A Proposed Method to Evaluate Water Saving Potential at Regional Scale and Its Application in Henan Province

Abstract

【Background】 Water scarcity in northern China is a limiting factor to its economic development and improving water management is hence essential to sustaining its development. The recently proposed water management in China can be summarized into five strategies: Prioritize water saving, balance regional variation, comprehensive remediation, and balance the roles of planning and free market played in water management, with saving water being the top priority. Various water saving policies have been proposed, some of which have been mandated. Evaluating water saving potential in a region is thus essential to alleviating the detrimental impact of its water shortage and sustaining economic and social development. Currently, there is a lack of such evaluation methods. 【Objective】 The purpose of this paper is to fill this gap by proposing and testing an evaluating method. 【Method】 Based on the primacy of water saving potential, we first clarified the connotation of water-saving potential and its interpretation in different sectors. We then derived formulae, with the sources of water in consideration, to calculate the water saving potential at regional scale. As an illustrative example, the method was applied to Henan province to help plan water management and evaluate the amount of water that the province can potentially save. 【Result】 The volume of the water that Henan can potentially save in 2025 is 1.072 billion m3, which could increase to 1.665 billion m3 by 2035 if the management improvements can be gradually implemented. This is massive, representing that, compared to the current water usage level, it will reduce provincial water consumption in 2025 and 2035 by 4.6% and 7.1% respectively. Among all sectors, the potential in saving agricultural water use is the greatest. 【Conclusion】 For Henan province, implementation of the five water management strategies could substantially improve its water usage. The method we developed is generic and can be applied to other regions helping improve their water resource management.

Keywords

• water saving potential
• calculation method
• henan province
• evaluation method