Quantification of human and climate contributions to multi-dimensional hydrological alterations:A case study in the Upper Minjiang River,China

Dual factors of climate and human on the hydrological process are reflected not only in changes in the spatiotemporal distribution of water resource amounts but also in the various characteristics of river flow regimes. Isolating and quantifying their contributions to these hydrological alterations helps us to comprehensively understand the response mechanism and patterns of hydrological process to the two kinds of factors. Here we develop a general framework using hydrological model and 33 indicators to describe hydrological process and quantify the impact from climate and human. And we select the Upper Minjiang River(UMR) as a case to explore its feasibility. The results indicate that our approach successfully recognizes the characteristics of river flow regimes in different scenarios and quantitatively separates the climate and human contributions to multi-dimensional hydrological alterations. Among these indicators, 26 of 33 indicators decrease over the past half-century(1961–2012) in the UMR, with change rates ranging from 1.3% to 33.2%, and the human impacts are the dominant factor affecting hydrological processes, with an average relative contribution rate of 58.6%. Climate change causes an increase in most indicators, with an average relative contribution rate of 41.4%. Specifically, changes in precipitation and reservoir operation may play a considerable role in inducing these alterations. The findings in this study help us better understand the response mechanism of hydrological process under changing environment and is conducive to climate change adaptation, water resource planning and ecological construction.

Periodically hydrologic alterations decouple the relationships between physicochemical variables and chlorophyll-a in a dam-induced urban lake

Periodically hydrologic alterations driven by seasonal change and water storage capacity management strongly modify physicochemical properties and chlorophyll-a(Chl-a)and their interactions in dam-induced lakes.However,the extent and magnitude of these changes still remain unclear.This study aimed to determine the effects of periodically hydrologic alterations on physicochemical variables and Chl-a in the dam-induced urban Hanfeng Lake,upstream of Three Gorges Reservoir.Shifts in Chl-a and 13 physicochemical variables were recorded monthly in the lake from January 2013 to December 2014.Chl-a was neither seasonal nor inter-annual differences while a few physical variables such as flow velocity(V)exhibited significantly seasonal variabilities,and chemical variables like total nitrogen(TN),nitrate-nitrogen(NO3-N),total phosphorus(TP),dissolved silica(DSi)were markedly inter-annual differences.Higher TN:TP(40:1)and lower NO3-N:DSi(0.8:1)relative to balanced stoichiometric ratios suggested changes in composition of phytoplankton communities and potentially increased proportion of diatom in Hanfeng Lake.Chl-a was predicable by combination of dissolved oxygen(DO),TN and DSi in dry season,and by V alone in wet season.During the whole study period,Chl-a was solely negatively correlated with TN:TP,indicating decline in N concentration and increase in P could therefore increase Chl-a.Our results highlight pronounced decoupling of linkages between Chl-a and physicochemical variables affected by periodically hydrologic alterations in dam-induced aquatic systems.

Hydrological alteration and biodiversity change along the river network caused by anthropogenic activities and climate variability

