scholarly journals Climate change or irrigated agriculture – what drives the water level decline of Lake Urmia?

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephan Schulz ◽  
Sahand Darehshouri ◽  
Elmira Hassanzadeh ◽  
Christoph Schüth
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Water Level ◽  
Climatic Changes ◽  
Water Withdrawal ◽  
Water Volume ◽  
Irrigated Agriculture ◽  
Agricultural Water ◽  
Lake Urmia ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Water Level Decline

<p>Lake Urmia is one of the largest hypersaline lakes on earth with a unique biodiversity. Over the past two decades the lake water level declined dramatically, threatening the functionality of the lake’s ecosystems. There is a controversial debate about the reasons for this decline, with either mismanagement of the water resources, or climatic changes assumed to be the main cause.</p><p>During this study we gathered an extensive hydro-meteorological data set, information about the reservoirs and the lake bathymetry. This data served for a quantification of the water budget components of Lake Urmia over the last five decades. Interestingly, a comparison of the temporal patterns of the principal natural boundary conditions of streamflow (precipitation and evaporation) with the inflow to the lake revealed that the variability of the inflow can be well explained its natural drivers. With this we can show that variations of Lake Urmia’s water level during the analyzed period were mainly triggered by climatic changes.</p><p>However, under the current climatic conditions agricultural water extraction volumes are significant and often exceed the remaining surface water inflow volumes. This rather simple observation shows that something deeper needs to be dug here. Therefore, we performed a parsimonious hindcast experiment and run a set of development scenarios based on the previously developed water balance. This helped us to better quantify the human impact on the development of the water volume of Lake Urmia. We could show that changes in agricultural water withdrawal would have a significant impact on the lake volume and could either stabilize the lake, or lead to its complete collapse (Schulz et al., 2020).</p><p> </p><p><strong>References</strong></p><p>Schulz, S., Darehshouri, S., Hassanzadeh, E., Tajrishy, M. and Schüth, C.: Climate change or irrigated agriculture – what drives the water level decline of Lake Urmia, Sci. Rep., 10(1), 236, doi:10.1038/s41598-019-57150-y, 2020.</p>

scholarly journals Climate change or irrigated agriculture – what drives the water level decline of Lake Urmia

2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephan Schulz ◽  
Sahand Darehshouri ◽  
Elmira Hassanzadeh ◽  
Massoud Tajrishy ◽  
Christoph Schüth
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Water Level ◽  
Irrigated Agriculture ◽  
Lake Urmia ◽  
Water Level Decline

Estimation of shallow groundwater evaporation from dried-up areas of Lake Urmia, Iran

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sahand Darehshouri ◽  
Nils Michelsen ◽  
Christoph Schüth ◽  
Stephan Schulz
Keyword(s):  
Water Level ◽  
Salt Lake ◽  
Shallow Groundwater ◽  
Irrigated Agriculture ◽  
Lake Area ◽  
Lake Urmia ◽  
Night Time ◽  
Undisturbed Soil ◽  
Custom Made ◽  
Water Level Decline

<p>Lake Urmia, located in the northwest of Iran, had an initial volume of about 19 km<sup>3</sup> and a surface area of 5,700 km<sup>2</sup> (Alipour, 2006). Once one of the largest hypersaline lakes in the world, this UNESCO Biosphere Reserve site currently shows a remarkable water level decline. About 70% of the lake area (Tourian et al., 2015) and more than 90% of its volume were lost between 2000 and 2014 (Schulz et al., 2020). The lack of a precise water balance of the Lake Urmia catchment is one of the challenges authorities are facing in their efforts to restore the lake to its ecological level. Here, key issues are that lake evaporation rates are mostly assumed and that evaporation of shallow groundwater from dried-up areas (up to 3,000 km<sup>2</sup>) is often ignored. The objective of this study is to obtain evaporation rate estimates for the dried-up parts of the Urmia lake bed. To this end, we set up a laboratory experiment with undisturbed soil columns collected from dried-up areas of the lake. With the help of a custom-made low-cost environmental chamber, the columns were subject to day- and night-time weather conditions typical for the area. Performed measurements comprise water level logging and monitoring of mass losses from the columns due to evaporation. First experimental results will be presented.</p><p> </p><p><strong>References </strong></p><p>Alipour, S., 2006. Hydrogeochemistry of seasonal variation of Urmia Salt Lake, Iran. Saline Systems 2, 9. doi:10.1186/1746-1448-2-9</p><p>Schulz, S., Darehshouri, S., Hassanzadeh, E., Tajrishy, M., Schüth, C., 2020. Climate change or irrigated agriculture – what drives the water level decline of Lake Urmia. Sci. Rep. 1–10. doi:10.1038/s41598-019-57150-y</p><p>Tourian, M.J., Elmi, O., Chen, Q., Devaraju, B., Roohi, S., Sneeuw, N., 2015. A spaceborne multisensor approach to monitor the desiccation of Lake Urmia in Iran. Remote Sens. Environ. 156, 349–360. doi:10.1016/j.rse.2014.10.006</p><p> </p>

