Clarifying the propagation dynamics from meteorological to hydrological drought induced by climate change and direct human activities

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ziyan Li ◽  
Shengzhi Huang ◽  
Shuai Zhou ◽  
Guoyong Leng ◽  
Dengfeng Liu ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
River Basin ◽  
Human Activities ◽  
Hydrological Drought ◽  
Underlying Surface ◽  
Propagation Time ◽  
Propagation Process ◽  
Changing Environment ◽  
Study Results ◽  
The Wei River Basin ◽  
Propagation Dynamics

AbstractAn understanding of the propagation process from meteorological to hydrological drought contributes to accurate prediction hydrological drought. However, the comprehensive influence of direct human activities involved in drought propagation is not well understood. In this study, an identification framework for drought propagation time was constructed to quantify the effects of direct human activities (i.e., reservoir storage, irrigation, industrial, domestic and agricultural water consumption) on drought propagation. Subsequently, the effects of meteorological and underlying surface factors on the drought propagation process were clarified based on random forest method, and the driving effect of teleconnection factors was investigated from top to bottom. The Wei River Basin (WRB), the largest tributary of the Yellow River Basin, was selected as the case study. Results disclosed that the propagation time from meteorological to hydrological drought was short in summer (approximately 2 months) and autumn (approximately 3 months), while long in spring (approximately 3–5 months) and winter (approximately 3–8 months), exhibiting noticeable spatial variability. In a changing environment, the propagation time generally showed a decreasing trend in spring and winter, while increasing propagation time was observed in summer and autumn. The dynamic drought propagation time of each season was all jointly controlled by the different extent variation of meteorological and underlying surface conditions, and the basic flow is all relatively significant throughout the period. Direct human activities had an effect on the seasonal dynamics of drought propagation, especially during the winter of the non-flood season, which alleviated the severity of winter hydrological drought to some extent, thus delaying the transmission of meteorological signals to hydrological systems. Sunspots, the dominant direct teleconnection driving force in the WRB, could indirectly affect the local precipitation and base flow in spring, autumn, and winter and interferes with the drought propagation process. This study sheds new insights into the attribution of drought propagation dynamics in a changing environment.

scholarly journals Drought Characteristics and Propagation in the Semiarid Heihe River Basin in Northwestern China

2019 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 59-77 ◽  
Author(s):  
Feng Ma ◽  
Lifeng Luo ◽  
Aizhong Ye ◽  
Qingyun Duan
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
River Basin ◽  
Human Activities ◽  
Meteorological Drought ◽  
Hydrological Drought ◽  
Heihe River Basin ◽  
Heihe River ◽  
Propagation Time ◽  
Drought Characteristics ◽  
Hydrological Droughts

Abstract Meteorological and hydrological droughts can bring different socioeconomic impacts. In this study, we investigated meteorological and hydrological drought characteristics and propagation using the standardized precipitation index (SPI) and standardized streamflow index (SSI), over the upstream and midstream of the Heihe River basin (UHRB and MHRB, respectively). The correlation analysis and cross-wavelet transform were adopted to explore the relationship between meteorological and hydrological droughts in the basin. Three modeling experiments were performed to quantitatively understand how climate change and human activities influence hydrological drought and propagation. Results showed that meteorological drought characteristics presented little difference between UHRB and MHRB, while hydrological drought events are more frequent in the MHRB. In the UHRB, there were positive relationships between meteorological and hydrological droughts, whereas drought events became less frequent but longer when meteorological drought propagated into hydrological drought. Human activities have obviously changed the positive correlation to negative in the MHRB, especially during warm and irrigation seasons. The propagation time varied with seasonal climate characteristics and human activities, showing shorter values due to higher evapotranspiration, reservoir filling, and irrigation. Quantitative evaluation showed that climate change was inclined to increase streamflow and propagation time, contributing from −57% to 63%. However, more hydrological droughts and shorter propagation time were detected in the MHRB because human activities play a dominant role in water consumption with contribution rate greater than (−)89%. This study provides a basis for understanding the mechanism of hydrological drought and for the development of improved hydrological drought warning and forecasting system in the HRB.

