scholarly journals Impact of Urbanization and Land-Use Change on Surface Climate in Middle and Lower Reaches of the Yangtze River, 1988–2008

2015 ◽  
Vol 2015 ◽  
pp. 1-10 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xiaowei Yao ◽  
Zhanqi Wang ◽  
Hua Wang

Land-use/land cover change (LUCC) is one of the fundamental causes of global environmental change. In recent years, understanding the regional climate impact of LUCC has become a hot-discussed topic worldwide. Some studies have explored LUCC impact on regional climate in specific cities, provinces, or farming areas. However, the quick-urbanized areas, which are highly influenced by human activities, have the most severe land-use changes in developing countries, and their climatic impact cannot be ignored. This study aims to identify the impact of land-use change coupled with urbanization on regional temperature and precipitation in the metropolitan areas of middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River in China by means of spatial analysis and numeric methods. Based on the exploration of land-use change and climate change during 1988–2008, the impact of land-use transition from non-built-up area to built-up area on temperature and precipitation was analyzed. The results indicated that the land-use conversion has affected the regional temperature with an increasing effect in the study area, while the influence on precipitation was not so significant. The results can provide useful information for spatial planning policies in consideration of regional climate change.

2013 ◽  
Vol 2013 ◽  
pp. 1-8 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jinyan Zhan ◽  
Juan Huang ◽  
Tao Zhao ◽  
Xiaoli Geng ◽  
Yihui Xiong

China has experienced rapid urbanization since 1978, and the dramatic change in land cover is expected to have significant impacts on the climate change. Some models have been used to simulate the relationship between land use and land cover change and climate change; however, there is still no sufficient evidence for the impacts of urbanization on the regional climate. This study aims to identify the impact of urban land use change on regional temperature and precipitation in summer in the Beijing-Tianjin-Tangshan Metropolitan area during 2030–2040 based on the analysis of the simulation results of WRF model. Firstly, we analyzed the land use change and climate change during 1995–2005 in the study area. The impacts of future urbanization on regional climate change were then simulated. The results indicate that urbanization in this area has affected the regional climate and has the potential to increase temperature and precipitation in the summer of 2030–2040. These research results can offer decision-making support information related to future planning strategies in urban environments in consideration of regional climate change.


Author(s):  
Hilary Keneth Bahati ◽  
Abraham Ogenrwoth ◽  
Jotham Ivan Sempewo

Abstract Ugandan rivers are being tapped as a resource for the generation of hydropower in addition to other uses. Studies on the reliability of these hydropower plants due to climate and land-use/land cover changes on the hydrology of these rivers are scanty. Therefore, this study aimed to model the impact of the changing climate and land use/cover on hydropower reliability to aid proper planning and management. The hydropower reliability of River Muzizi catchment was determined from its past (1998–2010) and midcentury (2042–2070) discharge at 75 and 90% exceedance probability under Representative Concentration Pathways (RCPs) of 4.5 and 8.5, respectively. The past and projected hydropower were compared to determine how future climate and land-use changes will impact the discharge and hydropower reliability of River Muzizi catchment. Six LULC scenarios (deforestation, 31–20%; grassland, 19–3%; cropland, 50–77%; water bodies, 0.02–0.01%; settlement, 0.23–0.37%, and Barren land 0.055–0.046% between 2014 and 2060) and three downscaled Regional Climate Model (REMO and RCA4 for precipitation and RACMO22T for temperature from pool of four CORDEX (Coordinated Regional Climate Downscaling Experiment) Africa RCMs) were examined. A calibrated SWAT simulation model was applied for the midcentury (2041–2060) period, and a potential change in hydropower energy in reference to mean daily flow (designflow ≥ 30% exceedance probability), firm flow (flow ≥ 95% exceedance probability), and mean annual flow was evaluated under the condition of altered runoff under RCP4.5 and RCP8.5 climate change scenarios for an average of REMO and RCA4 RCM. The future land use (2048) was projected using the MOLUSCE (Module for Land Use Change Evaluation) plugin in QGIS using CA-ANN. Three scenarios have been described in this study, including LULC change, climate change, and combined (climate and LULC change). The results suggest that there will be a significant increase in hydropower generation capacity (from 386.27 and 488.1 GWh to 867.82 and 862.53 GWh under RCP4.5 and RCP8.5, respectively, for the combined future effect of climate and land-use/cover changes. Energy utilities need to put in place mechanisms to effectively manage, operate, and maintain the hydropower plant amidst climate and land-use change impacts, to ensure reliability at all times.


