Future Availability Of Water Resources Research Articles

Future projection of water resources based on digitalisation and open data in a water-rich region: a case study of the city of Klagenfurt

ABSTRACT Implementation of different strategies on the demand and supply side to deal with potential water scarcity is based on a comparison of future water demand and availability of water resources based on different scenarios of climate change and population growth. Especially, the Alpine region is characterised by many small and medium water supply systems (WSSs) having neither human resources nor time for advanced planning, requiring simple methods for estimating future development. Therefore, the aim of this work is to provide future projections of water demand, resource availability, and drinking water quality for an Alpine area based on simple approaches with minimal data requirements. As the results of the case study show, linear and polynomial regression with precipitation and temperature data can illustrate the temporal variation of system input and drinking water temperature with sufficient accuracy and is suitable for an estimation of future development. The groundwater modelling, however, requires the consideration of a non-linear term depending on the depth to obtain reasonable results. Due to the usage of open-access data and the easy approaches developed and applied, a good transferability to other case studies is expected which can provide stakeholders a first assessment of the future need for action.

Combining Hydrological Modeling and Regional Climate Projections to Assess the Climate Change Impact on the Water Resources of Dam Reservoirs

Climate change may significantly impact the availability and quality of water resources in dam reservoirs by potentially altering the hydrological regime of lake tributaries and the corresponding flow–duration curves. Hydrological models driven by climate projections (downscaled to the watershed scale and bias corrected to eliminate systematic errors) are effective tools for assessing this potential impact. To assess the uncertainty in future water resource availability, resulting from the inherent uncertainty in climate model projections, an ensemble of climate models and different climate scenarios can be considered. The reliability and effectiveness of this approach were illustrated by analyzing the potential impact of climate change on the water availability at Brugneto Lake in northern Italy. This analysis was based on climate projections derived from an ensemble of 13 combinations of General Circulation Models and Regional Climate Models under two distinct scenarios (RCP4.5 and RCP8.5). The semi-distributed HEC-HMS model was adopted to simulate the hydrological response of the basin upstream of the lake. The hydrological model parameters were calibrated automatically via the PEST software package using the inflows to the lake, estimated through a reverse level pool routing method, as observed values. Future water availability was predicted for short- (2010–2039), medium- (2040–2069), and long-term (2070–2099) periods. The results indicate that the uncertainty in reservoir inflow is primarily due to the uncertainty in future rainfall. A moderate reduction in water availability is expected for Brugneto Lake by the end of the current century, accompanied by modifications in the flow regime. These changes should be considered when planning future adaptation measures and adjusting reservoir management rules.

The Synergic Effects of Climate Variability on Rainfall Distribution over Hare Catchment of Ethiopia

Climate analysis at relevant time scales is important for water resources management, agricultural planning, flood risk assessment, ecological modeling, and climate change adaptation. This study analyzes the spatiotemporal variability of climate on rainfall distribution for the Hare catchment of Ethiopia. Numerous hydroclimatic variables and scenarios were developed to assess the pattern of rainfall during different seasons. The average annual precipitation varies between −37.3%, +33.1%, and −38.2%, +61.2%, for RCP 4.5 and RCP 8.5, respectively. The anticipated declines in mean seasonal rainfall changes for the Bega and Belg seasons range from −69.6% to 88.4% and from −60.6% to 15.2% for RCP 4.5 and RCP 8.5, respectively. Climate models predict that the average periodic precipitation considered for the Kiremt season will vary from −12.1% to 1.33%. The Belg, Kiremt, and Bega seasons will likely see a 28.2%, 12.2%, and 22.6% drop in mean seasonal precipitation, respectively. The decrease in stream flow accompanied by the aforementioned climate scenarios (RCP 4.5 and RCP 8.5) can be as high as 19.6% and 6.7%, respectively. Also, the amount of discharge will reduce in the near future because of a substantial reduction in rainfall and a rise in evapotranspiration in the catchment. This decline in stream flow has its own effect on the future availability of water resources. The research finding is vital to environmental protection authority, decision makers, and scientific community to undertake climate change adaption techniques for rain scare areas. A program combined with multi-RCMs to evaluate climate change effects on hydrometeorology generated a novel approach to this research with appropriate adaptation mechanisms.

How sensitive are catchment runoff estimates to on-farm storages under current and future climates?

