Climate change is affecting snowfall, increasing the risk of summer drought: Study
As the climate warms worldwide, seasonal river flow peaks are becoming less frequent.
New Delhi:
Decreasing snowfall in the Northern Hemisphere is affecting seasonal river flows, increasing the risk of summer droughts, a new study finds.
Researchers said this could threaten water and food security, ecosystems and hydropower generation.
The team, led by researchers at the University of Bristol in the UK, found that as the planet warms, ice in the Rocky Mountains of North America, the Alps in Europe and the icy regions of northern Europe is melting prematurely.
In addition, they said, seasonal stream flow in low-snow areas is being delayed as winters become drier and warm-season precipitation occurs later in the year, becoming a more dominant source of river flow.
“The increase in (year-to-year) seasonal pattern of flow increases uncertainty in seasonal flow patterns, posing challenges for water resources planning and management,” said Ross Woods from the University of Bristol and lead author of the study published in the journal Nature.
“Water managers will need different strategies to adapt depending on their location. Future planning for water infrastructure will need to take into account these changes in seasonal river flows,” Woods said.
For the study, the researchers looked at climate and river flow data from 1950-2020 for more than 3,000 river basins in the Northern Hemisphere. For each year, they calculated the amount of precipitation that fell as snow, how this amount changed over time, as well as its timing and river flow in each season.
The team then compared these values to those observed during two ten-year periods – one with the highest snowfall, and the other with the lowest snowfall.
As the climate warms worldwide, seasonal river flow peaks become less frequent, resulting in more uniform river flows throughout the year, the researchers said.
Woods said the timing and seasonal changes in river flow are becoming more variable from year to year with decreasing snowfall, meaning it’s important to plan for these changes in the future.
Changing trends in seasonal river flows affect the availability of water resources and “have widespread implications for ecosystem functioning, food security and natural disaster management,” Woods said.
Previous studies have shown that climate change is reducing snowfall, shifting snowpack and altering river flows generated by meltwater.
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