The Influences of Climate Change on the Runoff of Gharehsoo River Watershed

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to survey the impact of climate change on the runoff of Gharehsoo River in northwest of Iran. In this research the outputs of monthly precipitation and temperature data of PRECIS model, which is a regional climate model with 50 × 50 km resolution on the basis of B2 scenario, have been utilized for base (1961-1990) and future (2071-2100) periods. The output results of PRECIS model show that the average temperature of watershed increased up to 2˚C-5˚C. In addition, future precipitation is more than the base precipitation on January, February, March, September and December. The observed data of 1996-2002 used for calibration of HSPF model and the data of 2003-2004 were used for HSPF validation. The present monthly patterns for precipitation and temperature were estimated using the geostatistical techniques and the future monthly patterns were retrieved by the combination of future monthly PRECIS data and monthly patterns of precipitation and temperature. Then, the base and future precipitation and temperature patterns were introduced to validate HSPF model for the simulation of monthly runoff in the base and future periods. The results show that in the future, the discharge of Gharehsoo River watershed decreases in all of the months. In addition, the peak discharge in the future period happens one month earlier, in April, because of increase of temperature and earlier beginning of snow melting season. Finally the sensitivity analysis was performed on the monthly runoff. The results showed that monthly discharge increases 0.3%-35.6% and decreases 0.3%-32.6% due to 20% increase and decrease of precipitation, respectively. In addition, 1˚C and 2˚C increase of temperature leads to 0%-8% and 0.1%-15% decrease of average monthly discharge, respectively.

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