Storage of water in farm dams is important to support irrigation, stock requirements and domestic uses when reticulated water is unavailable. Farm dams that fill by intercepting landscape runoff change the total volume and seasonality of catchment streamflow, potentially impacting water policy outcomes. While numerous studies have quantified how climate change and farm dams independently change streamflow characteristics, few studies have investigated their interactions. This study investigates the interactions between farm dams and climate change in the Murray-Darling Basin of southern and eastern Australia. We use hydrological modelling that explicitly represent farm dams and remotely sensed data describing historical farm dam development to assess the impacts of farm dams for 112 catchments on catchment runoff under current and future climates. Our analysis compares current and future runoff estimates to those derived without explicitly incorporating farm dam impacts to better understand the importance of farm dams in water resources assessments.We find that modelling farm dams in these catchments improves the performance of the hydrological model relative to a traditional rainfall-runoff model ignoring the effects of farm dams. The current level of farm dam development in the Murray-Darling Basin is estimated to reduce annual catchment runoff by 13% (in the range of 8%–19%) under the historical climate across the 112 catchments investigated here. We find that explicitly modelling farm dams increases the sensitivity of simulated streamflow to climate by approximately 10%. This is primarily because farm dams introduce additional catchment storage and water extractions that do not directly follow processes represented in traditional rainfall-runoff models.Our analysis offers important information for water policymakers in Australia and globally. Firstly, explicit modelling of farm dams is critical to understanding the future availability of water resources. Secondly, explicit modelling of farm dams allows their impacts on catchment runoff to be explored under current and future climates, and for policies to manage the impacts of dams to be investigated.

Regional and tele-connected impacts of the Tibetan Plateau surface darkening

Despite knowledge of the presence of the Tibetan Plateau (TP) in reorganizing large-scale atmospheric circulation, it remains unclear how surface albedo darkening over TP will impact local glaciers and remote Asian monsoon systems. Here, we use a coupled land-atmosphere global climate model and a glacier model to address these questions. Under a high-emission scenario, TP surface albedo darkening will increase local temperature by 0.24 K by the end of this century. This warming will strengthen the elevated heat pump of TP, increasing South Asian monsoon precipitation while exacerbating the current “South Flood-North Drought” pattern over East Asia. The albedo darkening-induced climate change also leads to an accompanying TP glacier volume loss of 6.9%, which further increases to 25.2% at the equilibrium, with a notable loss in western TP. Our findings emphasize the importance of land-surface change responses in projecting future water resource availability, with important implications for water management policies.

UniFHy v0.1.1: a community modelling framework for the terrestrial water cycle in Python

Abstract. The land surface, hydrological, and groundwater modelling communities all have expertise in simulating the hydrological processes at play in the terrestrial component of the Earth system. However, these communities, and the wider Earth system modelling community, have largely remained distinct with limited collaboration between disciplines, hindering progress in the representation of hydrological processes in the land component of Earth system models (ESMs). In order to address key societal questions regarding the future availability of water resources and the intensity of extreme events such as floods and droughts in a changing climate, these communities must come together and build on the strengths of one another to produce next-generation land system models that are able to adequately simulate the terrestrial water cycle under change. The development of a common modelling infrastructure can contribute to stimulating cross-fertilisation by structuring and standardising the interactions. This paper presents such an infrastructure, a land system framework, which targets an intermediate level of complexity and constrains interfaces between components (and communities) and, in doing so, aims to facilitate an easier pipeline between the development of (sub-)community models and their integration, both for standalone use and for use in ESMs. This paper first outlines the conceptual design and technical capabilities of the framework; thereafter, its usage and useful characteristics are demonstrated through case studies. The main innovations presented here are (1) the interfacing constraints themselves; (2) the implementation in Python (the Unified Framework for Hydrology, unifhy); and (3) the demonstration of standalone use cases using the framework. The existing framework does not yet meet all our goals, in particular, of directly supporting integration into larger ESMs, so we conclude with the remaining limitations of the current framework and necessary future developments.

Assessing future availability of water resources in Taiwan based on the Budyko framework

Assessing water resources availability in a changing climate is a determinant of promoting sustainable development in a region. Such assessment should better be inter-basin in order to unveil a region’s overall risk, so a time-varying Budyko framework is developed and adopted in this study. Gauge-based gridded precipitation and temperature, in company with runoff data, were used to derive the Budyko curves for 75 catchments over Taiwan. Downscaled precipitation and temperature data from selected global climate models and Representative Concentration Pathways (RCPs) were then used to calculate the shifts in the Budyko space of each catchment. It was found that the Budyko-related variables (e.g., evaporative and aridity indices, and catchment-specific parameter) exhibited considerable variability island-wide, with a few outliers in certain catchments being modulated by distinct landscape features and/or human activities. Under all RCPs analyzed, the majority of catchments showed the magnified movement vectors pointing at the 1st quadrant in the Budyko space in the late-21st century, suggesting a predominant and aggravating drying trend over Taiwan. Cluster analysis of the movement vectors under RCP8.5, which entailed the least inter-model differences, identified three major clusters, two of which (64 catchments included) indicated a drying trend of varied significancy. According to our findings, without effective mitigation of climate change, an increased likelihood of the worst-case scenario will substantialize the reduced availability of Taiwan’s water resources.