The propagation dynamics and causes of hydrological drought in response to meteorological drought at seasonal timescale

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lan Ma ◽  
Qiang Huang ◽  
Shengzhi Huang ◽  
Dengfeng Liu ◽  
Guoyong Leng ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Soil Moisture ◽  
Southern Oscillation ◽  
Standardized Precipitation Index ◽  
Multiple Linear Regression Model ◽  
Meteorological Drought ◽  
Hydrological Drought ◽  
Propagation Time ◽  
Study Results ◽  
The Wei River Basin ◽  
Definition Of

<p>According to widely accepted definition of drought, meteorological and hydrological droughts originally develop from rainfalls and runoffs deficits, respectively. Runoffs deficit is mainly derived from rainfalls deficit. Therefore, hydrological drought is essentially propagated from meteorological drought, which is critical for agricultural water management. Investigation of the propagation from meteorological to hydrological drought is important for drought early warning, preparedness and mitigation. Nevertheless, the characteristics and dynamic of drought propagation in spatiotemporal scale remain unresolved. To this end, the characteristics and dynamic of drought propagation in different seasons and their linkages with key forcing factors are evaluated. In this study, the meteorological drought and hydrological drought are characterized by Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) and Standardized Runoff Index (SRI), respectively. The propagation time is identified by the corresponding timescale of the maximum correlation coefficient between SPI and SRI. Then, a 20-year sliding window is adopted to explore the propagation dynamic in various seasons. Furthermore, the multiple linear regression model (MLR) is established to quantitatively explore the influence of meteorological factors, underlying surface features and teleconnection factors on the propagation time variations. The Wei River Basin (WRB), which is a typical Loess Plateau watershed in China, is selected as a case study. Results indicate that: (1) the propagation time from meteorological to hydrological drought is shorter in summer (2 months) and autumn (3 months), whilst that is longer in spring (8 months) and winter (13 months). Moreover, the propagation rates exhibit decreasing trend in warm seasons, which however show increasing trend in cold seasons; (2) a significant slowing propagation in autumn is mainly caused by the decreasing soil moisture and precipitation, while the non-significant tendency in summer is generally induced by the offset between insignificant increasing precipitation and significant decreasing soil moisture; (3) the replenishment from streamflow to groundwater in advance prompts the faster propagation from meteorological to hydrological drought in spring and winter; (4) teleconnection factors have strong influences on the propagation in autumn, in which Arctic Oscillation (AO), El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) mainly affect participation, arid index and soil moisture, thereby impacting drought propagation.</p>

scholarly journals Propagation dynamics and causes of hydrological drought in response to meteorological drought at seasonal timescales

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lan Ma ◽  
Qiang Huang ◽  
Shengzhi Huang ◽  
Dengfeng Liu ◽  
Guoyong Leng ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Soil Moisture ◽  
Southern Oscillation ◽  
Standardized Precipitation Index ◽  
Multiple Linear Regression Model ◽  
Meteorological Drought ◽  
Hydrological Drought ◽  
Propagation Time ◽  
Study Results ◽  
The Wei River Basin ◽  
Hydrological Droughts

