Long-term spatio-temporal seasonal snow cover variability in the Hindu Kush Himalaya

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kathrin Naegeli ◽  
Nils Rietze ◽  
Jörg Franke ◽  
Martin Stengel ◽  
Christoph Neuhaus ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
High Resolution ◽  
Snow Cover ◽  
Precipitation Pattern ◽  
Snow Cover Area ◽  
Seasonal Snow ◽  
Hindu Kush ◽  
Spatio Temporal ◽  
Area Percentage ◽  
Seasonal Snow Cover

<p>The Hindu Kush Himalaya (HKH), the worlds ‘water tower’, contains the largest volume of snow and ice outside of the polar ice sheets and is the headwater area of Asia’s largest rivers. Due to the complex topography and its great spatial extent the HKH is characterised by variable temperature and precipitation pattern and thus exhibits large heterogeneity in the presence of seasonal snow cover (SSC). Previous studies usually focused on regional studies of snow cover area percentage or the influence of snow melt on the local hydrological system. Here we present a systematic overview of spatio-temporal SSC variability of the entire HKH region on a climate relevant time scale (four decades).</p><p>Our results are based on Advanced Very High Resolution (AVHRR) data, collected onboard the polar orbiting satellites NOAA-7 to -19, providing daily, global imagery at a spatial resolution of 5 km since 1982 up to today. This unique dataset is exceptionally valuable to derive pixel-based SSC information using a Normalised Difference Snow Cover (NDSI) approach including additional thresholds related to topography and land cover, and developed in the frame of ESA CCI+ snow.  Calibrated and geocoded reflectance data and a consistent cloud mask, derived in the ESA CCI cloud project, are used. A temporal gap-filling was applied to mitigate the influence of clouds. Reference snow maps from high-resolution optical satellite data as well as in-situ station data were used to validate the time series.</p><p>The dataset allows analysis of the state and trends of SSC at regional and sub-regional level. We thus investigated spatio-temporal evolution and long-term variability of SSC for the entire HKH as well as for 14 hydrological basins. We find large spatial difference in the amount of SSC depending on the regional elevation and precipitation characteristics. Furthermore, we investigate SSC phenology, which is directly linked to climate change and thus of high relevance for seasonal water storage and mountain streamflow. Our analysis indicates a significant decline in snow cover area percentage (SCA %) during warm and dry summer month and a decreasing tendency from high winter through spring to early summer. At the hydrological basin level, no significant long-term trend was detected, however, both western and central basins indicate a decrease in SCA % and generally the latest years are strongly negative. Moreover, we examine SCA % anomalies at the highest available temporal frequency (daily information) and reveal an overall shortening of the SSC occurrence and a general decrease of SSC extent in the HKH region.</p>

Revealing snow cover dynamics in the Hindu Kush Himalaya over the past decades

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kathrin Naegeli ◽  
Carlo Marin ◽  
Valentina Premier ◽  
Gabriele Schwaizer ◽  
Martin Stengel ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
High Resolution ◽  
Snow Cover ◽  
Satellite Data ◽  
Weather Forecast ◽  
Short Wave ◽  
Climate Modelling ◽  
Snow Cover Area ◽  
Hindu Kush ◽  
Spatio Temporal ◽  
Area Percentage

<p>Knowledge about the snow cover distribution is of high importance for climate studies, weather forecast, hydrological investigations, irrigation or tourism, respectively. The Hindu Kush Himalayan (HKH) region covers almost 3.5 million km<sup>2</sup> and extends over eight different countries. The region is known as ‘water tower’ as it contains the largest volume of ice and snow outside of the polar ice sheets and it is the source of Asia’s largest rivers. These rivers provide ecosystem services, the basis for livelihoods and most importantly living water for drinking, irrigation, energy production and industry for two billion people, a fourth of the world’s population, living in the mountains and downstream.</p><p>The spatio-temporal variability of snow cover in the HKH is high and studies reported average snow-covered area percentage of 10–18%, with greater variability in winter (21–42%) than in summer (2–4%). However, no study systematically investigated snow cover metrics, such as snow cover area percentage (SCA), snow cover duration (SCD) or snow cover onset (SCOD) and melt-out day (SCMD), for the entire region so far. Here, we thus present unique in-sights of regional and sub-regional snow cover dynamics for the HKH based on almost four decades, an exceptionally long and in view of the climate modelling community valuable timeseries, of satellite data obtained within the ESA CCI+ Snow project.</p><p>Our results are based on Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) data, collected onboard the polar orbiting satellites NOAA-7 to -19, providing daily, global imagery at a spatial resolution of 5 km. Calibrated and geocoded reflectance data and a consistent cloud mask pre-processed and provided by the ESA Cloud_cci project as global 0.05° composites are used. The retrieval of snow extent considers the high reflectance of snow in the visible spectra and the low reflectance values in the short-wave infrared expressed in the Normalized Difference Snow Index (NDSI). Additional thresholds related to topography and land cover are included to derive the fractional snow cover of every pixel. A temporal gap-filling was applied to mitigate the influence of clouds. Reference snow maps from high-resolution optical satellite data as well as in-situ station data were used to validate the time series.</p>

