Monitoring changes in the water volume of Hulun Lake by integrating satellite altimetry data and Landsat images between 1992 and 2010

Zheng, Jiajia; Ke, Chang‐Qing; Shao, Zhude; Li, Fēi

doi:10.1117/1.jrs.10.016029

Cited by 29 publications

(27 citation statements)

References 51 publications

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“…In Lake Hulun, China, we observe a high exchange coefficient, which disputes recent studies focusing on climatic drivers (Cai et al, 2016; Liu et al, 2013; Zheng et al, 2016). Securitization occurs when an issue is perceived as an existential threat justifying exceptional measures.…”

Section: Resultscontrasting

confidence: 99%

“…Of the water required to sustain humanity, the agriculture sector consumes over 90% (Döll, 2009; Hoekstra & Mekonnen, 2012; Scanlon et al, 2017; Siebert et al, 2010), with demand for agricultural products—and irrigated agricultural area—increasing along with the global population (Siebert et al, 2015; Tilman et al, 2011). Nevertheless, responsibility for the shrinkage of certain inland water bodies has been assigned by some to climatic effects, including in the cases of the Great Salt Lake, Utah (Meng, 2019), Lake Urmia, Iran (Arkian et al, 2018; Dalby & Moussavi, 2017; Fathian, 2019; Fathian et al, 2014; Fathian et al, 2016; Jalili et al, 2012; Nazeri Tahroudi et al, 2019; Nourani et al, 2018; Shadkam et al, 2016), lakes in northern China and Mongolia (Cai et al, 2016; Li et al, 2018; Liu et al, 2013; Tao et al, 2015; Zheng et al, 2016), Lake Kinneret, Israel (Givati et al, 2019; Givati & Rosenfeld, 2007; Givati & Rosenfeld, 2009; Givati & Rosenfeld, 2013; Gophen, 2019; Tal, 2019a; Tal, 2019b; Tal, 2019c), and the Caspian Sea (Chen et al, 2017).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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In Water‐Limited Landscapes, an Anthropocene Exchange: Trading Lakes for Irrigated Agriculture

Wine

Laronne

2020

Earth's Future

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Lakes-quintessential features of Earth's surface prized from perspectives of water security, aquatic ecosystems, and recreation alike-are shrinking in water-limited regions of all of Earth's inhabited continents. Here we assessed Landsat-derived long-term decrease in global lake area relative to historical lake extent aiming to determine the role of recent Anthropocene levels of irrigated agriculture in the global phenomenon of lake desiccation. As of 2015, 11% (1.8 · 10 5 km 2 ) of global lake area has already been lost, primarily due to increased water consumption in support of irrigated agriculture in endorheic basins within water-limited regions. However, current levels of irrigated agriculture portend substantial additional shrinkage of global lakes before reaching new equilibria with present-day inflows, with an additional 60-130% increase in endorheic lake loss anticipated. The time required for shrinking lakes to attain new equilibria ranges from decades to centuries depending on lake hyposometry. Even a small decrease in lake area can portend lake transition from exorheic to endorheic and dramatic reductions in water quality. Thus, lake area changes severely understate the perilous condition of global lakes. The watershed area contributing to shrinking (endorheic and exorheic) lakes accounts for 18% of Earth's land area, far too large for the irrigated agriculture therein to be transferred elsewhere in order to save these lakes, though continued developments in the efficiency of water consumption in agriculture and urban areas can save significant quantities of water. This suggests that global lake shrinkage may be a harbinger signaling mankind having exceeded Earth's sustainable carrying capacity.Plain Language Summary Today, a host of processes influence the terrestrial water balance.These processes drive the observed shrinkage of lakes in water-limited regions of all inhabited continents. Typically, lake shrinkage is attributed either to climate change or unsustainable increases in human water consumption. However, while drivers of lake desiccation have been explored for individual lakes, the causes of this phenomenon have not been explored at the global scale. We therefore propose a simple conceptual model in which lake area and agricultural area are exchangeable in closed basins. We find that this simple model accurately determines the role of agriculture in loss of endorheic lakes. This model demonstrates that irrigated agriculture is the primary driver of desiccation of global lakes.

