Advancing Environmental Flow Science: Developing Frameworks for Altered Landscapes and Integrating Efforts Across Disciplines

Brewer, Shannon K.; McManamay, Ryan A.; Miller, Andrew D.; Mollenhauer, Robert; Worthington, Thomas A.; Arsuffi, Tom

doi:10.1007/s00267-016-0703-5

Cited by 23 publications

(18 citation statements)

References 176 publications

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“…An extensive list of environmental flow frameworks has emerged (Brewer et al, ), ranging from hydrological and hydraulic frameworks to habitat simulation and more holistic approaches. Required input data at the global level are only readily available for hydrological methods.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Capping Human Water Footprints in the World's River Basins

et al. 2020

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Increased water demand and overexploitation of limited freshwater resources lead to water scarcity, economic downturn, and conflicts over water in many places around the world. A sensible policy measure to bridle humanity's water footprint, then, is to set local and time‐specific water footprint caps, to ensure that water appropriation for human uses remains within ecological boundaries. This study estimates—for all river basins in the world—monthly blue water flows that can be allocated to human uses, while explicitly earmarking water for nature. Addressing some implications of temporal variability, we quantify trade‐offs between potentially violating environmental flow requirements versus underutilizing available flow—a trade‐off that is particularly pronounced in basins with a high seasonal and interannual variability. We discuss several limitations and challenges that need to be overcome if setting water footprint caps is to become a practically applicable policy instrument, including the need (for policy makers) to reach agreement on which specific capping procedure to follow. We conclude by relating local and time‐specific water footprint caps to the planetary boundary for freshwater use.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Capping Human Water Footprints in the World's River Basins

et al. 2020

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“…Our results suggest that hydrologic and hydraulic conditions experienced on the valley floor surface during out-of-bank flow may not be well represented by existing hydrologic metrics derived from discharge data alone. Additional tools are therefore needed to describe spatially explicit inundation regimes within the broader hydrologic and geomorphic contexts and assess potential responses to management activities (Bond et al 2014, Brewer et al 2016, Kozak et al 2016.…”

Section: Contribution Of 2d Hydraulic Modeling To Understanding Floodmentioning

confidence: 99%

River‐valley morphology, basin size, and flow‐event magnitude interact to produce wide variation in flooding dynamics

2019

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Inundation dynamics are a key driver of ecosystem form and function in river-valley bottoms.Inundation itself is an outcome of multi-scalar interactions and can vary strongly within and among river reaches. As a result, establishing to what degree and how inundation dynamics vary spatially both within and among river reaches can be challenging. The objective of this study was to understand how river-valley morphology, basin size, and flow-event magnitude interact to affect inundation dynamics in river-valley bottoms. We used 2D hydraulic models to simulate inundation in four river reaches from Maryland's Piedmont physiographic province, and qualitatively and quantitatively summarized within-and amongreach patterns of inundation extent, duration, depth, shear stress, and wetting frequencies. On average, reaches from confined valley settings experienced less extensive flooding, shorter durations and shallower depths, stronger gradients of maximum shear stress, and relatively infrequent wetting compared to reaches from unconfined settings. These patterns were generally consistent across flow-event magnitudes. Patterns of within-reach flooding across event magnitudes revealed complex interactions between hydrology and surface topography. We concluded that valley morphology had a greater impact on flooding patterns than basin size: Inundation patterns were more consistent across reaches of similar morphology than similar basin size, but absolute values of inundation characteristics varied between large and small basins. Our results showed that the manifestation of out-of-bank flows in valley floors can vary widely depending on geomorphic context, even within a single physiographic province, which suggests that hydrologic and hydraulic conditions experienced on the valley floor may not be well represented by existing hydrologic metrics derived from discharge data alone. We thus support the notion that 2D hydraulic models can be useful hydrometric tools for cross-scale investigations of floodplain ecosystems.

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“…For example, reintroducing high‐magnitude, long‐duration floods of a more natural flood regime may not produce positive results if the sediment to be moved by the floods is no longer present (Arthington et al, ; Wohl, Bledsoe, et al, ). Furthermore, reinstating historical flow regimes may in fact be detrimental to some ecosystems (Brewer et al, ; Palmer et al, ). A study by Tracy‐Smith et al () on Missouri River sandbar habitat showed that natural and environmental flow alternatives were less beneficial than regulated flows within the context of the channelized reach morphology of the river.…”

Section: Process‐based Thinking Drives Convergent Perspectivesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Coupling landscapes and river flows to restore highly modified rivers

Whipple

Viers

2019

Water Resources Research

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Modifications to landscapes and flow regimes of rivers have altered the function, biodiversity, and productivity of freshwater ecosystems globally. Reestablishing geomorphological and hydrological conditions necessary to sustain ecosystems is a central challenge for restoration within highly altered systems. Meeting this challenge requires simultaneously addressing multiple and interacting stressors within the context of irreversible changes and socio-economic constraints. Traditionally, river restoration approaches either physically change the landscape or channel (channel-floodplain manipulation) or adjust hydrology (environmental flows), and such actions are often independent. We juxtapose these two subfields of river restoration, which have undergone parallel transformations, from goals of reproducing static representations of form and flow regime to goals of reestablishing processes. The parallel transformations have generated shared ideas, which point to benefits of coupling channel-floodplain manipulation and environmental flow actions to achieve process-based goals. Such coupling supports comprehensive river restoration efforts aimed at supporting resilient ecosystems within human dominated landscapes in a nonstationary climate. We identify four elements of coupled approaches for restoring highly modified rivers:(1) identify physical and ecological process potential given interactive effects of altered landscapes and flows;(2) consider capacity for sustaining identified processes under potential future change; (3) model alternatives for coupled restoration actions to support identified processes; and (4) evaluate alternatives using metrics representing integrative effects of coupled actions. We suggest these emergent elements contribute to the development of standard practices for restoring highly modified rivers and encourage an increasing number and quality of coupled applications.

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Advancing Environmental Flow Science: Developing Frameworks for Altered Landscapes and Integrating Efforts Across Disciplines

Cited by 23 publications

References 176 publications

Capping Human Water Footprints in the World's River Basins

Capping Human Water Footprints in the World's River Basins

River‐valley morphology, basin size, and flow‐event magnitude interact to produce wide variation in flooding dynamics

Coupling landscapes and river flows to restore highly modified rivers

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