Spatio-temporal variations of the flood mitigation service of ecosystem under different climate scenarios in the Upper Reaches of Hanjiang River Basin, China

Abstract

Extreme rainstorm and the subsequent flood increasingly threaten the security of human society and ecological environment with aggravation of global climate change and anthropogenic activity in recent years. Therefore, the research on flood mitigation service (FMS) of ecosystem should be paid more attention to mitigate the risk. In this paper, we assessed FMS in the Upper Reaches of Hanjiang River (URHR), China from 2000 to 2014 using the Soil Conservation Service Curve Number (SCS-CN) model, and further simulated the future FMS under two climate scenarios (in 2020 and 2030). The results reveal that the FMS presented a fluctuating rising trend in the URHR from 2000 to 2014. The FMS in southern URHR was higher than that of northern URHR, and the change rate of FMS in the upstream of URHR (western URHR) was higher than the downstream of URHR (eastern URHR). The future FMS under scenarios of Medium-High Emissions (A2) and Medium-Low Emissions (B2) will decrease consistently. As land use/land cover changes in the URHR are negligible, we concluded that the change in FMS was mainly driven by climate change, such as storm and runoff. Our study highlights that climate scenarios analysis should be incorporated into the assessment of hydrologic-related services to facilitate regional water resources management.