Rock glacier composition and structure from radio wave speed analysis with dipping reflector correction

AbstractWe assess the composition and geometry of four individual rock glaciers in Alaska, Wyoming and Colorado by measuring their radio wave speed and applying these results to ground-penetrating radar depth corrections and dielectric mixing models. Our method includes a correction for subsurface reflector dip angle, which we show can lead to an incorrect determination of wave speeds using common midpoint configurations. By observing the radar properties of the rock glaciers and their supraglacial debris, we find that some of the sites exhibit nearly pure ice cores, and all of the sites indicate volumetric ice fractions >50%. These results have implications for terrestrial glaciology and hydrology because the present ice volume is connected to past ice accumulation and subsurface ice preservation, which may affect the future availability of alpine water resources. An understanding of the processes that govern rock glacier evolution over a wide range of latitudes and elevations will also contribute to the exploration of planetary surfaces such as Mars, which hosts a significant population of debris-covered glaciers. Our subsurface composition and geometry estimates will inform simulations of rock glacier formation and evolution to test hypothesized ice origin mechanisms along with the preservation of climate signals.

Management Alternatives of Aquifer Storage, Distribution, and Simulation in Conjunctive Use

Aquifers are ubiquitous, and their water is easy to obtain with low extraction costs. On many occasions, these characteristics lead to overexploitation due to important water level declines, reduction of river base flows, enhanced seawater intrusion, and wetland affection. The forecasted increase in water demands and global warming will impact the future availability of water resources. Conjunctive use of surface and subsurface waters can help in mitigating these impacts. There are two main conjunctive use strategies: artificial recharge (AR) and alternate conjunctive use (ACU). AR stores waters that are not to be used directly in aquifers. ACU utilizes groundwater in dry periods, while surface waters are preferred in wet ones; this allows the increase of water supply with lower dam storage, economic gains, and environmental advantages. Efficient conjunctive use can prevent soil salinization and waterlogging problems in semiarid countries due to excessive recharge from irrigation return flows or other origins. Groundwater is a neglected and generally misused resource to maintain environmental conditions. When considering the solution to a water resources problem, groundwater should always be part of the design as an alternative or a complementary resource. Aquifers have large inertia, and changes in their volumes are only noticeable after years of observations. Unfortunately, groundwater observation networks are much poorer than surface ones, something that should be changed if groundwater is to come to the rescue in these times of climate change. Human and material resources should be made available to monitor, control, analyze, and forecast groundwater.

Long-term trends and changes in rainfall magnitude and duration in a semi-arid catchment, South Africa

Abstract The study investigated long-term trends and changes in rainfall magnitude and duration in a semi-arid catchment. It is crucial to determine changes in rainfall to support efforts to adapt to climate change in highly vulnerable semi-arid areas. Trends for long-term seasonal and annual rainfall magnitude and duration were determined using Mann–Kendall (MK) and quantile regression (QR) methods. Sen's slope was used to determine the magnitude of change in rainfall. Correlation analysis was conducted to determine the influence of altitude and land-use change on rainfall trends. There were dominant non-statistically significant decreasing trends for annual, seasonal rainfall magnitude, and rainfall duration. Trends from QR at low (0.1 and 0.2) and high (0.7 and 0.9) quantiles mostly deviated from those of MK. There were weak and variable correlations of long-term rainfall trends with altitude and land-use change. Land-use change and topography may therefore not adequately explain the variations of trends. Further studies are essential to understand the interaction of various environmental factors and their influence on rainfall trends. Variations of trends will impact future water resource availability and allocation. It is important to consider the deviations when developing climate change adaptation measures and ensure improved decision-making.