2013 ◽  
Vol 2013 ◽  
pp. 1-12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Qian Xu ◽  
Qunou Jiang ◽  
Kai Cao ◽  
Xing Li ◽  
Xiangzheng Deng

Land Use/Land Cover change (LUCC) is a key aspect of global environmental change, which has a significant impact on climate change. In the background of increasing global warming resulting from greenhouse effect, to understand the impact of land use change on climate change is necessary and meaningful. In this study, we choose China as the study area and explore the possible land use change trends based on the AgLU module and ERB module of global change assessment model (GCAM model and Global Change Assessment Model). We design three scenarios based on socioeconomic development and simulated the corresponding structure change of land use according to the three scenarios with different parameters. Then we simulate the different emission of CO2under different scenarios based on the simulation results of structure change of land use. At last, we choose the most suitable scenario that could control the emission of CO2best and obtain the relatively better land use structure change for adaption of climate change. Through this research we can provide a theoretical basis for the future land use planning to adapt to climate change.


Hydrology ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 48
Author(s):  
Paul Kiprotich ◽  
Xianhu Wei ◽  
Zongke Zhang ◽  
Thomas Ngigi ◽  
Fengting Qiu ◽  
...  

The Anthropocene period is characterised by a general demographic shift from rural communities to urban centres that transform the predominantly wild global landscape into mostly cultivated land and cities. In addition to climate change, there are increased uncertainties in the water balance and these feedbacks cannot be modelled accurately due to scarce or incomplete in situ data. In African catchments with limited current and historical climate data, precise modelling of potential runoff regimes is difficult, but a growing number of model applications indicate that useful simulations are feasible. In this study, we used the new generation of soil and water assessment tool (SWAT) dubbed SWAT+ to assess the viability of using high resolution gridded data as an alternative to station observations to investigate surface runoff response to continuous land use change and future climate change. Simultaneously, under two representative concentration pathways (RCP4.5 and RCP8.5), six regional climate models (RCMs) from the Coordinated Regional Climate Downscaling Experiment Program (CORDEX) and their ensemble were evaluated for model skill and systematic biases and the best performing model was selected. The gridded data predicted streamflow accurately with a Nash–Sutcliffe efficiency greater than 0.89 in both calibration and validation phases. The analysis results show that further conversion of grasslands and forests to agriculture and urban areas doubled the runoff depth between 1984 and 2016. Climate projections predict a decline in March–May rainfall and an increase in the October–December season. Mean temperatures are expected to rise by about 1.3–1.5 °C under RCP4.5 and about 2.6–3.5 °C under RCP8.5 by 2100. Compared to the 2010–2016 period, simulated surface runoff response to climate change showed a decline under RCP4.5 and an increase under RCP8.5. In contrast, the combine effects of land use change and climate change simulated a steady increase in surface runoff under both scenarios. This suggests that the land use influence on the surface runoff response is more significant than that of climate change. The study results highlight the reliability of gridded data as an alternative to instrumental measurements in limited or missing data cases. More weight should be given to improving land management practices to counter the imminent increase in the surface runoff to avoid an increase in non-point source pollution, erosion, and flooding in the urban watersheds.


Land ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (8) ◽  
pp. 804
Author(s):  
Bo Niu ◽  
Dazhuan Ge ◽  
Rui Yan ◽  
Yingyi Ma ◽  
Dongqi Sun ◽  
...  

