Title: | Impacts of climate change and human activities on the Three Gorges Reservoir inflow |
Authors: | Zhang, Y., P.-a. Zhong, J. Chen, J. Bing, D. Xu and M. Wang |
Year: | 2017 |
Journal: | Water |
Volume (Issue): | 9(12) |
Pages: | |
Article ID: | 957 |
DOI: | 10.3390/w9120957 |
URL (non-DOI journals): | |
Model: | SWAT |
Broad Application Category: | hydrologic only |
Primary Application Category: | climate change and human activities change |
Secondary Application Category: | hydrologic assessment |
Watershed Description: | 1,000,000 km^2 portion of the Yangtze River that flows to the Three Gorges Reservoir, which drains portions of southwest and central China. |
Calibration Summary: | |
Validation Summary: | |
General Comments: | |
Abstract: | Identifying changes in runoff and quantifying the impacts of climate change and human
activities are of great significance for water resources planning and management in a river basin.
In this study, an inflow series of the Three Gorges Reservoir observed from 1951 to 2016 is used to
identify the trend and abrupt change point by using statistical methods. Based on the meteorological
data, soil type data, and land use data during the same period, the Soil and Water Assessment
Tool (SWAT) model is established to quantitatively attribute changes in the Three Gorges Reservoir
inflow to climate change and human activities separately and discuss the differences between the
two-stage method, which divides the whole study period into two stages to analyze the reasons for
runoff evolution, and multi-stage method, which divides the whole study period into more stages to
consider the temporal and spatial variation of land use/cover (LULC). The results show: (1) During
the study period, a significant decrease is detected in the Three Gorges Reservoir inflow and the
decrease rate is 7.7 km3 per ten years, annual total precipitation decreases by -13.5 mm per ten
years, and annual average temperature increases by 0.1 C per ten years. (2) Contribution of climate
change and human activities is around 7:3. Climate change is the main reason for the decrease in
the Three Gorges Reservoir inflow. (3) Results of stages in multi-stage method are different from
the result of two-stage method. Accumulative results of multi-stage method and result of two-stage
method are consistent. There are some changes in results of every stage, which are different from the
accumulative results |
Language: | English |
Keywords: | Three Gorges Reservoir; reservoir inflow; climate change; human activities; LUCC |