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Quantifying Climatic and Anthropogenic Influences on Water Discharge and Sediment Load in Xiangxi River Basin of the Three Gorges Reservoir Area

  • WATER RESOURCES AND THE REGIME OF WATER BODIES
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Abstract

Quantifying the relative contributions of climate change and human activities to water and sediment variations is of great importance for regional resources and river basin management, which has become a hot topic in hydrology research. In this study, water discharge and sediment load in Xiangxi River basin of Three Gorges Reservoir area were investigated based on hydrometeorological time series since 1960s. The non-parametric Mann-Kendall (M-K) test was used to detect both the trends and abrupt changes in the time series. Double mass curve and sediment rating curve method were used to quantify and evaluate the climatic and anthropogenic effects on water discharge and sediment load. Results indicated that both water discharge and sediment load showed significant decreasing trends with annual decrement rate of –0.08 × 108 and ‒1.011 × 104 t/yr, respectively. The abrupt change points were observed in 1991 for water discharge and 1999 for sediment load by sequential M-K test and cumulative anomaly curve analysis. This study demonstrated that water discharge was mainly influenced by precipitation in 1990s while by human activities ever since 2000, and sediment load was predominantly influenced by human activities (relative contribution 86–98%, regardless of whether the effect is negative or positive). In this study, soil and water conservation as well as land use change were primarily responsible for water and sediment variations in Xiangxi river basin especially since 2000. Further studies need to be done to quantify the importance of a specific driving factor at multi-timescales.

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Funding

This study was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (41 877 082, 41761058), the Fundamental Research Funds for Central Public Welfare Research Institutes (CKSF2019410TB), the National Natural Science Foundation for Young Scientists of China (41 701 316), and the National Key R&D Program of China (2017YFE0118100-2, 2017YFC050530302).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Soil and Water Conservation Department, Changjiang River Scientific Research Institute, 430010, Wuhan, China

    Guanhua Zhang & Wenfeng Ding

  2. Research Center on Mountain Torrent and Geologic Disaster Prevention of Ministry of Water Resources, 430010, Wuhan, China

    Guanhua Zhang & Wenfeng Ding

  3. School of Hydraulic and Ecological Engineering, Nanchang Institute of Technology, 330099, Nanchang, China

    Huiying Liu

  4. Central-Southern Safety and Environment Technology Institute Co., Ltd., 430071, Wuhan, China

    Liang Yi & Xu Lei

  5. Bureau of Hydrology, Changjiang Water Resources Commission, 430071, Wuhan, China

    Ouyang Zhang

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  1. Guanhua Zhang
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Guanhua Zhang, Ding, W., Liu, H. et al. Quantifying Climatic and Anthropogenic Influences on Water Discharge and Sediment Load in Xiangxi River Basin of the Three Gorges Reservoir Area. Water Resour 48, 204–218 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1134/S0097807821020184

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