scholarly journals Temporal dynamics of soil susceptibility to erosion in semiarid watersheds

2021 ◽  
Vol 43 ◽  
pp. e51378
Author(s):  
Camilo Vinícius Trindade Silva ◽  
Eunice Maia de Andrade ◽  
Luis Cesar de Aquino Lemos Filho ◽  
Jacques Carvalho Ribeiro Filho ◽  
Hermínio Sabino de Oliveira Júnior

The intensification of anthropogenic activities on soils contributes to soil loss through erosion. Moreover, the pattern of soil loss in the Cobra River watershed, located in the semiarid region of Rio Grande do Norte, is related to the history of land use and occupation, mainly from agriculture and the red ceramic industry, as well as the climatic seasonality of the region. Thus, the objective of this work was to identify the pattern of soil loss from the Cobra River microbasin in the state of Rio Grande do Norte. For this, the following analyses were performed: a survey of land use class areas for the years 1987, 1997, 2007 and 2017 as part of the Mapbiomas project; estimation of basin soil loss for these years; and quantification of areas of erosion vulnerability classes for this period. QGIS software was used to treat georeferenced data. According to the results, the land cover classes in the rich Cobra River microbasin fluctuated over time. Potential soil loss from the watershed increased from 1987 to 2017, with an increase of approximately 20 million megagrams of potentially erodible soil. The study of soil loss in a microbasin located in the Brazilian semiarid region should consider the variation in land cover over time, climatic seasonality and anthropic activity. To this end, it is important to use geotechnology and geoprocessing techniques to conduct a more robust spatiotemporal analysis.

Author(s):  
Ajit Kumar Jain ◽  
S. K Katiyar ◽  
M. S Chauhan

Anthropogenic activities impart serious challenges on wetland management. The issues of Anthropogenic Activities manifest in the form of environmental degradation, point and non-point source pollution of lake water. Catchment area of upper lake Bhopal has been witnessing the same scenario; raising the question of its planning and management to control water pollution. It shows the necessity to analyse and study the pattern of land use & land cover(LULC). In order to assess the LULC pattern and spatio-temporal dynamics the changing pattern of patch number(NP), class area(CA), mean patch size(MPS), mean shape index (MSI), Shannon’s Diversity index(SHDI), Simpson’s Diversity Index(SDI) of all land use/land cover categories. In this researchpaper above mentioned parameters were measured and analyzed for landuse/landcover change from year 2003 to 2011. Area of agriculture and built up land expanded 16.18% and 4.77% while number of patches reduced by 332 and 187 for these two classes respectively. On the other hand class area of vegetation and barren land reduced 9.33% and 11.62%. Few patches of vegetation completely eliminated resulted in reduction of number of patches by 1250. Increased no. of patches of barren land by 150 shows fragmentation. Reduction in diversity indices indicates that area becomes less diversified during study period. During the period of 2003 to 2011 shape of patches of agriculture and built up land becomes more complex and that of barren land and vegetation converted to simpler shape. These indices provided meaningful insights pertaining to the spatiotemporal dynamics prevailing in the catchment area of Upper Lake Bhopal.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
BIJAY HALDER ◽  
Jatisankar Bandyopadhyay

Abstract The worldwide fertility rate is becoming a most significant context of anthropological condition. Rapid population pressure is one of increasing factors for the global land crisis and gradually affects the environment and boosting climatic vulnerability. But world population progressively increased and hammering the natural environmental condition. Urban heat island (UHI) is increased due to anthropogenic activities and urban expansion, which causes public health emergency. Space-based UHI identification methods are used to estimate the environmental degradation using Land surface temperature (LST) along with different spectral indicators derived from multi-temporal Landsat images. The Landsat imageries were used to calculated land use and land cover maps of 1990, 2000, 2010, and 2020 were used for Habra-I and Habra-II blocks of North 24 Parganas. A supervised classification technique was applied for LU/LC classification. Shannon’s entropy model has been used for detecting urban expansion over the last 30 years. Land use and land cover (LULC) changes are notified in this study region because of urban expansion. 17.81 Sq.km of Agricultural land and 17.99 Sq,km of thick vegetation have been decreased similarly 43.24 Sq.km of the built-up area increased. Central Business District (CBD) is more densely population rather than the peripheral part. In the last thirty years around 6.52 ° C temperatures have been increased in this area. The highest values of NDBI are 0.16 (1990) to 0.59 (2020) respectively. The highest values of NDVI are 0.808 (1990) to 0.459 (2020) respectively. That spectral indicator shows that vegetated area has been affected due to urban expansion.