In recent years, the impact of land-use systems on global climate change has become increasingly significant, and land-use change has become a hot issue of concern to academics, both within China and abroad. Urbanization, as an important socioeconomic factor, plays a vital role in promoting land-use transition, which also shows a significant spatial dependence on urbanization. This paper constructs a theoretical framework for the interaction relationship between urbanization and land-use transition, taking the Yangtze River Delta as an example, and measures the level of urbanization from the perspective of population urbanization, economic urbanization and social urbanization, while also evaluating the level of land-use morphologies from the perspective of dominant and recessive morphologies of land-use. We construct a PVAR model and coupled coordination model based on the calculated indexes for empirical analysis. The results show that the relationship between urbanization and land-use transition is not a simple linear relationship, but tends to be complex with the process of urbanization, and reasonable urbanization and land-use morphologies will promote further benign coupling in the system. By analyzing the interaction relationship between urbanization and land-use transition, this study enriches the study of land-use change and provides new pathways for thinking about how to promote high-quality urbanization.


2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Susanne Rolinski ◽  
Alexander V. Prishchepov ◽  
Georg Guggenberger ◽  
Norbert Bischoff ◽  
Irina Kurganova ◽  
...  

AbstractChanges in land use and climate are the main drivers of change in soil organic matter contents. We investigated the impact of the largest policy-induced land conversion to arable land, the Virgin Lands Campaign (VLC), from 1954 to 1963, of the massive cropland abandonment after 1990 and of climate change on soil organic carbon (SOC) stocks in steppes of Russia and Kazakhstan. We simulated carbon budgets from the pre-VLC period (1900) until 2100 using a dynamic vegetation model to assess the impacts of observed land-use change as well as future climate and land-use change scenarios. The simulations suggest for the entire VLC region (266 million hectares) that the historic cropland expansion resulted in emissions of 1.6⋅ 1015 g (= 1.6 Pg) carbon between 1950 and 1965 compared to 0.6 Pg in a scenario without the expansion. From 1990 to 2100, climate change alone is projected to cause emissions of about 1.8 (± 1.1) Pg carbon. Hypothetical recultivation of the cropland that has been abandoned after the fall of the Soviet Union until 2050 may cause emissions of 3.5 (± 0.9) Pg carbon until 2100, whereas the abandonment of all cropland until 2050 would lead to sequestration of 1.8 (± 1.2) Pg carbon. For the climate scenarios based on SRES (Special Report on Emission Scenarios) emission pathways, SOC declined only moderately for constant land use but substantially with further cropland expansion. The variation of SOC in response to the climate scenarios was smaller than that in response to the land-use scenarios. This suggests that the effects of land-use change on SOC dynamics may become as relevant as those of future climate change in the Eurasian steppes.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Morteza Akbari ◽  
Ehsan Neamatollahi ◽  
Hadi Memarian ◽  
Mohammad Alizadeh Noughani

Abstract Floods cause great damage to ecosystems and are among the main agents of soil erosion. Given the importance of soils for the functioning of ecosystems and development and improvement of bio-economic conditions, the risk and rate of soil erosion was assessed using the RUSLE model in Iran’s Lorestan province before and after a period of major floods in late 2018 and early 2019. Furthermore, soil erosion was calculated for current and future conditions based on the Global Soil Erosion Modeling Database (GloSEM). The results showed that agricultural development and land use change are the main causes of land degradation in the southern and central parts of the study area. The impact of floods was also significant since our evaluations showed that soil erosion increased from 4.12 t ha-1 yr-1 before the floods to 10.93 t ha-1 yr-1 afterwards. Field surveying using 64 ground control points determined that erodibility varies from 0.17 to 0.49% in the study area. Orchards, farms, rangelands and forests with moderate or low vegetation cover were the most vulnerable land uses to soil erosion. The GloSEM modeling results revealed that climate change is the main cause of change in the rate of soil erosion. Combined land use change-climate change simulation showed that soil erosion will increase considerably in the future under SSP1-RCP2.6, SSP2-RCP4.5, and SSP5-RCP8.5 scenarios. In the study area, both natural factors, i.e. climate change and human factors such as agricultural development, population growth, and overgrazing are the main drivers of soil erosion.


2018 ◽  
Vol 135 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 1031-1044 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Gries ◽  
Margarete Redlin ◽  
Juliette Espinosa Ugarte

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