There is a worldwide consensus that climate change is a real, rapidly advancing and widespread threat facing this century. This is a crucial issue in Himalayan and special in Nepal because of its possible impact on water resource, biodiversity, and consequence on economic growth of the region. The increase trend of glacial retreat and variability on temperature and participation has the direct impact on the water resource and hydropower development. Mountain regions are particularly vulnerable, both because warming trends are higher and the impacts are magnifed by the extreme changes in altitude over small distances. It indicates the great variability of hydro-climatic variability in major rivers and their tributaries. Decrease runoff will have direct impact on the hydropower development, but there is uncertainty about the role of spatial variability of changing climatic scenarios and their possible impact for hydropower development in large and middle rivers. This paper presents the scenarios of climate change in Nepal in terms of hydro-climatic variability. The frst part describes hydro-climatic variability and its uncertainty for hydropower development, and the second part deals with the mitigation of uncertainties. Key words: Climate change; Deglaciation; GLOF; Water resource; Hydrological cycle; Hydropower; Himalayas; NepalDOI: 10.3126/hn.v6i0.4190 Hydro Nepal Vol 6, January 2010 Page : 31-34 Uploaded Date: 24 January, 2011
Nepal is endowed with abundant water resources from the availability point of view. Hydropower is considered as a viable means of economic growth for the country's overall development. The river and physiographic characteristics of Nepal offer immense possibilities for the development of hydropower schemes of different scales, and various national and international agencies have expressed keen interest. On the other hand, Nepal's biodiversity resources, a fragile landscape, scattered settlement patterns and natural resource based rural livelihoods are directly affected by hydropower development. Use of recent information about place, people and scientific analysis is crucial for addressing the environmental and socio-economic impacts of development activities. Geographic Information System (GIS) and Remote Sensing (RS) technology have the capabilities to create, update and manage recent information about the earth's surface and its integration with socio- economic information; but these technologies have not been used properly for the hydropower development sector in Nepal. This paper is about the application of GIS and Remote sensing technology to make the hydropower development environment friendly and to create less impact upon the rural livelihood. Key words: GIS, Remote Sensing, hydropower, watershed management, Nepal doi: 10.3126/hn.v3i0.1920 Hydro Nepal Journal of Water, Energy and Environment Issue No. 3, July 2008. Page: 42-45
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