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Section: Resultscontrasting

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

In Water‐Limited Landscapes, an Anthropocene Exchange: Trading Lakes for Irrigated Agriculture

Wine

Laronne

2020

Earth's Future

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“…Any future changes in air temperature due to global climate change would have additional impacts, although these are likely to have a larger influence on evapotranspiration in the watershed than on the lake itself [23]. Other studies have empirically correlated temperature increases with the shrinkage of lakes [24][25][26][27][28]. However, those studies that have also quantified the role of rising temperature on agricultural evapotranspiration have found that warming-driven lake evaporation changes remain of lesser importance, relative to agricultural water consumption, given the level of observed warming at present [17].…”

Section: Impacts Of Rising Temperaturesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Climatization—Negligent Attribution of Great Salt Lake Desiccation: A Comment on Meng (2019)

Wine

Null

DeRose

et al. 2019

Climate

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A recent article reviewed data on Great Salt Lake (Utah) and concluded falsely that climate changes, especially local warming and extreme precipitation events, are primarily responsible for lake elevation changes. Indeed climatically influenced variation of net inflows contribute to huge swings in the elevation of Great Salt Lake (GSL) and other endorheic lakes. Although droughts and wet cycles have caused lake elevation changes of over 4.5 m, they have not caused a significant long-term change in the GSL stage. This recent article also suggests that a 1.4 °C rise in air temperature and concomitant increase in the lake’s evaporative loss is an important reason for the lake’s decline. However, we calculate that a 1.4 °C rise may have caused only a 0.1 m decrease in lake level. However, since 1847, the lake has declined 3.6 m and the lake area has decreased by ≈50%, despite no significant change in precipitation (p = 0.52) and a slight increase, albeit insignificant, in river flows above irrigation diversions (p = 0.085). In contrast, persistent water extraction for agriculture and other uses beginning in 1847 now decrease water flows below diversions by 39%. Estimates of consumptive water use primarily for irrigated agriculture in the GSL watershed suggest that approximately 85% (2500 km2) of the reduced lake area can be attributed to human water consumption. The recent article’s failure to calculate a water budget for the lake that included extensive water withdrawals misled the author to focus instead on climate change as a causal factor for the decline. Stable stream flows in GSL’s headwaters, inadequate temperature increase to explain the extent of its observed desiccation, stable long-term precipitation, and the magnitude of increased water consumption from GSL together demonstrate conclusively that climatic factors are secondary to human alterations to GSL and its watershed. Climatization, in which primarily non-climatic processes are falsely attributed to climatic factors, is a threat to the credibility of hydrological science. Despite a recent suggestion to the contrary, pressure to support Earth’s rising human population—in the form of increasing consumption of water in water-limited regions, primarily to support irrigated agriculture—remains the leading driver of desiccation of inland waters within Earth’s water-limited regions.

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“…But since only the first three are available for both satellite, we only used these. There are no retracker available for land, rivers or lakes and most authors use one of the ice retrackers (Zhang et al, 2010;Da Silva et al, 2012;Zheng et al, 2016). As we observed frequent problems with the available retrackers, we build one specifically for lakes of calm water (very large lakes tend to have waves similar to oceans).…”

Section: Water Level Determinationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

An Original Processing Method of Satellite Altimetry for Estimating Water Levels and Volume Fluctuations in a Series of Small Lakes of the Pantanal Wetland Complex in Brazil

Costa

Pereira

Maillard

2016

Int. Arch. Photogramm. Remote Sens. Spatial Inf. Sci.

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ABSTRACT:Satellite altimetry is becoming a major tool for measuring water levels in rivers and lakes offering accuracies compatible with many hydrological applications, especially in uninhabited regions of difficult access. The Pantanal is considered the largest tropical wetland in the world and the sparsity of in situ gauging station make remote methods of water level measurements an attractive alternative. This article describes how satellites altimetry data from Envisat and Saral was used to determine water level in two small lakes in the Pantanal. By combining the water level with the water surface area extracted from satellite imagery, water volume fluctuations were also estimated for a few periods. The available algorithms (retrackers) that compute a range solution from the raw waveforms do not always produce reliable measurements in small lakes. This is because the return signal gets often "contaminated" by the surrounding land. To try to solve this, we created a "lake" retracker that rejects waveforms that cannot be attributed to "calm water" and convert them to altitude. Elevation data are stored in a database along with the water surface area to compute the volume fluctuations. Satellite water level time series were also produced and compared with the only nearby in situ gauging station. Although the "lake" retracker worked well with calm water, the presence of waves and other factors was such that the standard "ice1" retracker performed better on the overall. We estimate our water level accuracy to be around 75 cm. Although the return time of both satellites is only 35 days, the next few years promise to bring new altimetry satellite missions that will significantly increase this frequency.

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Monitoring changes in the water volume of Hulun Lake by integrating satellite altimetry data and Landsat images between 1992 and 2010

Cited by 29 publications

References 51 publications

In Water‐Limited Landscapes, an Anthropocene Exchange: Trading Lakes for Irrigated Agriculture

In Water‐Limited Landscapes, an Anthropocene Exchange: Trading Lakes for Irrigated Agriculture

Climatization—Negligent Attribution of Great Salt Lake Desiccation: A Comment on Meng (2019)

An Original Processing Method of Satellite Altimetry for Estimating Water Levels and Volume Fluctuations in a Series of Small Lakes of the Pantanal Wetland Complex in Brazil

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