Investigation of impacts of land use/land cover change on water availability of Tons River Basin, Madhya Pradesh, India

Abstract

Both natural erosional dynamics and anthropogenic changes have intense effects on the land use/land cover (LULC) of the global earth. These LULC changes have a substantial impact on soil and water. This study focus on impacts of LULC changes on hydrological processes governing the Tons River Basin (TRB). Landsat satellite images based on seven land use classes which were defined for this basin are forest deciduous (FRSD), forest mixed (FRST), mixed crop (RWSW), barren land (BARN), hay (HAY), residential (URBN) and water body (WATR). The LULC (1985–2035) result showed an increase in URBN from 0.29 to 2.81% while the rate of change (RoC) for URBN was calculated to be 8.71%. A continuous reduction was seen in FRSD from 15.57 to 9.77% giving the RoC as − 0.37%. The FRST increased at the RoC of 1.95% from 0.6 to 1.77% while the mixed crop (RWSW) increased from 72.68 to 78.27% at the RoC of 0.77%. The other LULC classes showed similar results. The hydrologic impacts were analyzed by running SWAT for the LULC changes in order to predict the corresponding changes in the hydrologic process. In this consequence SWAT was run for five decades from 1985 to 1995, 1995–2005, 2005–2015 (before baseline scenario) and 2015–2025, 2025–2035 (after baseline scenario) assuming 2015 as a baseline scenario. Evaluation of the impact of LULC changes revealed that there was decrease in surface runoff, from 62.29 to 62.14% and lateral flow from 2.39 to 0.261% for the period of 2015 to 2035. The groundwater flow showed a slight increment from 37.42 to 37.62% while the total water yield increased from 774.74 to 776.74 mm. The simulated results for TRB showed that the hydrological processes in the watershed were minimally influenced by LULC changes. It was concluded that the basin’s LULC change was not pronounced and was minimally affected by natural and artificial changes. The hydrological changes were not correlated with LULC changes. It is recommended that in order to manage the water resources and to properly develop the entire catchment, a rational regulation policy for land use patterns is vitally important in order to assist stakeholders and policy makers.