How Do Terrestrial Determinants Impact the Response of Water Quality to Climate Drivers?—An Elasticity Perspective on the Water–Land–Climate Nexus

Afed Khan,Ashish Sharma,Peng Wang,Jehanzeb Khan,Jiping Jiang

doi:10.3390/su9112118

Abstract

Investigating water–land–climate interactions is critical for urban development and watershed management. This study examined this nexus by elasticity and statistical approaches through the lens of three watersheds: The Yukon, Mekong and Murray. Here, this study reports the fundamental characteristics, explanations and ecological and management implications of terrestrial determinant influence on the response of water quality to climate drivers. The stability of the response, measured by climate elasticity of water quality (CEWQ), is highly dependent on terrestrial determinants, with strong impacts from anthropogenic biomes and low impacts from surficial geology. Compared to temperature elasticity, precipitation elasticity of water quality is more unstable due to its possible linkages with many terrestrial determinants. Correlation and linear models were developed for the interaction system, which uncovered many interesting scenarios. The results implied that watersheds with a higher ratio of rangeland biomes have a lower risk of instability as compared to watersheds with a higher proportion of dense settlement, cropland and forested biomes. This study discusses some of the most essential pathways where instability might adversely affect CEWQ parameters and recommends suggestions for policy makers to alleviate the instability impacts to bring sustainability to the water environment.

Highlights

Nexus thinking mentions the importance of complex linkages among resource sectors, which are useful for management and decision making
This study presented the impacts of land use and soil characteristics on the relations between water quality and climate drivers, by focusing on precipitation elasticity and temperature elasticity of water quality
This research was conducted to uncover the generic relationships among water quality, terrestrial factors and climate drivers based on a direct, data-intensive approach, and climate elasticity of water quality

Summary

Introduction

Nexus thinking mentions the importance of complex linkages among resource sectors, which are useful for management and decision making. The water–land–climate nexus highlights many interconnections among water, land and climate. This nexus is important for science, planning and engineering. Climatic systems and freshwater are closely associated, so alteration in one system impacts the other one [1,2] Climate change impacts both water quantity and quality. Surface water quality is influenced by multiple factors, which include both climatic and non-climatic drivers [3,4]. Effects of climatic drivers on surface water quality and its relationships with land use are complex and rarely inspected. The influence of climate change on water quality and its correlation with land use is prominent but not fully recognized. It is necessary to investigate the response of water quality parameters to climatic drivers and its association with terrestrial determinants

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Results

Conclusion