Drought Under Global Warming and Climate Change: An Empirical Study of the Loess Plateau

Sustainability

Lijun Zhang¹  Ziwu Pan¹  Yang Li¹  Zhicheng Zheng¹  Zhixiang Xie¹  Zhenzhen Liu¹  Haoming Xia¹  Yaochen Qin¹ 

[1] College of Environment and Planning, Henan University / Key Laboratory of Geospatial Technology for Middle and Lower Yellow River Regions, Kaifeng 475004, China;

关键词: drought;    standardized precipitation evapotranspiration index;    Mann-Kendall;    Hurst index;    persistence;    the Loess Plateau;   

DOI  :  10.3390/su11051281

来源: DOAJ

【 摘 要 】

The Loess Plateau is located at the transition zone between agriculture and livestock farming; its spatial and temporal pattern of drought is the key for an appropriate adaptation to climate change. This study investigated monthly meteorological observation data of 79 meteorological stations from 1955 to 2014 to calculate the standardized precipitation evapotranspiration index at different time scales. The spatial and temporal characteristics and persistence of drought were analyzed. The results showed the following: (i) The drought trend is most apparent in spring (0.096/10a) and lower in summer (0.036/10a) and autumn (0.009/10a). (ii) A higher drought level indicates a lower frequency of droughts occurrence and vice versa. The frequency of light drought was highest (11.36%), while that of extreme drought was lowest (0.12%). (iii) The mean drought intensity was highest in summer, followed by spring, autumn, and winter. The drought intensity was mainly light, showing a pattern of severe drought in the northwest and light drought in the southeast. (iv) The Loess Plateau will continue a trend of drought in the future, but the season of the continuous intensity will differ. Droughts in spring and summer are highly persistent, autumn drought trends continue but may slow, and winter droughts become random events.

【 授权许可】

Unknown