| Abstract: | Abstract Although often modelled, empirical evidence for regional water balance shifts, due to local land-use changes, is rare. The same holds for the quantification of such effects by measurement. The flooding of former open-cast mining areas in Lusatia, eastern Germany, delivers a unique opportunity to address this topic in a well-gauged region. During two decades, flooding changed about 60 km2 of lignite pits to lake surfaces. To quantify possible shifts in the regional precipitation pattern, the background of general precipitation dynamics within the research area was separated from all raingauge records using principal component analysis (PCA). Linear models with the dominating PCA component as independent variable were fitted to the single station records. The residuals of these fits represent the local deviations from the general dynamics, and they contain the signals of climate alterations within the region. The analysis of these residuals revealed a shifting precipitation pattern with significant increases (up to 10% of the former mean annual precipitation, which is approximately 650 mm) on the lee side of the developing lake area. Further analysis showed that most of the observed changes are due to more frequent and intense convective storms. Water balance estimations indicate that the additional evaporation approximately equals the precipitation increase. |