scholarly journals Drying Lakes: A Review on The Health Conditions and Restoration Strategies

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anchita Anchita ◽  
Kamshat Tussupova ◽  
Peder Hjorth
Keyword(s):  
Water Level ◽  
Lake Water ◽  
Saline Lakes ◽  
Saline Lake ◽  
Dust Storms ◽  
Water Levels ◽  
Aral Sea ◽  
Water Withdrawal ◽  
Local Context ◽  
Lake Urmia

<p><strong>Abstract: </strong>Decrease of saline lakes, which comprises of 44% of all the available lake water, is a major concern. It additionally brings to desertification process to the region. Thus, various countries have taken different actions in protecting their lake’s water level. The aim of this paper is to assess different strategies directed to tackle the decreasing saline lake water levels. Lake Urmia and the Aral Sea which split into North Aral and South Aral were among the world's largest saline lakes and now have reduced to 10% of their original size. A thorough review of academic reports, official documents and databases were considered. Although the dry-up of the lake is a natural process, it has been sped up by human interventions in the hydrology cycle. Dust storms (strong winds) in the case of the Aral Sea, transmit the pollutants from dry lake surface which initially accumulated in the lakebed causing severe health issue. Various strategies were implemented to manage the socio-economic conditions caused due to the drying of lakes. The strategy implemented for the North Aral Sea was to restore the lake by reducing the water withdrawal from tributary rivers which leads to increased water level in the sea. The strategy implemented for Lake Urmia was to restore the lake by water transfer activities from neighbouring water sources which until now show no increase in water level. The strategy implemented for the South Aral Sea was to use a dry lakebed to diversify the economy by oil and mineral extraction which shows the adaptation to the environmental conditions with no restoration strategy. As a conclusion, it is found that there is no common best solution for this kind of problem. The best fit depends on the local context and it is strongly path dependent.<strong> </strong></p><p>Keywords: Drying saline lake; Dust storms; Aral sea; Health impacts; Lake Urmia; Restoration of saline lake; Strategies.</p>

Water level decline at Iran's Lake Urmia: changing population dynamics

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-20
Author(s):  
Somayeh Mohammadi hamidi ◽  
Hossein Nazmfar ◽  
Christine Fürst ◽  
Mohammad Hassan Yazdani ◽  
Ahad Rezayan
Keyword(s):  
Population Dynamics ◽  
Water Level ◽  
Lake Urmia ◽  
Water Level Decline

scholarly journals Too Hot to Handle: Climate Change and Agricultural Water Use

2011 ◽  
pp. 1-9
Author(s):  
Denise Fort
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Water Rights ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Western United States ◽  
Irrigated Agriculture ◽  
Agricultural Water ◽  
Agricultural Water Use ◽  
The Status ◽  
Water Uses

The world faces enormous challenges in responding to looming crises in food and water. Responding to this challenge will require flexibility; such flexibility may be impeded by legal institutions. This paper looks at the western United States and discusses the role of irrigated agriculture in that region. Because of climate change, a growing population, declining groundwater, the need to protect ecosystems and other conflicts, the author suggests that all water uses, including long-standing agricultural water rights, need to be examined in light of these changes. Legal systems have tended to serve the status quo, but perhaps the law can help facilitate this re-examination.

scholarly journals Climate Change Implications for Water Availability: A Case Study of Barcelona City