Assessment of Future Climate Change Impacts on Water Resources of Khabour River Catchment, North Of Iraq

In arid and semi-arid areas, assessing the potential impact of climate change on water availability is of critical importance for achieving better management of future water resources. Iraq as one example of those areas is expected to experience more stress on water due to the climatological characteristics and to the rapid population growth in addition to the policy of the riparian upstream countries. Therefore, the present study aims to quantify the impacts of climate change on the Khabour River catchment north of Iraq, which is one of the riparian catchments between Iraq and Turkey. The HEC-HMS model was firstly calibrated and validated against daily streamflow data measured for the period 01Jan2004-30Jun2009 near the catchment outlet at Zakho station. Thereafter, the future climate changes data from the HadGEM2_ES model was fed into the calibrated HEC-HMS model to quantify the future water resources availability. The impacts of climate change on the water under four possible scenarios of RCPs (RCP2.6, RCP4.5, RCP6, and RCP8.5) of atmospheric greenhouse gas (GHG) concentrations for three future slice periods (2021-2030), (2041-2050), and (2061-2070); was assessed in attribution to that from the period (2000-2009). Results show that the implemented HEC-HMS model was superior in modeling the streamflow data. NSE, R² and RMSE value was 0.871, 0.89 and 26.7, respectively, for calibration and 0.936, 0.9364 and 18.0, respectively for validation. The results also suggest that annual river runoff will likely decrease under all scenarios of RCPs and time stages of the future period.

Deep Learning Based Modeling of Groundwater Storage Change

The understanding of water resource changes and a proper projection of their future availability are necessary elements of sustainable water planning. Monitoring GWS change and future water resource availability are crucial, especially under changing climatic conditions. Traditional methods for in situ groundwater well measurement are a significant challenge due to data unavailability. The present investigation utilized the Long Short Term Memory (LSTM) networks to monitor and forecast Terrestrial Water Storage Change (TWSC) and Ground Water Storage Change (GWSC) based on Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) datasets from 2003–2025 for five basins of Saudi Arabia. An attempt has been made to assess the effects of rainfall, water used, and net budget modeling of groundwater. Analysis of GRACE-derived TWSC and GWSC estimates indicates that all five basins show depletion of water from 2003–2020 with a rate ranging from −5.88 ± 1.2 mm/year to −14.12 ± 1.2 mm/year and −3.5 ± 1.5 to −10.7 ± 1.5, respectively. Forecasting based on the developed LSTM model indicates that the investigated basins are likely to experience serious water depletion at rates ranging from −7.78 ± 1.2 to −15.6 ± 1.2 for TWSC and −4.97 ± 1.5 to −12.21 ± 1.5 for GWSC from 2020–2025. An interesting observation was a minor increase in rainfall during the study period for three basins.

The fate of the City of Mutare's urban water supply as changing climate impacts on its source in the Pungwe sub‐catchment

AbstractSustaining a steady supply of water to urban communities is of importance in a period that is characterised by rapid urban population growth, a global pandemic, and a changing climate that threatens the availability of the resource from its sources. Water supply to the City of Mutare is from three sources, Small Bridge Dam, Odzani, and the Pungwe River. The Pungwe source provides better quality water resources equivalent to the combined quantity supplied by the other two. It becomes an important source for the city, but climate change threatens the availability of water resources in the southern African region. Thus, it is imperative to quantitatively assess the impacts of a changing climate on water resources to enable the development of sustainable management alternatives. Using two carbon emission scenarios Representative Concentration Pathways (RCPs) 4.5 and 8.5, the study assesses the future availability of water resources from the Pungwe River to the City of Mutare using the Pitman hydrological model applied in an uncertainty framework. Available historical streamflow observations at gauging station F14 indicate a Q95 flow of about 2 Mm3/year. Projected future water resources at the end of the 21st century show a slight increase of up to 2.38% under the low carbon emission scenario (RCP4.5) and a decrease of up to 9.73%under the high carbon emission scenario (RCP8.5). These model‐generated results are useful to water managers to plan for catchment management strategies that would ensure continuous urban water supply, and the identification and development of possible future alternative water sources.

Impacts of climate change on future water availability for hydropower and public water supply in Wales, UK

Study regionWales, United Kingdom. Study focusClimate change is predicted to have a large impact on the hydrological regimes of Welsh rivers. However, its influence on the abstraction capability of key sectors, such as public water supply (PWS) and hydroelectric power (HEP), is not yet fully understood. We use the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) to generate future (2021–2079) streamflows under a worst-case scenario of greenhouse gas emissions (Representative Concentration Pathway 8.5) at two catchments in Wales, the Conwy and Tywi. SWAT streamflow output is used to estimate total unmet demand for PWS and changes in generation characteristics for HEP. PWS unmet demand is assessed using the Water Evaluation And Planning (WEAP) system under increasing, static, and declining demand scenarios. Mann-Kendall analysis is performed to detect and characterise trends. New hydrological insights for the regionUnder all future demand scenarios, there is increased occurrence of insufficient streamflow to satisfy PWS demand. For HEP, decrease in annual abstraction volume results in a loss of generation potential, despite an increasing number of days that maximum abstraction is reached. Changes in HEP generation and PWS availability are most pronounced in the medium-term (2021–2054), with rate of change slowing after 2060. We provide a novel perspective on future water resource availability in Wales, giving context to management planning to ensure future PWS sustainability and HEP generation efficiency.