Long-term change of seasonal snow cover and its effects on river runoff in the Tarim River basin, northwestern China

2009 ◽  
Vol 23 (14) ◽  
pp. 2045-2055 ◽  
Author(s):  
Changchun Xu ◽  
Yaning Chen ◽  
Yimit Hamid ◽  
Tiyip Tashpolat ◽  
Yapeng Chen ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Snow Cover ◽  
River Basin ◽  
River Runoff ◽  
Tarim River ◽  
Tarim River Basin ◽  
Seasonal Snow ◽  
Term Change ◽  
The Tarim River Basin ◽  
Seasonal Snow Cover

scholarly journals Evaluation of snow extent time series derived from Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer global area coverage data (1982–2018) in the Hindu Kush Himalayas

2021 ◽  
Vol 15 (9) ◽  
pp. 4261-4279
Author(s):  
Xiaodan Wu ◽  
Kathrin Naegeli ◽  
Valentina Premier ◽  
Carlo Marin ◽  
Dujuan Ma ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
High Resolution ◽  
Land Cover ◽  
Snow Cover ◽  
Area Coverage ◽  
Slope Aspect ◽  
Hindu Kush ◽  
Very High

Abstract. Long-term monitoring of snow cover is crucial for climatic and hydrological studies. The utility of long-term snow-cover products lies in their ability to record the real states of the earth's surface. Although a long-term, consistent snow product derived from the ESA CCI+ (Climate Change Initiative) AVHRR GAC (Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer global area coverage) dataset dating back to the 1980s has been generated and released, its accuracy and consistency have not been extensively evaluated. Here, we extensively validate the AVHRR GAC snow-cover extent dataset for the mountainous Hindu Kush Himalayan (HKH) region due to its high importance for climate change impact and adaptation studies. The sensor-to-sensor consistency was first investigated using a snow dataset based on long-term in situ stations (1982–2013). Also, this includes a study on the dependence of AVHRR snow-cover accuracy related to snow depth. Furthermore, in order to increase the spatial coverage of validation and explore the influences of land-cover type, elevation, slope, aspect, and topographical variability in the accuracy of AVHRR snow extent, a comparison with Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM) data was included. Finally, the performance of the AVHRR GAC snow-cover dataset was also compared to the MODIS (MOD10A1 V006) product. Our analysis shows an overall accuracy of 94 % in comparison with in situ station data, which is the same with MOD10A1 V006. Using a ±3 d temporal filter caused a slight decrease in accuracy (from 94 % to 92 %). Validation against Landsat TM data over the area with a wide range of conditions (i.e., elevation, topography, and land cover) indicated overall root mean square errors (RMSEs) of about 13.27 % and 16 % and overall biases of about −5.83 % and −7.13 % for the AVHRR GAC raw and gap-filled snow datasets, respectively. It can be concluded that the here validated AVHRR GAC snow-cover climatology is a highly valuable and powerful dataset to assess environmental changes in the HKH region due to its good quality, unique temporal coverage (1982–2019), and inter-sensor/satellite consistency.

Comparison study of seasonal snow cover area from space-borne satellite data in the Heilongjiang Basin

2009 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kaishan Song ◽  
Guixin Zhong ◽  
Zongming Wang ◽  
Lihong Zeng ◽  
Cui Jin ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Snow Cover ◽  
Satellite Data ◽  
Comparison Study ◽  
Snow Cover Area ◽  
Seasonal Snow ◽  
Seasonal Snow Cover

scholarly journals Characterising spatio-temporal variability in seasonal snow cover at a regional scale from MODIS data: the Clutha Catchment, New Zealand

2019 ◽  
Vol 23 (8) ◽  
pp. 3189-3217 ◽  
Author(s):  
Todd A. N. Redpath ◽  
Pascal Sirguey ◽  
Nicolas J. Cullen
Keyword(s):  
New Zealand ◽  
Snow Cover ◽  
Temporal Variability ◽  
Catchment Area ◽  
Regional Scale ◽  
Precipitation Variability ◽  
Seasonal Snow ◽  
Temperature And Precipitation ◽  
Spatio Temporal ◽  
Seasonal Snow Cover

