A study on hydrological responses of the Fuhe River Basin to combined effects of land use and climate change

Study region: The Fuhe River Basin in Jiangxi Province, China. Study focus: Global climate change and intensified human activities are making the hydrological processes at Fuhe River Basin experiencing dramatic changes. Although some studies have investigated their individual impacts on basin-scale water resources, their combined effects on hydrology have received little attention. In this study, future scenarios were constructed for three future periods, based on five global climate model outputs (GCMs) from the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 (CMIP6) and a dataset of future land use projections under three shared socioeconomic pathways and representative concentration pathways (SSP-RCPs). Then, the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) model was used to assess the relative changes in water balance components and extreme flow frequency under these developed scenarios. Furthermore, the hydrological response assessment methodology was improved from the original multiscenario ensemble flow forecast (MESF) framework, which not only strengthens the connection between climate and land use input changes but also adds more assessment items. New hydrological insights for the region: The flow at the outlet of Fuhe River Basin is expected to increase by approximately 27.1%-30.2%, 24.7-39.0% and 35.5%-43.5% in the 2030 s, 2060 s and 2090 s, respectively. Water availability will increase significantly in February, August and October and decrease in November and December. To the end of 21st century, surface runoff will have more than 100% increase. Future floods and droughts will be more frequent and severe under SSP5-8.5.