Abstract
Lake Khuvsgul, a tectonic lake, plays a vital role in surface water resources of northern Mongolia and Eurasia. The lake stores three quarter (~384 km3) of the total volume of freshwater resources in Mongolia, and it is a major headwater of Lake Baikal in eastern Siberia through Eg and Selenge rivers. The water resource of Lake Khuvsgul is the largest not only in Mongolia but also in Central Asia. Lake Khuvsgul responses to the present climate change with gradual hydrological fluctuations. The lake gained an area by 15.6 km2 between 1970 and 2010, and it lost by 24.6 km2 between 2010 and 2015. The area increase coincided with the rise in lake level and increase in precipitation, whereas the area decrease was consistent with the air temperature rise since 2010. The Lake Khuvsgul area during 1989–2015 had weak linear relationships with the annual average air temperature (R2 = 0.1431) and precipitation (R2 = 0.1059) recorded at the northern shore of the lake, and here the correlation analysis shows that the lake area had weak negative correlations with both air temperature (r = −0.378) and precipitation (r = −0.325). The lake area during 1970–2015 had weak linear relationships with the annual average air temperature (R2 = 0.1467) and precipitation (R2 = 0.1089) recorded at the southern shore of the lake, and here the correlation analysis shows that the lake area had a weak positive correlation with precipitation (r = 0.330) and a weak negative correlation with air temperature (r = −0.382).
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Notes
- 1.
Khuvsgul has been misspelled as Hovsgol and Khubsugul in many publications. Khuvsgul is the right English transliteration from Mongolian Хөвсгөл.
- 2.
Baigali meaning nature has been misspelled as Baikal by the Russians. Baigali is the right English transliteration from Mongolian Байгаль.
- 3.
Munkh has been often misspelled as Munku or Munh based on the Russian pronunciation in the international literature. Munkh is the correct English transliteration from Mongolian Мөнх.
- 4.
Saridag has been also misspelled as Sardyk or Sardig by the Russians internationally. Saridag is the correct English transliteration from Mongolian Сарьдаг.
- 5.
Selenge has been often incorrectly written as Selenga based on the Russian pronunciation. Selenge is the correct English transliteration from Mongolian Сэлэнгэ.
- 6.
Khui, meaning Navel, has been misspelled as Khuu and/or Huu and mistranslated into English as Boy in Wikipedia. Khui is the right English transliteration from Mongolian Хүй.
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Orkhonselenge, A., Uuganzaya, M., Davaagatan, T. (2022). Lake Khuvsgul. In: Lakes of Mongolia. Syntheses in Limnogeology. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-99120-3_16
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