TY - JOUR
T1 - Streamflow droughts aggravated by human activities despite management
AU - Van Loon, Anne F.
AU - Rangecroft, Sally
AU - Coxon, Gemma
AU - Werner, Micha
AU - Wanders, Niko
AU - Di Baldassarre, Giuliano
AU - Tijdeman, Erik
AU - Bosman, Marianne
AU - Gleeson, Tom
AU - Nauditt, Alexandra
AU - Aghakouchak, Amir
AU - Breña-Naranjo, Jose Agustin
AU - Cenobio-Cruz, Omar
AU - Costa, Alexandre Cunha
AU - Fendekova, Miriam
AU - Jewitt, Graham
AU - Kingston, Daniel G.
AU - Loft, Jessie
AU - Mager, Sarah M.
AU - Mallakpour, Iman
AU - Masih, Ilyas
AU - Maureira-Cortés, Héctor
AU - Toth, Elena
AU - Van Oel, Pieter
AU - Van Ogtrop, Floris
AU - Verbist, Koen
AU - Vidal, Jean Philippe
AU - Wen, Li
AU - Yu, Meixiu
AU - Yuan, Xing
AU - Zhang, Miao
AU - Van Lanen, Henny A.J.
N1 - Funding Information:
SR and AVL were supported by NWO Rubicon (2004/08338/ALW). AVL receives funding from the European Research Council project PerfectSTORM (ERC-2020-StG 948601). HVL is supported by the EU-funded ANYWHERE project (Grant Agreement No. 700099). NW was supported by NWO Rubicon 825.15.003 and NWO 016.Veni.181.049. GDB was partly funded by the European Research Council (Consolidator Grant, HydroSocialExtremes project n. 771678).
Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 The Author(s). Published by IOP Publishing Ltd.
PY - 2022
Y1 - 2022
N2 - Human activities both aggravate and alleviate streamflow drought. Here we show that aggravation is dominant in contrasting cases around the world analysed with a consistent methodology. Our 28 cases included different combinations of human-water interactions. We found that water abstraction aggravated all drought characteristics, with increases of 20%-305% in total time in drought found across the case studies, and increases in total deficit of up to almost 3000%. Water transfers reduced drought time and deficit by up to 97%. In cases with both abstraction and water transfers into the catchment or augmenting streamflow from groundwater, the water inputs could not compensate for the aggravation of droughts due to abstraction and only shift the effects in space or time. Reservoir releases for downstream water use alleviated droughts in the dry season, but also led to deficits in the wet season by changing flow seasonality. This led to minor changes in average drought duration (-26 to +38%) and moderate changes in average drought deficit (-86 to +369%). Land use showed a smaller impact on streamflow drought, also with both increases and decreases observed (-48 to +98%). Sewage return flows and pipe leakage possibly counteracted the effects of increased imperviousness in urban areas; however, untangling the effects of land use change on streamflow drought is challenging. This synthesis of diverse global cases highlights the complexity of the human influence on streamflow drought and the added value of empirical comparative studies. Results indicate both intended and unintended consequences of water management and infrastructure on downstream society and ecosystems.
AB - Human activities both aggravate and alleviate streamflow drought. Here we show that aggravation is dominant in contrasting cases around the world analysed with a consistent methodology. Our 28 cases included different combinations of human-water interactions. We found that water abstraction aggravated all drought characteristics, with increases of 20%-305% in total time in drought found across the case studies, and increases in total deficit of up to almost 3000%. Water transfers reduced drought time and deficit by up to 97%. In cases with both abstraction and water transfers into the catchment or augmenting streamflow from groundwater, the water inputs could not compensate for the aggravation of droughts due to abstraction and only shift the effects in space or time. Reservoir releases for downstream water use alleviated droughts in the dry season, but also led to deficits in the wet season by changing flow seasonality. This led to minor changes in average drought duration (-26 to +38%) and moderate changes in average drought deficit (-86 to +369%). Land use showed a smaller impact on streamflow drought, also with both increases and decreases observed (-48 to +98%). Sewage return flows and pipe leakage possibly counteracted the effects of increased imperviousness in urban areas; however, untangling the effects of land use change on streamflow drought is challenging. This synthesis of diverse global cases highlights the complexity of the human influence on streamflow drought and the added value of empirical comparative studies. Results indicate both intended and unintended consequences of water management and infrastructure on downstream society and ecosystems.
KW - abstraction
KW - drought
KW - human activities
KW - reservoirs
KW - streamflow
KW - water management
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85128784334&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1088/1748-9326/ac5def
DO - 10.1088/1748-9326/ac5def
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85128784334
SN - 1748-9318
VL - 17
JO - Environmental Research Letters
JF - Environmental Research Letters
IS - 4
M1 - 044059
ER -