Abstract. A 16-year series of daily snow-covered area (SCA) for 2000–2016 is derived from MODIS imagery to produce a regional-scale snow cover climatology for New Zealand's largest catchment, the Clutha Catchment. Filling a geographic gap in observations of seasonal snow, this record provides a basis for understanding spatio-temporal variability in seasonal snow cover and, combined with climatic data, provides insight into controls on variability. Seasonal snow cover metrics including daily SCA, mean snow cover duration (SCD), annual SCD anomaly and daily snowline elevation (SLE) were derived and assessed for temporal trends. Modes of spatial variability were characterised, whilst also preserving temporal signals by applying raster principal component analysis (rPCA) to maps of annual SCD anomaly. Sensitivity of SCD to temperature and precipitation variability was assessed in a semi-distributed way for mountain ranges across the catchment. The influence of anomalous winter air flow, as characterised by HYSPLIT back-trajectories, on SCD variability was also assessed. On average, SCA peaks in late June, at around 30 % of the catchment area, with 10 % of the catchment area sustaining snow cover for > 120 d yr−1. A persistent mid-winter reduction in SCA, prior to a second peak in August, is attributed to the prevalence of winter blocking highs in the New Zealand region. In contrast to other regions globally, no significant decrease in SCD was observed, but substantial spatial and temporal variability was present. rPCA identified six distinct modes of spatial variability, characterising 77 % of the observed variability in SCD. This analysis of SCD anomalies revealed strong spatio-temporal variability beyond that associated with topographic controls, which can result in snow cover conditions being out of phase across the catchment. Furthermore, it is demonstrated that the sensitivity of SCD to temperature and precipitation variability varies significantly across the catchment. While two large-scale climate modes, the SOI and SAM, fail to explain observed variability, specific spatial modes of SCD are favoured by anomalous airflow from the NE, E and SE. These findings illustrate the complexity of atmospheric controls on SCD within the catchment and support the need to incorporate atmospheric processes that govern variability of the energy balance, as well as the re-distribution of snow by wind in order to improve the modelling of future changes in seasonal snow.

Monitoring snowpack evolution with meteorological reanalysis data in the Atlas Mountains

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wassim Mohamed Baba ◽  
Abdelghani Boudhar ◽  
Simon Gascoin ◽  
Lahoucine Hanich ◽  
Ahmed Marchane ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Snow Cover ◽  
Snow Water Equivalent ◽  
Growing Season ◽  
Reanalysis Data ◽  
Water Runoff ◽  
Snow Cover Area ◽  
Seasonal Snow ◽  
Atlas Mountains ◽  
Snow Water ◽  
Seasonal Snow Cover

<p>The seasonal snow cover in the Altas mountains of Morocco is an important resource, mostly because it provides melt-water runoff for irrigation during the crop growing season. However, the knowledge on physical properties of the snowpack (e.g., snow water equivalent (SWE) and snowmelt) is still very limited due to the scarcity or the lack of ground measurements in the elevated area. In this study we suggest that the recent progresses of meteorological reanalysis data (e.g., MERRA-2 and ERA-5) open new perspectives to overcome this issue. We fed a distributed snowpack evolution model (SnowModel) with downscaled ERA-5 and MERRA-2 reanalyses and evaluate their performance to simulate snow cover. The modeling covers the period 1981 to 2019 (37 water years). SnowModel simulations were assessed using observations of river discharge, snow height and snow cover area derived from MODIS.</p><p>For most of hydrological years, the results show a good performance for both MERRA-2 and ERA-5 with a slight superiority of ERA-5, to reproduce the snowpack state.</p><p><strong>Key words</strong>: snow, snow water equivalent, reanalysis , MERRA-2, ERA-5</p>

scholarly journals Changes in seasonal snow cover in Hindu Kush-Himalayan region

2011 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 755-777 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. R. Gurung ◽  
A. V. Kulkarni ◽  
A. Giriraj ◽  
K. S. Aung ◽  
B. Shrestha ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Snow Cover ◽  
Linear Trend ◽  
Geographical Area ◽  
Western Himalaya ◽  
Seasonal Snow ◽  
Snow Covered Area ◽  
Covered Area ◽  
Depletion Curve ◽  
Hindu Kush ◽  
Seasonal Snow Cover

Abstract. The changes in seasonal snow covered area in the Hindu Kush-Himalayan (HKH) region have been examined using Moderate – resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) 8-day standard snow products. The average snow covered area of the HKH region based on satellite data from 2000 to 2010 is 0.76 million km2 which is 18.23% of the total geographical area of the region. The linear trend in annual snow cover from 2000 to 2010 is −1.25±1.13%. This is in consistent with earlier reported decline of the decade from 1990 to 2001. A similar trend for western, central and eastern HKH region is 8.55±1.70%, +1.66% ± 2.26% and 0.82±2.50%, respectively. The snow covered area in spring for HKH region indicates a declining trend (−1.04±0.97%). The amount of annual snowfall is correlated with annual seasonal snow cover for the western Himalaya, indicating that changes in snow cover are primarily due to interannual variations in circulation patterns. Snow cover trends over a decade were also found to vary across seasonally and the region. Snow cover trends for western HKH are positive for all seasons. In central HKH the trend is positive (+15.53±5.69%) in autumn and negative (−03.68&plusmn3.01) in winter. In eastern HKH the trend is positive in summer (+3.35±1.62%) and autumn (+7.74±5.84%). The eastern and western region of HKH has an increasing trend of 10% to 12%, while the central region has a declining trend of 12% to 14% in the decade between 2000 and 2010. Snow cover depletion curve plotted for the hydrological year 2000–2001 reveal peaks in the month of February with subsidiary peaks observed in November and December in all three regions of the HKH.

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