Assessment of institutional capacity to adapt to climate change in transboundary river basins

Responses to climate change in transboundary river basins are believed to depend on national and sub-national capacities as well as the ability of co-riparian nations to communicate, coordinate, and cooperate across their international boundaries. We develop the first framework for assessing transboundary adaptive capacity. The framework considers six dimensions of transboundary river basins that influence planning and implementation of adaptation measures and represents those dimensions using twelve measurable indicators. These indicators are used to assess transboundary adaptive capacity of 42 basins in the Middle East, Mediterranean, and Sahel. We then conduct a cluster analysis of those basins to delineate a typology that includes six categories of basins: High Capacity, Mediated Cooperation, Good Neighbour, Dependent Instability, Self-Sufficient, and Low Capacity. We find large variation in adaptive capacity across the study area; basins in Western Europe generally have higher capacities to address the potential hazards of climate change. Our basin typology points to how climate change adaptation policy interventions would be best targeted across the different categories of basins.     

Assessment of transboundary river basins for potential hydro-political tensions

This paper presents a systematic, global assessment of transboundary watersheds that identifies regions more likely to experience hydro-political tensions over the next decade and beyond based upon environmental, political, and economic indicators. The development of new water infrastructure in transboundary basins can strain relationships among fellow riparians as the impacts of new dams and diversions are felt across borders. Formal arrangements governing transboundary river basins, such as international water treaties and river basin organizations, provide a framework for dialogue and negotiation, thus contributing to assuaging potential disputes. Our study examines these two issues in tandem − the stresses inherent in development and the mitigating impact of institutions − and maps the risk of potential hydro-political tensions that exist where basins may be ill-equipped to deal with transboundary disputes triggered by the construction of new dams and diversions. We also consider several factors that could exacerbate those hydropolitical tensions in the near future, including changes in terrestrial water storage, projected changes in water variability, per capita gross national income, domestic and international armed conflicts, and recent history of disputes over transboundary waters. The study points to the vulnerability of several basins in Southeast Asia, South Asia, Central America, the northern part of the South American continent, the southern Balkans as well as in different parts of Africa, where new water infrastructure is being built or planned, but formal transboundary arrangements are absent. Moreover, in some of these regions there is a concomitance of several political, environmental and socioeconomic factors that could exacerbate hydropolitical tensions. This study contributes to the understanding of how the recent proliferation of development accompanied with unfavourable socio-economic and environmental indicators may influence global hydropolitical resilience.     

Unpacking governance: Building adaptive capacity to climate change of river basins in Brazil

Governance and institutions are critical determinants of adaptive capacity and resilience. Yet the make-up and relationships between governance components and mechanisms that may or may not contribute to adaptive capacity remain relatively unexplored empirically. This paper builds on previous research focusing on integrated water resources management in Brazil to ‘unpack’ water governance mechanisms that may shape the adaptive capacity of water systems to climatic change. We construct a river basin index to characterize governance approaches in 18 Brazilian river basins, apply a reliability test to assess the validity of these governance indicators, and use in-depth qualitative data collected in a subsample of the basins to explore the relationship between the governance indicators and adaptive capacity. The analysis suggests a positive relationship between integrated water governance mechanisms and adaptive capacity. In addition, we carry out a cluster analysis to group the basins into types of governance approaches and further unveil potential relationships between the governance variables and overall adaptive capacities. The cluster analysis indicates that tensions and tradeoffs may exist between some of the variables, especially with equality of decision making and knowledge availability; a finding that has implications for decision makers aiming to build adaptive capacity and resilience through governance and institutional means.     

Adaptation,adaptive capacity and vulnerability

This paper reviews the concept of adaptation of human communities to global changes, especially climate change, in the context of adaptive capacity and vulnerability. It focuses on scholarship that contributes to practical implementation of adaptations at the community scale. In numerous social science fields, adaptations are considered as responses to risks associated with the interaction of environmental hazards and human vulnerability or adaptive capacity. In the climate change field, adaptation analyses have been undertaken for several distinct purposes. Impact assessments assume adaptations to estimate damages to longer term climate scenarios with and without adjustments. Evaluations of specified adaptation options aim to identify preferred measures. Vulnerability indices seek to provide relative vulnerability scores for countries, regions or communities. The main purpose of participatory vulnerability assessments is to identify adaptation strategies that are feasible and practical in communities. The distinctive features of adaptation analyses with this purpose are outlined, and common elements of this approach are described. Practical adaptation initiatives tend to focus on risks that are already problematic, climate is considered together with other environmental and social stresses, and adaptations are mostly integrated or mainstreamed into other resource management, disaster preparedness and sustainable development programs.     

