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A Systematic Feedback Assessment Framework to Identify the Impact of Climate Change and Ecological Restoration on Water Yield Patterns

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Abstract

Understanding the responses of water yield (WY) to climate change and vegetation greening is crucial for water resources management. However, quantifying the feedback relationships among climate, vegetation, and WY remains challenging. In this study, we developed a system feedback assessment framework based on Integrated Valuation of Ecosystem Services and Tradeoff (InVEST), gravity center model, and structural equation model to reveal these relationships. The framework involves identifying land cover transfer projects, assessing spatio-temporal variations in climate, vegetation, and WY, and quantifying their system feedback relationships, which was applied in the Yellow River Basin (YRB) with significant climate change and vegetation greening. The results demonstrated that precipitation, Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), and WY showed significant increasing trends (p < 0.05) at rates of 2.92 mm/a, 0.004 /a and 0.71 mm/a, respectively, during 1991–2020. The areas of significant increase in precipitation, NDVI, and WY were primarily concentrated in the source and midstream of the YRB. The gravity centre of WY moved southwest from 1991 to 2000 and then northeast from 2000 to 2020 in the YRB. Precipitation changes and ecological restoration were identified as key driving factors affecting the variation of WY. Our findings highlight the possible negative effects of ecological restoration on WY variation and provide important information for developing adaptation strategies for land use management in the YRB or other regions.

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Data Availability

Data will be made available on request.

Abbreviations

WY:

water yield

NDVI:

Normalized Difference Vegetation Index

InVEST:

Integrated Valuation of Ecosystem Services and Tradeoff

SEM:

structural equation model

YRB:

Yellow River Basin

LCTPs:

land cover transfer projects

CLP:

cropland loss projects

RCG:

return cropland to grassland

RCF:

return cropland to forest

UGP:

urban gain projects

BLP:

barren loss projects

PET:

potential evapotranspiration

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Funding

This work was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (U2243203); the National Natural Science Foundation of Jiangsu Province, China (BK20211202); and the Research Council of Norway (FRINATEK Project 274310).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. The National Key Laboratory of Water Disaster Prevention, Hohai University, Nanjing, 210098, China

    Yongwei Zhu, Shanhu Jiang & Liliang Ren

  2. Cooperative Innovation Center for Water Safety and Hydro-Science, Hohai University, Nanjing, 210098, China

    Yongwei Zhu, Shanhu Jiang, Liliang Ren, Hao Cui & Menghao Wang

  3. Department of Water Resources, Institute of Water Resources and Hydropower Research, 100038, Beijing, China

    Denghua Yan

  4. Department of Geosciences, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway

    Chong-Yu Xu

Authors
  1. Yongwei Zhu
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  2. Shanhu Jiang
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  3. Liliang Ren
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  4. Denghua Yan
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  5. Hao Cui
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  6. Menghao Wang
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  7. Chong-Yu Xu
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Contributions

Conceptualization: Yongwei Zhu and Shanhu Jiang; Methodology: Denghua Yan; Hao Cui, and Menghao Wang; Funding acquisition: Shanhu Jiang, Liliang Ren, and Chong-Yu Xu.

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Correspondence to Shanhu Jiang.

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Zhu, Y., Jiang, S., Ren, L. et al. A Systematic Feedback Assessment Framework to Identify the Impact of Climate Change and Ecological Restoration on Water Yield Patterns. Water Resour Manage (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11269-024-03808-w

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