An Eco-Hydrological Model-Based Assessment of the Impacts of Soil and Water Conservation Management in the Jinghe River Basin, China

Water

Hui Peng²  Yangwen Jia¹  Christina Tague³  Peter Slaughter³ 

[1] State Key Laboratory of Simulation and Regulation of River Basin Water Cycle (SKL-WAC), China Institute of Water Resources and Hydropower Research (IWHR), Beijing 100038, China;Key Laboratory of Marine Environment and Ecology, Ministry of Education, Ocean University of China, Qingdao 266100, China;Donald Bren School of Environmental Science and Management, University of California at Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA 93117, USA; E-Mails:

关键词: eco-hydrological model;    soil and water conservation;    the Jinghe River Basin;   

DOI  :  10.3390/w7116301

来源: mdpi

【 摘 要 】

Many soil and water conservation (SWC) measures have been applied in the Jinghe River Basin to decrease soil erosion and restore degraded vegetation cover. Analysis of historical streamflow records suggests that SWC measures may have led to declines in streamflow, although climate and human water use may have contributed to observed changes. This paper presents an application of a watershed-scale, physically-based eco-hydrological model—the Regional Hydro-Ecological Simulation System (RHESSys)—in the Jinghe River Basin to study the impacts of SWC measures on streamflow. Several extensions to the watershed-scale RHESSys model were made in this paper to support the model application at larger scales (>10,000 km²) of the Loess Plateau. The extensions include the implementation of in-stream routing, reservoir sub-models and representation of soil and water construction engineering (SWCE). Field observation data, literature values and remote sensing data were used to calibrate and verify the model parameters. Three scenarios were simulated and the results were compared to quantify both vegetation recovery and SWCE impacts on streamflow. Three scenarios respectively represent no SWC, vegetation recovery only and both vegetation recovery and SWCE. The model results demonstrate that the SWC decreased annual streamflow by 8% (0.1 billion m³), with the largest decrease occurring in the 2000s. Model estimates also suggest that SWCE has greater impacts than vegetation recovery. Our study provides a useful tool for SWC planning and management in this region.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© 2015 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.