EGU2020-1511
https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu2020-1511
EGU General Assembly 2020
© Author(s) 2020. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Contribution of Climate Change and Landuse / Landcover Change on Variations of Hydrological Processes in The Water Towers of Yangtze River, China

Naveed Ahmed1,2, Genxu Wang1, Sun Xiangyang1, Ghulam Nabi3, Fiaz Hussain4,5, Kewei Huang2, Aamir Shakoor7, and Sarfraz Munir6
Naveed Ahmed et al.
  • 1Key Laboratory of Mountain Surface Process and Ecological Regulations, Institute of Mountain Hazards and Environment, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Chengdu 610041, - China. Email: naveedahmed@imde.ac.cn, wanggx@imde.ac.cn, sunxiangyang@imde.ac.cn, huangkw
  • 2University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China.
  • 3Center of Excellence in Water Resources Engineering, Univeristy of Engineering and Technology, Lahore-Pakistan. Email: gnabi60@yahoo.com
  • 4Department of Civil Engineering, National Central University, Chung-Li 32001, Taiwan.
  • 5Department of Agricultural Engineering, PMAS-Arid Agriculture University, Rawalpindi 46300, Pakistan. Email: engr.fiaz@uaar.edu.pk
  • 6Water Resources Engineering University of Kurdistan Hewler 30 Meter Avenue, Erbil, Kurdistan, Iraq. Email: s.munir@ukh.edu.krd
  • 7Department of Agricultural Engineering, Bahauddin Zakariya University, Multan-Pakistan. Email: aamirskr@bzu.edu.pk

The impact assessment of landuse / landcover change (LULCC) and climate change (CC) on the runoff in a highly elevated watershed has key importance in terms of sustainable water resources and ecological developments. In this research, statistical technique was deployed with the addition of Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) in the Water Towers of Yangtze River (WTYZ). The coefficient of determination (R2) and Nash-Sutcliffe Efficiency (NSE) were used as a decision criterion to ensure the performance of model simulations. The model performed satisfactory with monthly R2 = 0.80 to 0.83 and NSE = 0.63 to 0.69 during calibration (1985 - 2000) and (2001 – 2016) periods. Major LULCC transformations were assessed from low grassland to medium grassland (2.017%) and wetlands (0.90%), bare land to medium grassland (0.23%) and glaciers to wetland (16.83%), high grassland to medium grassland (5.77%) during 1990s and 2005s. Impact of CC increased runoff by 97.97% and decreased evapotranspiration by -5.15% of total runoff and evapotranspiration respectively. It was also noteworthy that LULCC caused the increase in runoff and evapotranspiration by 2.02% and 105.15% relative to totals, respectively. Thus, the variations of runoff in the WTYZ are mainly impacted by landuse/landcover, while climate change have relatively least impacts.

How to cite: Ahmed, N., Wang, G., Xiangyang, S., Nabi, G., Hussain, F., Huang, K., Shakoor, A., and Munir, S.: Contribution of Climate Change and Landuse / Landcover Change on Variations of Hydrological Processes in The Water Towers of Yangtze River, China, EGU General Assembly 2020, Online, 4–8 May 2020, EGU2020-1511, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu2020-1511, 2019