Development and application of a short- /long-term composited drought index in the upper Huaihe River basin, China

M Yu,Q Li,G Lu,P Li,H Wang

doi:10.5194/piahs-369-103-2015

Abstract

Abstract. Accurate and reliable drought monitoring is of primary importance for drought mitigation and reduction of social-ecological vulnerability. The aim of the paper was to propose a short-term/long-term composited drought index (CDI) which could be widely used for drought monitoring and early warning in China. In the study, the upper Huaihe River basin above the Xixian gauge station, which has been hit by severe droughts frequently in recent decades, was selected as the case study site. The short-term CDI was developed by the Principle Component Analysis of the self-calibrating Palmer Drought Severity Index (sc-PDSI), the 1- and 3-month Standardized Precipitation Evapotranspiration Index (SPEI), Z Index (ZIND), the Soil Moisture Index (SMI) with the long-term CDI being formulated by use of the self-calibrating Palmer Hydrology Drought Index (sc-PHDI), the 6-, 12-, 18- and 24-month SPEI, the Standardized Streamflow Index (SSI), the SMI. The sc-PDSI, the PHDI, the ZIND, the SPEI on a monthly time scale were calculated based on the monthly air temperature and precipitation, and the monthly SMI and SSI were computed based on the simulated soil moisture and runoff by the distributed Xinanjiang model. The thresholds of the short-term/long-term CDI were determined according to frequency statistics of different drought indices. Finally, the feasibility of the two CDIs was investigated against the scPDSI, the SPEI and the historical drought records. The results revealed that the short-term/long-term CDI could capture the onset, severity, persistence of drought events very well with the former being better at identifying the dynamic evolution of drought condition while the latter better at judging the changing trend of drought over a long time period.

Highlights

Drought is one of the most damaging natural hazards and often results in devastating effects to social and ecological systems (Hao and Aghakouchak, 2014)
The aim of this paper is to introduce and evaluate a short-term/long-term composited drought index in the upper Huaihe River basin
It can been found that the three drought index identified most dry conditions of the upper Huaihe River basin, the drier the conditions, the lower the drought index values and the basin was in relatively dry condition in 1990s and early 2000s

Summary

Introduction

Drought is one of the most damaging natural hazards and often results in devastating effects to social and ecological systems (Hao and Aghakouchak, 2014). The annual economic damage of severe droughts across China is estimated to be 2.5–3.5 % of the gross domestic product. The frequency of severe and extreme droughts in China increased significantly from 26.8 % during 1950–1990 to 47.6 % during 1991–2011, and the drought percentage area increased by 3.92 %/10a from 1990s (Yu et al, 2014). Accurate and reliable drought monitoring and prediction is of critical importance for risk assessment and decision making. Different drought indices have been developed and applied for drought monitoring and assessment. The standardized precipitation index (SPI; McKee et al, 1993) and the standardized precipitation evapotranspiration index (SPEI; Vicente-Serrano et al, 2010) are commonly used for meteorological drought monitoring. The standardization concept was applied to other drought indices such as the standardized soil moisture index (SMI) and the standardized streamflow index (SSI, Vicente-Serrano et al, 2012).

Objectives

Results

Conclusion