Spatiotemporal Changes and Hazard Assessment of Hydrological Drought in China Using Big Data

Abstract

The intensification of the regional water cycle resulting from climate change, coupled with the influence of human activities, has brought about alterations in the frequency, scale, and intensity of droughts. In this study, based on hydrological big data and the standardized runoff drought index (SRI), the multi-scale spatiotemporal evolution of hydrological drought in China from 1948 to 2014 was analyzed using the run-length theory and gravity center model. Meanwhile, the hydrological drought hazard index was constructed to analyze the distribution of the hazard levels of drought in China. The results showed that, during 1948~2014, there was an opposite spatial distribution between the average intensity and the average coverage–duration–frequency of drought in the Yellow River Basin, Haihe River Basin and southeastern river basins. The drought situation in most river basins in China has shown an aggravating trend, among which the southeastern river basins, Haihe River Basin, Songliao River Basin and Pearl River Basin have generally shown an aggravating trend. The drought situation in China was severe in the 1950s and 1960s, gradually reduced in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s, and the drought situation was the mildest in the 1990s. After entering the 21st century, the drought situation began to worsen sharply. Meanwhile, from 1948 to 2014, the hazard level of drought generally presented a pattern of high in the west and north, and low in the east and south. The hazard levels of drought in the northwest and northeast were generally higher, and those in the southwest and southeast regions were generally lower. In general, the hazard levels of drought were relatively high in most areas of China.

Changes in Drought Characteristics in the Yellow River Basin during the Carbon-Neutral Period under Low-Emission Scenarios

“…In this study, we chose two standardized indices, the Standardized Runoff Index (SRI) and the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI), to characterize hydrological and meteorological droughts, respectively. The SRI and SPI were calculated by applying a two-step method [41][42][43][44] to gridded precipitation and total runoff data. Taking the SRI as an example, in the first step, the gamma distribution function was applied to fit the total runoff for each month during 1981-2000, and the total runoff in the historical (1979-2014) and future (2015-2100) periods for that month was then standardized to obtain SRI values using the same parameters in the fitted distribution [43,45].…”

Resilience of an Urban Coastal Ecosystem in the Caribbean: A Remote Sensing Approach in Western Puerto Rico

“…ET values consider the water that is released into the atmosphere via evaporation and transpiration, and it is a function of solar radiation, temperature, wind, and soil moisture. Climate change has affected the water cycle due to increased temperatures [4,5]. Thus, ET values are a sensitive measure to help us better understand the water cycle and the resilience of ecosystems [6,7].…”