Coupling the hydrological and ecological process to implement the sustainable water resources management in Hanjiang River Basin

Abstract

Research on the combination of hydrological variation and ecological demands plays an important role in water availability assessment and sustainable management on basin scale. An integrative frame, consisting of hydrological regime modelling, ecological water demands estimation and renewable resources management, is given in this paper in order to support the implementation of the sustainable water resources management. The suggested integrative frame has been used to study the integrated water resources management in southern Hanjiang River Basin which is the water source of South-to-North Water Transportation Project in China. SWAT (soil and water assessment tool) model was used to simulate the monthly averaging streamflow and the amounts of ecological water demands in stream were also estimated in order to evaluate the available water resources for the local users and the transportation project. Then we formed the developing scenarioes by coupling the available water resources, the recovering rate of water resources in natural water cycle, the local water use rate and the amounts of the water transported to North, and used the Scheafer model to analyze their evolving trajectories. Eventually, the sustainable water resources management measures were assembled by the comprehensive evaluation of the scenarioes. The research indicates that the integrative frame provided a new way for the integrated water resources management in river basin.