2014 ◽  
Vol 18 (9) ◽  
pp. 3763-3775 ◽  
Author(s):  
K. Meusburger ◽  
G. Leitinger ◽  
L. Mabit ◽  
M. H. Mueller ◽  
A. Walter ◽  
...  

Abstract. Snow processes might be one important driver of soil erosion in Alpine grasslands and thus the unknown variable when erosion modelling is attempted. The aim of this study is to assess the importance of snow gliding as a soil erosion agent for four different land use/land cover types in a subalpine area in Switzerland. We used three different approaches to estimate soil erosion rates: sediment yield measurements in snow glide depositions, the fallout radionuclide 137Cs and modelling with the Revised Universal Soil Loss Equation (RUSLE). RUSLE permits the evaluation of soil loss by water erosion, the 137Cs method integrates soil loss due to all erosion agents involved, and the measurement of snow glide deposition sediment yield can be directly related to snow-glide-induced erosion. Further, cumulative snow glide distance was measured for the sites in the winter of 2009/2010 and modelled for the surrounding area and long-term average winter precipitation (1959–2010) with the spatial snow glide model (SSGM). Measured snow glide distance confirmed the presence of snow gliding and ranged from 2 to 189 cm, with lower values on the north-facing slopes. We observed a reduction of snow glide distance with increasing surface roughness of the vegetation, which is an important information with respect to conservation planning and expected and ongoing land use changes in the Alps. Snow glide erosion estimated from the snow glide depositions was highly variable with values ranging from 0.03 to 22.9 t ha−1 yr−1 in the winter of 2012/2013. For sites affected by snow glide deposition, a mean erosion rate of 8.4 t ha−1 yr−1 was found. The difference in long-term erosion rates determined with RUSLE and 137Cs confirms the constant influence of snow-glide-induced erosion, since a large difference (lower proportion of water erosion compared to total net erosion) was observed for sites with high snow glide rates and vice versa. Moreover, the difference between RUSLE and 137Cs erosion rates was related to the measured snow glide distance (R2 = 0.64; p < 0.005) and to the snow deposition sediment yields (R2 = 0.39; p = 0.13). The SSGM reproduced the relative difference of the measured snow glide values under different land uses and land cover types. The resulting map highlighted the relevance of snow gliding for large parts of the investigated area. Based on these results, we conclude that snow gliding appears to be a crucial and non-negligible process impacting soil erosion patterns and magnitude in subalpine areas with similar topographic and climatic conditions.


2018 ◽  
Vol 192 ◽  
pp. 02017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jatuwat Wattanasetpong ◽  
Uma Seeboonruang ◽  
Uba Sirikaew ◽  
Walter Chen

Soil loss due to surface erosion has been a global problem not just for developing countries but also for developed countries. One of the factors that have greatest impact on soil erosion is land cover. The purpose of this study is to estimate the long-term average annual soil erosion in the Lam Phra Phloeng watershed, Nakhon Ratchasima, Thailand with different source of land cover by using the Universal Soil Loss Equation (USLE) and GIS (30 m grid cells) to calculate the six erosion factors (R, K, L, S, C, and P) of USLE. Land use data are from Land Development Department (LDD) and ESA Climate Change Initiative (ESA/CCI) in 2015. The result of this study show that mean soil erosion by using land cover from ESA/CCI is less than LDD (29.16 and 64.29 ton/ha/year respectively) because soil erosion mostly occurred in the agricultural field and LDD is a local department that survey land use in Thailand thus land cover data from this department have more details than ESA/CCI.


