Methods for integrating high-resolution land, climate, and infrastructure scenarios in a hydrologic simulation model

Abstract

Global alterations of the hydrologic cycle by humans have led to alarming rates of water shortages and irreversible ecosystem change. Our ability to manage water resources lies in accurately modeling water availability at scales meaningful to management. Although hydrologic models have been used to understand the implications of future climate and land cover change on regional water availability, many modeling approaches fail to integrate human infrastructures (HI) with bio-geophysical drivers to facilitate sustainable regional water resource management. This paper presents an integrated framework, inclusive of modeling and data needs, to quantify the effects of both bio-geophysical and HI influence on regional surface water hydrology. The framework enables the integration of high spatial and temporal anthropogenic alterations of water availability for identifying hot-spots and hot-moments of hydrological stresses within individual river-segments using a hydrologic simulation model, Soil and Water Analysis Tool (SWAT). • A high-resolution river network for the study region with a greater spatial granularity compared to contemporary SWAT applications attempted to account for HI. • The anthropogenic influence on water balance for each river segment was estimated using data on human infrastructures, such as water intakes, power production facilities, discharges, dams, and land transformation.

Keywords

• Human infrastructure
• Urbanizing river basins
• Climate drivers
• Regional hydrology
• Integrated modeling framework