Spatio-temporal trends of rainfall across Indian river basins

Theoretical and Applied Climatology - Daily gridded high-resolution rainfall data of India Meteorological Department at 0.25° spatial resolution (1901–2015) was analyzed to detect the...     

江淮流域年降水量和温度的均一性检验

采用SNHT方法对江淮流域内苏皖两省41个代表站1961-2003年逐年降水量和平均温度序列进行均一性检验,结果表明绝大部分台站年降水和温度资料质量基本可靠,站址迁移是引起年降水和年平均温度非均一性的主要原因.     

近50 a来中国不同流域降水的变化趋势分析

利用我国612个气象站1961—2010年逐日降水量资料,借助地理信息系统Arc GIS,分析了我国十大流域的年、季节降水量的时空变化趋势特征。结果表明,我国降水主要集中在珠江、东南诸河和长江流域,西北诸河流域降水最少;四季降水量与年降水量的空间分布特征高度相似;降水量均为夏季最多,冬季最少。就年降水量而言,西北诸河流域有变湿趋势,海河流域和黄河流域有变干趋势。就降水季节而言,西南诸河、松花江、西北诸河流域春季有变湿趋势;东南诸河流域和长江流域夏季有变湿趋势,海河流域和西南诸河流域夏季有变干趋势;西北诸河流域秋季有变湿趋势,长江流域、黄河流域和淮河流域秋季有变干趋势;松花江流域、西北诸河流域和长江流域冬季有变湿趋势。     

Uncertainty in adaptive capacity and the importance of scale

Understanding different adaptive capacities is a prerequisite for targeting interventions to reduce the adverse impacts of climate change. Indicators and indices are common tools in this process, but their construction embodies many uncertainties, not least of which is their scale specificity. This paper describes the development of two empirical adaptive capacity indices for use at different scales of analysis: a national index for cross-country comparison in Africa and a household index for cross-household comparison in a village in Limpopo province, South Africa. Explaining the decisions made at each stage of construction illuminates the degree of uncertainty involved when assessing adaptive capacity, and how this uncertainty is compounded when looking across different scales of analysis. It concludes that the central elements of adaptive capacity, based on institutional collective response and the availability of and access to resources, are common at different scales, although the structure of each index is scale-specific. Hence the findings of these apparently irreconcilable scales of analysis converge to demonstrate points of leverage for policy intervention to raise resilience and the capacity to adapt to the risks posed by climate change.     

Linkages between vulnerability,resilience, and adaptive capacity

This article uses a systemic perspective to identify and analyze the conceptual relations among vulnerability, resilience, and adaptive capacity within socio-ecological systems (SES). Since different intellectual traditions use the terms in different, sometimes incompatible, ways, they emerge as strongly related but unclear in the precise nature of their relationships. A set of diagnostic questions is proposed regarding the specification of the terms to develop a shared conceptual framework for the natural and social dimensions of global change. Also, development of a general theory of change in SESs is suggested as an important agenda item for research on global change.     