2018 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-39
Author(s):  
Katia Helena Lipp-Nissinen ◽  
Bruna de Sá Piñeiro ◽  
Letícia Sebastião Miranda ◽  
Alexandre de Paula Alves

2021 ◽  
Vol 101 (1) ◽  
pp. 31-47
Author(s):  
Marko Langovic ◽  
Slavoljub Dragicevic ◽  
Ivan Novkovic ◽  
Nenad Zivkovic ◽  
Radislav Tosic ◽  
...  

Riverbank erosion and lateral channel migration are important geomorphological processes which cause various landscape, socio-economic, and environmental consequences. Although those processes are present on the territory of Serbia, there is no available data about the soil loss caused by riverbank erosion for the entire country. In this study, the spatial and temporal dynamics of the riverbank erosion for the largest internal rivers in Serbia (Velika Morava, Zapadna Morava, Juzna Morava, Pek, Mlava, Veliki Timok, Kolubara) was assessed using remote sensing and GIS. The aim of this paper is to determine the total and average soil loss over large-scale periods (1923-2020), comparing data from the available sources (aerial photographs, satellite images, and different scale paper maps). Results indicated that lateral migration caused significant problems through land loss (approximately 2,561 ha), especially arable land, and land use changes in river basins, but also economic loss due to the reduction of agricultural production. Total and average soil loss was calculated for five most representative meanders on all studied rivers, and on the basis of the obtained values, certain regularities about further development and dynamics of riverbank movement are presented. A better understanding of river channel migration in this area will be of a great importance for practical issues such as predicting channel migration rates for river engineering and planning purposes, soil and water management and land use changes, environment protection.


2011 ◽  
Vol 50 (9) ◽  
pp. 1872-1883 ◽  
Author(s):  
Winston T. L. Chow ◽  
Bohumil M. Svoma

AbstractUrbanization affects near-surface climates by increasing city temperatures relative to rural temperatures [i.e., the urban heat island (UHI) effect]. This effect is usually measured as the relative temperature difference between urban areas and a rural location. Use of this measure is potentially problematic, however, mainly because of unclear “rural” definitions across different cities. An alternative metric is proposed—surface temperature cooling/warming rates—that directly measures how variations in land-use and land cover (LULC) affect temperatures for a specific urban area. In this study, the impact of local-scale (<1 km2), historical LULC change was examined on near-surface nocturnal meteorological station temperatures sited within metropolitan Phoenix, Arizona, for 1) urban versus rural areas, 2) areas that underwent rural-to-urban transition over a 20-yr period, and 3) different seasons. Temperature data were analyzed during ideal synoptic conditions of clear and calm weather that do not inhibit surface cooling and that also qualified with respect to measured near-surface wind impacts. Results indicated that 1) urban areas generally observed lower cooling-rate magnitudes than did rural areas, 2) urbanization significantly reduced cooling rates over time, and 3) mean cooling-rate magnitudes were typically larger in summer than in winter. Significant variations in mean nocturnal urban wind speeds were also observed over time, suggesting a possible UHI-induced circulation system that may have influenced local-scale station cooling rates.


2010 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 55-70 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hyun Joong Kim

Rapidly growing urban areas tend to reveal distinctive spatial and temporal variations of land use/land cover in a locally urbanized environment. In this article, the author analyzes urban growth phenomena at a local scale by employing Geographic Information Systems, remotely sensed image data from 1984, 1994, and 2004, and landscape shape index. Since spatial patterns of land use/land cover changes in small urban areas are not fully examined by the current GIS-based modeling studies or simulation applications, the major objective of this research is to identify and examine the spatial and temporal dynamics of land use changes of urban growth at a local scale. Analytical results demonstrate that sizes, locations, and shapes of new developments are spatio-temporally associated with their landscape variations and major transportation arteries. The key findings from this study contribute to GIS-based urban growth modeling studies and urban planning practices for local communities.


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