recharge ability has reduced about 36.82 %. Human activities in Liulin Springs have drastically changed the groundwater system. Piecewise grey system model is a robust method for hydrological process simulation.