The Elbow River watershed in Alberta covers an area of 1,238 km(2) and represents an important source of water for irrigation and municipal use. In addition to being located within the driest area of southern Canada, it is also subjected to considerable pressure for land development due to the rapid population growth in the City of Calgary. In this study, a comprehensive modeling system was developed to investigate the impact of past and future land-use changes on hydrological processes considering the complex surface-groundwater interactions existing in the watershed. Specifically, a spatially explicit land-use change model was coupled with MIKE SHE/MIKE 11, a distributed physically based catchment and channel flow model. Following a rigorous sensitivity analysis along with the calibration and validation of these models, four land-use change scenarios were simulated from 2010 to 2031: business as usual (BAU), new development concentrated within the Rocky View County (RV-LUC) and in Bragg Creek (BC-LUC), respectively, and development based on projected population growth (P-LUC). The simulation results reveal that the rapid urbanization and deforestation create an increase in overland flow, and a decrease in evapotranspiration (ET), baseflow, and infiltration mainly in the east sub-catchment of the watershed. The land-use scenarios affect the hydrology of the watershed differently. This study is the most comprehensive investigation of its nature done so far in the Elbow River watershed. The results obtained are in accordance with similar studies conducted in Canadian contexts. The proposed modeling system represents a unique and flexible framework for investigating a variety of water related sustainability issues.
Shifts in winter temperature and precipitation patterns can profoundly affect snow accumulation and melt regimes. These shifts have varying impacts on local to large-scale hydro-ecological systems and freshwater distribution, especially in cold regions with high hydroclimatic heterogeneity. We evaluate winter climate changes in the six ecozones (Mountains, Foothills, Prairie, Parkland, Boreal, and Taiga) in Alberta, Canada, and identify regions of elevated susceptibility to change. Evaluation of historic trends and future changes in winter climate use high-resolution (~10 km) gridded data for 1950–2017 and projections for the 2050s (2041–2070) and 2080s (2071–2100) under medium (RCP 4.5) and high (RCP 8.5) emissions scenarios. Results indicate continued declines in winter duration and earlier onset of spring above-freezing temperatures from historic through future periods, with greater changes in Prairie and Mountain ecozones, and extremely short or nonexistent winter durations in future climatologies. Decreases in November–April precipitation and a shift from snow to rain dominate the historic period. Future scenarios suggest winter precipitation increases are expected to predominantly fall as rain. Additionally, shifts in precipitation distributions are likely to lead to historically-rare, high-precipitation extreme events becoming more common. This study increases our understanding of historic trends and projected future change effects on winter snowpack-related climate and can be used inform adaptive water resource management strategies.
Abstract:This study proposes an integrated modeling system consisting of the physically-based MIKE SHE/MIKE 11 model, a cellular automata model, and general circulation models (GCMs) scenarios to investigate the independent and combined effects of future climate and land-use/land-cover (LULC) changes on the hydrology of a river system. The integrated modelling system is applied to the Elbow River watershed in southern Alberta, Canada in conjunction with extreme GCM scenarios and two LULC change scenarios in the 2020s and 2050s. Results reveal that LULC change substantially modifies the river flow regime in the east sub-catchment, where rapid urbanization is occurring. It is also shown that the change in LULC causes an increase in peak flows in both the 2020s and 2050s. The impacts of climate and LULC change on streamflow are positively correlated in winter and spring, which intensifies their influence and leads to a significant rise in streamflow, and, subsequently, increases the vulnerability of the watershed to spring floods. This study highlights the importance of using an integrated modeling approach to investigate both the independent and combined impacts of climate and LULC changes on the future of hydrology to improve our understanding of how watersheds will respond to climate and LULC changes.
Groundwater vulnerability mapping is an important key to improving planning and decision-making processes in order to prevent groundwater contamination. This study generates groundwater vulnerability maps for the Izeh Plain in Iran using a modified Drastic model, geographical information system and remote sensing data. Sensitivity analysis was used to assign weight by showing the importance of each parameter in the Drastic model. The highest weight (5) was assigned to the aquifer media factor of the model, which had the highest mean value (4·53), and the lowest weight was assigned to the topography factor. The resulting maps revealed that the groundwater is highly vulnerable in the southwest Izeh Plain.
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