Abstract According to the widely accepted definition of drought, meteorological and hydrological droughts originally develop from rainfall and runoff deficits, respectively. Runoff deficit is mainly derived from rainfall deficit, and the propagation from meteorological drought to hydrological drought is critical for agricultural water management. Nevertheless, the characteristics and dynamics of drought propagation in the spatiotemporal scale remain unresolved. To this end, the characteristics and dynamics of drought propagation in different seasons and their linkages with key forcing factors are evaluated. In this study, meteorological and hydrological droughts are characterized by the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) and the Standardized Runoff Index (SRI), respectively. Propagation time is identified by the corresponding timescale of the maximum correlation coefficient between the SPI and the SRI. Then, a 20-year sliding window is adopted to explore the propagation dynamic in various seasons. Furthermore, the multiple linear regression model is established to quantitatively explore the influence of meteorological factors, underlying surface features and teleconnection factors on the propagation time variations. The Wei River Basin, a typical Loess Plateau watershed in China, is selected as a case study. Results indicate the following: (1) the propagation time from meteorological to hydrological drought is shorter in summer (2 months) and autumn (3 months), whereas it is longer in spring (8 months) and winter (13 months). Moreover, the propagation rates exhibit a decreasing trend in warm seasons, which, however, show an increasing trend in cold seasons; (2) a significant slowing propagation in autumn is mainly caused by the decreasing soil moisture and precipitation, whereas the non-significant tendency in summer is generally induced by the offset between insignificant increasing precipitation and significant decreasing soil moisture; (3) the replenishment from streamflow to groundwater in advance prompts the faster propagation from meteorological to hydrological drought in spring and winter and (4) teleconnection factors have strong influences on the propagation in autumn, in which Arctic Oscillation, El Niño-Southern Oscillation and Pacific Decadal Oscillation mainly affect participation, arid index and soil moisture, thereby impacting drought propagation.

scholarly journals Impacts of different human activities on hydrological drought in the Huaihe River Basin based on scenario comparison

2021 ◽  
Vol 37 ◽  
pp. 100909
Author(s):  
Hui Cheng ◽  
Wen Wang ◽  
Pieter Richard van Oel ◽  
Jingxuan Lu ◽  
Gang Wang ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
River Basin ◽  
Human Activities ◽  
Hydrological Drought ◽  
Huaihe River Basin ◽  
Huaihe River ◽  
The Huaihe River

scholarly journals Evolution characteristics and relationship of meteorological and hydrological droughts from 1961 to 2018 in Hanjiang River Basin, China

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lin Wang ◽  
Jianyun Zhang ◽  
Amgad Elmahdi ◽  
Zhangkang Shu ◽  
Yinghui Wu ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
River Basin ◽  
Human Activities ◽  
Water Cycle ◽  
Standardized Precipitation Index ◽  
Meteorological Drought ◽  
Hydrological Drought ◽  
Evolution Characteristics ◽  
Hanjiang River ◽  
Hydrological Droughts ◽  
Meteorological Droughts

Abstract In the context of global warming and increasing human activities, the acceleration of the water cycle will increase the risk of basin drought. In this study, to analyze the spatial and temporal evolution characteristics of hydrological and meteorological droughts over the Hanjiang River Basin (HRB); the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) and Standardized Runoff Index (SRI) were selected and applied for the period 1961–2018. In addition, the cross-wavelet method was used to discuss the relationship between hydrological drought and meteorological droughts. The results and analysis indicated that: (1) the meteorological drought in the HRB showed a complex cyclical change trend of flood-drought-flood from 1961 to 2018. The basin drought began to intensify from 1990s and eased in 2010s. The characteristics of drought evolution in various regions are different based on scale. (2) During the past 58 years, the hydrological drought in the HRB has shown a significant trend of intensification, particularly in autumn season. Also, the hydrological droughts had occurred frequently since the 1990s, and there were also regional differences in the evolution characteristics of drought in various regions. (3) Reservoir operation reduces the frequency of extreme hydrological drought events. The effect of reducing the duration and intensity of hydrological drought events by releasing water from the reservoir is most obvious at Huangjiagang Station, which is the nearest to Danjiangkou Reservoir. (4) The hydrological drought and meteorological drought in the HRB have the strongest correlation on the yearly scale. After 1990, severe human activities and climate change are not only reduced the correlation between hydrological drought and meteorological drought in the middle and lower reaches of the basin, but also reduced the lag time between them. Among them, the hydrological drought in the upper reaches of the basin lags behind the meteorological drought by 1 month, and the hydrological drought in the middle and lower reaches of the basin has changed from 2 months before 1990 to 1 month lagging after 1990.

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