Modeling the Impacts of Climate Change on Crop Yield and Irrigation in the Monocacy River Watershed, USA

Abstract

Crop yield depends on multiple factors, including climate conditions, soil characteristics, and available water. The objective of this study was to evaluate the impact of projected temperature and precipitation changes on crop yields in the Monocacy River Watershed in the Mid-Atlantic United States based on climate change scenarios. The Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) was applied to simulate watershed hydrology and crop yield. To evaluate the effect of future climate projections, four global climate models (GCMs) and three representative concentration pathways (RCP 4.5, 6, and 8.5) were used in the SWAT model. According to all GCMs and RCPs, a warmer climate with a wetter Autumn and Spring and a drier late Summer season is anticipated by mid and late century in this region. To evaluate future management strategies, water budget and crop yields were assessed for two scenarios: current rainfed and adaptive irrigated conditions. Irrigation would improve corn yields during mid-century across all scenarios. However, prolonged irrigation would have a negative impact due to nutrients runoff on both corn and soybean yields compared to rainfed condition. Decision tree analysis indicated that corn and soybean yields are most influenced by soil moisture, temperature, and precipitation as well as the water management practice used (i.e., rainfed or irrigated). The computed values from the SWAT modeling can be used as guidelines for water resource managers in this watershed to plan for projected water shortages and manage crop yields based on projected climate change conditions.

Assessing the Effect of Land-Use and Land-Cover Changes on Discharge and Sediment Yield in a Rural Coal-Mine Dominated Watershed in Kentucky, USA

“…The resulting statistics of our study were acceptable based on the guidelines [59,65], and were similar to values found in other studies conducted in the United States [5,13,45,[73][74][75][76][77] and around the world [4,[45][46][47][48][49][50]. Spruill et al [45] reported the SWAT model as an effective model for simulating monthly runoff in a small watershed in central Kentucky, with NSE values of 0.89 (calibration) and 0.58 (validation).…”

Responses of Soybean Water Supply and Requirement to Future Climate Conditions in Heilongjiang Province

“…Nageen reported an increasing trend in ET c for sugarcane as well, which was due to the forecasted temperature rise in the future Pakistan region, while the increased P e could not compensate for the increased ET c [45]. In addition, this study found that the increase in sunshine hours provided more radiation and light energy to the soybean [48], thus promoting the opening of stomata for plant transpiration and leading to an increase in transpiration [49]; accordingly, ET c showed an increasing trend. Li et al [46] reported that the temperature would continue to rise in the future in the Huang-Huai-Hai Plain, while the summer maize evaporation would increase, resulting in increased ET c .…”

Using a Multi‐Institutional Ensemble of Watershed Models to Assess Agricultural Conservation Effectiveness in a Future Climate

“…While the research is lacking, Paul et al. (2020) simulated introducing irrigation to a rain‐fed watershed increased surface runoff and suggests it may subsequently increase nutrient loss.…”