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (5) ◽  
pp. 1779 ◽  
Author(s):  
Edwar Forero-Ortiz ◽  
Eduardo Martínez-Gomariz ◽  
Robert Monjo
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Water Availability ◽  
Strong Dependence ◽  
Water Levels ◽  
Series Data ◽  
Water Volume ◽  
Climate Projections ◽  
Main Concern ◽  
Rainfall Time Series ◽  
Data Set

Barcelona city has a strong dependence on the Ter and Llobregat reservoir system to provide drinking water. One main concern for the next century is a potential water scarcity triggered by a severe and persistent rainfall shortage. This is one of the climate-driven impacts studied within the EU funded project RESCCUE. To evaluate potential drought scenarios, the Hydrologiska Byråns Vattenbalansavdelning (HBV) hydrological model reproduces the water contributions by month that have reached the reservoirs, regarding the accumulated rainfall over each sub-basin, representing the available historical-observed water levels. For future scenarios, we adjusted the input data set using climate projections of rainfall time series data of the project RESCCUE. Local outputs from 9 different climate models were applied to simulate river basins’ responses to reservoirs’ incoming water volume. Analyzing these results, we obtained average trends of the models for each scenario, hypothetical extreme values, and quantification for changes in water availability. Future water availability scenarios for Barcelona central water sources showed a mean decrease close to 11% in comparison with the period 1971–2015, considering the representative concentration pathway 8.5 (RCP8.5) climate change scenario in the year 2100. This research forecasts a slight downward trend in water availability from rainfall contributions from the mid-21st century. This planned future behavior does not mean that the annual water contributions are getting lower than the current ones, but rather, identifies an escalation in the frequency of drought cycles.

scholarly journals Unraveling the Water-Energy-Food-Environment Nexus for Climate Change Adaptation in Iran: Urmia Lake Basin Case-Study

Water ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (9) ◽  
pp. 1282
Author(s):  
Hossein Nasrollahi ◽  
Rasool Shirazizadeh ◽  
Reza Shirmohammadi ◽  
Omid Pourali ◽  
Majid Amidpour
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Water Level ◽  
Holistic Approach ◽  
Urmia Lake ◽  
Lake Basin ◽  
Lake Urmia ◽  
Industrial Sectors ◽  
Ecological Water Level ◽  
Urmia Lake Basin

A holistic approach to the management of water, energy, food, and the environment is required to both meet the socioeconomic demands of the future as well as sustainable development of these limited resources. The Urmia Lake Basin has faced environmental, social, and economic challenges in recent years, and this situation is likely to worsen under the impacts of climate change. For this study, an adaptability analysis of this region is proposed for the 2040 horizon year. Two models, the water evaluation and planning (WEAP (Stockholm Environmental Institute, Stockholm, Sweden)) and the low emissions analysis platform (LEAP (Stockholm Environmental Institute, Boston, MA, USA)), are integrated to simulate changes in water, energy, food, and the environment over these 20 years. Two climate scenarios and nine policy scenarios are combined to assess sustainable development using a multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) approach. Results show that, through pursuing challenging goals in agricultural, potable water, energy, and industrial sectors, sustainable development will be achieved. In this scenario, the Lake Urmia water level will reach its ecological water level in 2040. However, social, technical, and political challenges are considered obstacles to implementing the goals of this scenario. In addition, industry growth and industry structure adjustment have the most impact on sustainable development achievement.

scholarly journals Trends of climate change in the Lower Indus Basin region of Pakistan

2016 ◽  
Vol 8 (5) ◽  
pp. 718-731 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mustafa Nawaz Shafqat ◽  
Amtul Samie Maqbool ◽  
Syed Ali Musstjab Akber Shah Eqani ◽  
Raza Ahmed ◽  
Haroon Ahmed
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Food Security ◽  
Climatic Factors ◽  
Climatic Changes ◽  
Indus Basin ◽  
Maximum Temperature ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Lower Indus Basin ◽  
The Future