江西五河流域降水与重大降水过程天气系统特征分析

通过对江西五大江河流域内的测站降水进行统计，分析了各流域的暴雨、连续大降水过程等降水气候特征；同时还对各个流域一些重大降水过程的天气系统进行普查，得出了一些统计事实。为今后制作流域预报提供一些参考。     

An estimation of the probable maximum precipitation for river basins in the Czech Republic

The hydro-meteorological evaluation of a flood event in July 1997 (the Odra flood in Central Europe) demonstrated that new procedures to estimate design floods for the reservoir outflow structures in the Czech Republic (CR) were needed. Therefore, the techniques of the estimation of Probable Maximum Precipitation (PMP) were developed in a national research project (1998–2000), and the activity focused on the improvement of the area related PMP estimates was going on within a present national project. In the frame of the evaluation of the next extreme precipitation event in August 2002 (the Labe flood in the CR and Germany), we compared the catchments related precipitation with the PMP estimates. In this paper, an outline of the PMP estimation techniques is given and the use of data from the Czech gauges is described, the aim being the statistical derivation of the point and area PMP estimates for precipitation duration of 1 to 5 days. The use of radar data in assessing the maximized area reduction factor is discussed and the relationship resulting from the radar measurements over the CR territory is presented. An evaluation of the radar-based area rainfall enabled us to transform the point PMP to the area PMP estimate designed for the river basins in CR. In the last part of the paper, the results obtained by comparing the rainfalls in 1997 and 2002 flood events with the PMP estimates are presented. The comparison showed that the maximum area rainfalls over small Czech catchments (the 3rd order river basins) did not exceed 63% of the corresponding PMP values.     

Technogenic influence on the quality of water resources of small river basins (with a special reference to the Protva river)

The underground waters in small river basins in central Russia are recharged as a result of the atmospheric precipitation infiltration on the catchment and river water inflow to the horizons hydraulically connected with the river. In the first case, the atmospheric precipitation on its way of transit is being enriched in elements of water-bearing rocks, in the second case, of the surface runoff and domestic wastes waters. Both fluxes get mixed at the coastal water withdrawals of underground water. Some regularities in the drinking water quality formation connected with climatic conditions and water use regime were established based on geochemical and hydrodynamic studies of underground waters of the Protva River basin deposits.     

Projected increased risk of water deficit over major West African river basins under future climates

Despite decades of research, large multi-model uncertainty remains about the Earth’s equilibrium climate sensitivity to carbon dioxide forcing as inferred from state-of-the-art Earth system models (ESMs). Statistical treatments of multi-model uncertainties are often limited to simple ESM averaging approaches. Sometimes models are weighted by how well they reproduce historical climate observations. Here, we propose a novel approach to multi-model combination and uncertainty quantification. Rather than averaging a discrete set of models, our approach samples from a continuous distribution over a reduced space of simple model parameters. We fit the free parameters of a reduced-order climate model to the output of each member of the multi-model ensemble. The reduced-order parameter estimates are then combined using a hierarchical Bayesian statistical model. The result is a multi-model distribution of reduced-model parameters, including climate sensitivity. In effect, the multi-model uncertainty problem within an ensemble of ESMs is converted to a parametric uncertainty problem within a reduced model. The multi-model distribution can then be updated with observational data, combining two independent lines of evidence. We apply this approach to 24 model simulations of global surface temperature and net top-of-atmosphere radiation response to abrupt quadrupling of carbon dioxide, and four historical temperature data sets. Our reduced order model is a 2-layer energy balance model. We present probability distributions of climate sensitivity based on (1) the multi-model ensemble alone and (2) the multi-model ensemble and observations.     

Validation of the Polar MM5 for use in the simulation of the Arctic river basins

The simulations were performed using a modified mesoscale model,the Polar MM5,which was adapted for use within polar regions.The objective of the study was to illustrate the skill of the Polar MM5 in simulating atmospheric behavior over the Arctic river basins.Automatic weather station data,global atmospheric analyses,as well as near-surface and upper-air observations were used to verify the simulation. Parallel simulations of the Polar MM5 and the original MM5 within the period 19-29 April 1997 simula- tions revealed that Polar MM5 reproduced better near-surface variables forecasts than the original MM5 for the region located over the North American Arctic regions.The well predicted near-surface temperature and mixing ratio by the Polar MM5 confirmed the modified physical parameterization schemes that were used in this model are appropriate for the Arctic river regions.Then the extended evaluations of the Polar MM5 simulations over both the North American and Eurasian domains during 15 December 2002 to 15 May 2003 were then carried out.The time series plots and statistical analyses from the observations and the Polar MM5 simulations at 16 stations for the near-surface and vertical profiles at 850 hPa and 500 hPa variables were analyzed.The model was found to reproduce the observed atmospheric state both at magnitude and variability with a high degree of accuracy,especially for temperature and near-surface winds,although there was a slight cold bias that existed near the surface.     