Background:Population growth and intensified human activities in conjunction with climate variability continue to affect the hydrologic cycle,aquatic and terrestrial flora and fauna.In this regard,understanding interactions among ecosystem functions,impacts of anthropogenic interventions and those of climate variability is vital for projecting future ecosystem responses to human activities and climate forcing.The objectives of this study are to determine the ecological flow state via eco-flow index based on discharge hydrograph,to model the ecological diversity through the Shannon diversity index,and to assess the degree of hydrologic alteration using indicators of hydrologic alteration and range of variability approach in six hydrometric stations along the Zayandeh-Rud River in central Iran.The river drains into Gavkhuni Marsh.Also,the streamflow-induced potential changes for Capoeta damascina(a cyprinid fish species of the genus Capoeta),Petroleuciscus esfahani(a small cyprinid fish)and Aphanius isfahanensis(a Cyprinodontid fish)are evaluated.The outcome is expected to assist managers with understanding the effects of anthropogenic activities and climate variability on Gavkhuni aquatic ecosystems so that management options that enhance species resilience and adaptability are outlined.Results:Human activities,a primary factor influencing the natural flow regime,caused a significant increase in the minimum flow,July to March streamflow,low pulse number,and the number of reversals in most studied stations.On the contrary,some other hydrologic indices declined in value.Reservoir impoundment,the most prominent factor among human interventions,resulted in an overall alteration degree of 74.8%in streamflow.Climate variability impacted the natural flow regime in the range of low degree hydrologic alteration(27.3%).In addition,the biodiversity of the study basin,as modeled by the Shannon diversity index,had strong relevance to the annual eco-surplus and was more sensitive to summer floods and autumn hydrological droughts than other factors.Conclusions:This study corroborates the effectiveness of scenario-based hydrological modeling framework in evaluating the impacts of climate variability and human activities imposed on natural flow metrics.Additionally,the recently introduced eco-flow metrics based on discharge hydrographs and the Shannon diversity index based on indicators of hydrological alteration may be adopted in basins lacking ecological data.These two indices can effectively identify the most prominent factors in hydrological alteration and biodiversity change through a river network and may provide scientific decision-making support for water resource management in the study area.

Changes in runoff and eco-flow in the Dongjiang River of the Pearl River Basin, China

The Dongjiang River, one of the tributaries of the Pearl River, serves as the critical water source for Guangdong Province and the District of Hong Kong in China. In this study, the change trend and change points of flow at three main gaging stations in the Dongjiang River were analyzed using the nonparametric Mann-Kendall test and Pettitt-Mann-Whitney change-point statistics. Flow regime changes in the Dongjiang River were quantified by using both the Indicators of Hydrologic Alteration （IHA） parameters and eco-statistics, such as ecosurplus and eeodeficit. It was found that the change trend for annual median flow in the Dongjiang River increased over the past 60years, with the major change occurring sometime between 1970 and 1974. IHA analyses showed that the magnitude of monthly flow decreased during the flood period, but increased greatly during the dry period. The median date of the one-day minimum flow moved ahead, and the duration of low pulse for the Dongjiang River was reduced significantly because of reservoir construction and operations. The IHA-based Dundee Hydrological Regime Alteration Method analysis indicated that all three stations have experienced a moderate risk of impact since 1974. The eco-statistical analyses showed that the majority of the flows appeared to be ecosurplus at all three locations after 1974, while flows with less than 30%, or higher exceedance probability, had ecodeficit in the summer flood period due to heavy reservoir operations.

Quantifying relations between altered hydrology and fish community responses for streams in Minnesota

Background:Altered hydrology is a stressor on aquatic life,but quantitative relations between specific aspects of streamflow alteration and biological responses have not been developed on a statewide scale in Minnesota.Best sub-sets regression analysis was used to develop linear regression models that quantify relations among five categories of hydrologic metrics(i.e.,duration,frequency,magnitude,rate-of-change,and timing)computed from streamgage records and six categories of biological metrics(i.e.,composition,habitat,life history,reproductive,tolerance,trophic)computed from fish-community samples,as well as fish-based indices of biotic integrity(FIBI)scores and FIBI scores normalized to an impairment threshold of the corresponding stream class(FIBI_BCG4).Relations between hydrology and fish community responses were examined using three hydrologic datasets that represented periods of record,long-term changes,and short-term changes to flow regimes in streams of Minnesota.Results:Regression models demonstrated significant relations between hydrologic explanatory metrics and fish-based biological response metrics,and the five regression models with the strongest linear relations explained over 70%of the variability in the biological metric using three hydrologic metrics as explanatory variables.Tolerance-based biological metrics demonstrated the strongest linear relations to hydrologic metrics.The most commonly used hydrologic metrics were related to bankfull flows and aspects of flow variability.Conclusions:Final regression models represent paired streamgage records and biological samples throughout the State of Minnesota and encompass differences in stream orders,hydrologic landscape units,and watershed sizes.Presented methods can support evaluations of stream fish communities and facilitate targeted efforts to improve the health of fish communities.Methods also can be applied to locations outside of Minnesota with continuous streamgage data and fish-community samples.