Abstract
As an extremely important region for the socioeconomic development of China, the Yangtze River Basin (YRB) is vulnerable to climate change and natural disasters. In recent decades, hydrological droughts have jeopardized regional water supply, local ecosystem services, and economic development in this region. This study simulates the characteristics of hydrological droughts in the YRB using the PCR-GLOBWB v2.0 model and the variable threshold method. High-spatial-resolution (about 10 km) PCR-GLOBWB v2.0 simulations considering the effects of human activities closely match the observed hydrological data for the YRB. Thus, the results indicate that human activities directly influence the tempo-spatial characteristics of hydrological droughts in the YRB. Reservoir operation decreases the multi-year monthly discharge but increases low flow in the severe drought years in the middle and lower subbasins of the YRB. These findings highlight the uneven effects of human activities on hydrological droughts in the YRB. In conclusion, anthropogenic activities must be considered when developing future mitigation and adaptation strategies for the YRB.
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The anonymous reviewers and the associate editor are thanked for their comments and suggestions, which were helpful in the improvement in this paper.
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All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection, and analysis were performed by Donglai Jiao and Dajiang Wang. The first draft of the manuscript was written by Donglai Jiao, and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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Meteorological data are available at China Meteorological Data Service Center (https://data.cma.cn/). Data on abstraction water from groundwater and surface water, irrigation water and irrigation return water, storage capacity of all reservoirs in Yangtze River were collected from the water resources bulletins of the Yangtze River, which can be downloaded from Changjiang Water Resources Commission (CWRC, https://www.cjw.gov.cn/).
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Jiao, D., Wang, D. & Lv, H. Effects of human activities on hydrological drought patterns in the Yangtze River Basin, China. Nat Hazards 104, 1111–1124 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11069-020-04206-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11069-020-04206-2