Assessment of climate change effects in Aegean river basins: the case of Gediz and Buyuk Menderes Basins

IPCC Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) discloses that the global climate system is undoubtedly warming. Observations have shown that many natural systems, including hydrologic systems and water resources, are being affected by regional climate changes, particularly temperature increases. Eventually, these effects will have to be considered in water resources planning and management. Accordingly, need is indicated to evaluate the impact of expected climate change on hydrology and water resources at regional and local levels. The presented paper summarizes the results of the sub-project studies under the United Nations Development Program-Global Environment Facility (UNDP-GEF) Project. The studies cover the generation of climate change scenarios, modeling of basin hydrology, and testing the sensitivity of runoff to changes in precipitation and temperature. Simulation results of the water budget model have shown that nearly 20% of the surface waters in the studied basins will be reduced by the year of 2030. By the years 2050 and 2100, this percentage will increase up to 35% and more than 50%, respectively. The decreasing surface water potential of the basins will cause serious water stress problems among water users, mainly being agricultural, domestic and industrial water users.     

Incorporating groundwater dynamics and surface/subsurface runoff mechanisms in regional climate modeling over river basins in China

To improve the capability of numerical modeling of climate-groundwater interactions, a groundwater component and new surface/subsurface runoff schemes were incorporated into the regional climate model RegCM3, renamed RegCM3_Hydro. 20－year simulations from both models were used to investigate the effects of groundwater dynamics and surface/subsurface runoff parameterizations on regional climate over seven river basins in China. A comparison of results shows that RegCM3_Hydro reduced the positive biases of annual and summer (June, July, August) precipitation over six river basins, while it slightly increased the bias over the Huaihe River Basin in eastern China. RegCM3_Hydro also reduced the cold bias of surface air temperature from RegCM3 across years, especially for the Haihe and the Huaihe river basins, with significant bias reductions of 0.80C and 0.88C, respectively. The spatial distribution and seasonal variations of water table depth were also well captured. With the new surface and subsurface runoff schemes, RegCM3_Hydro increased annual surface runoff by 0.11－0.62 mm d－1 over the seven basins. Though previous studies found that incorporating a groundwater component tends to increase soil moisture due to the consideration of upward groundwater recharge, our present work shows that the modified runoff schemes cause less infiltration, which outweigh the recharge from groundwater and result in drier soil, and consequently cause less latent heat and more sensible heat over most of the basins.     

气侯变化对东部季风区赣江和官厅流域径流的影响

选取中国东部季风区南方赣江流域和北方官厅流域,基于逐日气象和水文观测数据率定和验证了HBV水文模型,并以国际耦合模式比较计划第五阶段（CMIP5）中输出要素最多的5个全球气候模式在3种典型浓度路径（RCP2.6、RCP4.5和RCP8.5）下的预估结果驱动HBV模型,预估了气候变化对21世纪两个流域径流的影响。结果表明：(1) 1961—2017年,赣江和官厅流域年平均气温均呈显著上升趋势,升温速率分别为0.17℃/(10 a)和0.28℃/(10 a);同期,赣江流域降水显著增加,官厅流域降水微弱下降。不同RCP情景下,21世纪两个流域均将持续变暖、降水有所增加,北方官厅流域的气温和降水增幅均大于南方赣江流域。(2) 21世纪,官厅流域年、季径流增幅远大于赣江流域。官厅流域年径流在近期（2020—2039年）、中期（2050—2069年）、末期（2080—2099年）均呈增加趋势,RCP8.5情景下增幅最大、RCP4.5最小。赣江流域在RCP4.5下,近期、中期年径流相对基准期略有减少,但在整个21世纪径流呈上升趋势;RCP2.6和RCP8.5下,21世纪中期以后径流增幅下降。(3) 21世纪,东部季风区北部的官厅流域发生洪涝、南方赣江流域发生干旱的可能性增大,不同RCP情景预估得到相同的结论。