Purpose Lower Indus Basin (LIB) region is the food basket of Pakistan, and climatic variation in response to global warming might severely affect the crop production and, thus, food security and ultimately to the economy of the country. Design/methodology/approach The authors analyzed the previous climatic factors data series of LIB region to investigate the past and present climatic trends and to predict the future changes. Climatic changes were monitored by studying temperature, rainfall and relative humidity (RH) dynamics at two locations (Lahore and Multan) of the LIB region, Pakistan, by using data from 1953 to 2006. The data were divided into two equal halves (1953-1979 and 1980-2006) and statistically compared for the aforementioned weather parameters. Findings The results suggested that mean minimum temperature (MMT) and overall mean temperature in winter were significantly increased, whereas few summer months had also experienced the reduction in both temperatures. However, few minor changes were also observed for the mean maximum temperature at both locations. The rainfall amount did not vary significantly at both locations, with the exception for the months of February and June at Lahore location, which experienced relatively higher rainfall in latter period (1980-2006). However, morning and evening RH was significantly increased at Multan throughout the year and for some selected months (February-March and May-July) at Lahore. However, the comparison of climatic data of both temporal halves suggested either dryer weather during winter months because of increase in MMT and/or increase in area under irrigated agriculture, resulting in more evaporation at both locations. Similarly, the data also indicated the early monsoon rainfall patterns in summer and late western depression rainfall spell during winter, which played key role to affect the crop yield because of irregular rain events. Research limitations/implications The current manuscript would be very useful for the disaster management authorities and agriculture sector to predict the future irregular trends of climate change in Pakistan. Moreover, current findings can be important tool toward the management of climatic changes issues (i.e. floods and dryer spells) and to formulate the future strategies for the improved crop growth in arid and/or semi-arid developing nations such as Pakistan. Originality/value The current manuscript, for the very first time, provided detailed insights into key climatic factors changes for past seven decades, into the severely climate change-affected areas of the world. Furthermore, agricultural sector is likely to be severely affected because of minor seasonal change in temperature and moisture, and have a strong food security impact, which can be reflected with current data set to cope with both ecological and economic impacts of climate change in Pakistan. The current findings would be useful to manage the climate change-related issues in Pakistan, including the social, environmental and economic.

scholarly journals Recent developments in predictive uncertainty assessment based on the model conditional processor approach

2011 ◽  
Vol 15 (10) ◽  
pp. 3253-3274 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. Coccia ◽  
E. Todini
Keyword(s):  
Water Level ◽  
Flood Forecasting ◽  
Uncertainty Assessment ◽  
Water Volume ◽  
Po River ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Predictive Uncertainty ◽  
Emilia Romagna Region ◽  
Future Value ◽  
Truncated Normal

Abstract. The work aims at discussing the role of predictive uncertainty in flood forecasting and flood emergency management, its relevance to improve the decision making process and the techniques to be used for its assessment. Real time flood forecasting requires taking into account predictive uncertainty for a number of reasons. Deterministic hydrological/hydraulic forecasts give useful information about real future events, but their predictions, as usually done in practice, cannot be taken and used as real future occurrences but rather used as pseudo-measurements of future occurrences in order to reduce the uncertainty of decision makers. Predictive Uncertainty (PU) is in fact defined as the probability of occurrence of a future value of a predictand (such as water level, discharge or water volume) conditional upon prior observations and knowledge as well as on all the information we can obtain on that specific future value from model forecasts. When dealing with commensurable quantities, as in the case of floods, PU must be quantified in terms of a probability distribution function which will be used by the emergency managers in their decision process in order to improve the quality and reliability of their decisions. After introducing the concept of PU, the presently available processors are introduced and discussed in terms of their benefits and limitations. In this work the Model Conditional Processor (MCP) has been extended to the possibility of using two joint Truncated Normal Distributions (TNDs), in order to improve adaptation to low and high flows. The paper concludes by showing the results of the application of the MCP on two case studies, the Po river in Italy and the Baron Fork river, OK, USA. In the Po river case the data provided by the Civil Protection of the Emilia Romagna region have been used to implement an operational example, where the predicted variable is the observed water level. In the Baron Fork River example, the data set provided by the NOAA's National Weather Service, within the DMIP 2 Project, allowed two physically based models, the TOPKAPI model and TETIS model, to be calibrated and a data driven model to be implemented using the Artificial Neural Network. The three model forecasts have been combined with the aim of reducing the PU and improving the probabilistic forecast taking advantage of the different capabilities of each model approach.

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