Assessment of the relative impacts of climate changes and anthropogenic forcing on spring discharge of a Mediterranean karst system

The Mediterranean region is a climate change hotspot where the rate of climate change exceeds the global mean. The rapidly changing climate in combination with an increase in anthropogenic pressures cause water resources in the Mediterranean basin to become increasingly scarce. Modelling future water resource availability considering both climate and anthropogenic changes on karst catchments remains a major challenge in the field of hydrology. The purpose of this study is to assess the relative effects of climate change and anthropogenic forcing on the spring discharge of a Mediterranean karst system by coupling 12 climate model simulations under two emission scenarios (RCP 4.5 and RCP 8.5) with three hydrological models and four scenarios of future groundwater extraction for drinking water supply (no abstraction, present-day abstraction, +50% abstraction and + 100% abstraction at horizon 2100). The study area is the Oeillal spring’s karst catchment which is located at the Fonfroide-Monredon massif located in Southern France. The periods of spring drying-up can increase up to 30% according the RCP 4.5 and up to 70% according the RCP 8.5. This may be aggravated by groundwater abstraction in the area which, combined with climate change, could contribute to double the length of spring drying-up period in the worst scenario. The main results of the study suggest that climate change has a major effect on the future evolution of the Oeillal spring’s discharge and that groundwater abstraction constitutes a secondary but non-negligible factor which increases the occurrence of drying-up of this Mediterranean spring.

Navigating the Anthropocene’s rivers of risk—climatic change and science-policy dilemmas in Australia’s Murray-Darling Basin

Water extraction is fundamentally altering many of the world’s rivers, floodplains and wetlands, while drying trends intensify competition for water resources. Climate change is challenging integrated water resource management policies that aim to balance human and environmental water needs. This paper explores the challenges of managing natural resources in a regime of climate change. It examines Australia’s Murray-Darling Basin, where national water law requires a Basin Plan based on best available science. However, proactively responding to climate risks is institutionally and politically complex, even though understanding of the Basin’s hydro-climate system has improved. Despite decades of research consistently warning of a drying climate, the Basin Plan relied on historical hydrological data to determine future water resource availability. The paper uses the heuristic of the science-policy interface to examine why there were no significant adjustments to account for climate change. This analysis finds that the science-policy interface is highly politicised, with different risk cultures in the scientific, governmental, political and commercial sectors constraining adaptation planning. These constraints need to be overcome because the changing nature of the Anthropocene’s rivers means adaptive policy and institutional frameworks are needed that can navigate the complexities, uncertainties and indeterminacies of a changing climate.

Evaluation of Irrigation Water Resources Availability and Climate Change Impacts—A Case Study of Mwea Irrigation Scheme, Kenya

Rice is an important cereal crop in Kenya, where it is mainly grown in the Mwea Irrigation Scheme, MIS. The serious challenges of MIS include low water use efficiency and limited available water resources. The objective of this study is to analyze the current and future irrigation water resource availability for the improvement of future water management. A Soil Water Assessment Tool (SWAT), a public domain software supported by the United States Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Research Service in Bushland, TX, USA, was used to estimate the current and future water resources availability from the MIS’s main irrigation water supply sources (River Thiba and River Nyamindi). CropWat, a computer program developed by the Land and Water Division of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), Rome, Italy, was used to estimate irrigation water requirements from 2013–2016 and into the future (2020–2060 and 2061–2099). Future climatic data for total available flow and irrigation requirement estimations were downloaded from three General Circulation Models (GCMs). The data was bias corrected and down-scaled (with observed data) using a Climate Change Toolkit, a toolkit for climate change analysis developed by the Water Weather and Energy Ecosystem, Zurich, Switzerland. The results indicated that the highest irrigation water deficits were experienced in July and August based on the existing cropping pattern. Under a proposed future pattern, estimates show that MIS will experience water deficits mainly from June to October and from January to February. This study recommends that MIS management should put into strong consideration the simulated future estimates in irrigation water availability for the improvement of water management.

Groundwater monitoring for assessing artificial recharge in the Mediterranean coastal aquifer of Korba (Northeastern Tunisia).

Groundwater (GW) artificial recharge with treated wastewater (TWW) is seen as a promising technical solution to overcome groundwater overexploitation and seawater intrusion and to ascertain future water resources availability. While these introduced recharge systems have shown positive impacts in many areas across the world, their effective contribution to GW recharge is still not well quantified in water-stressed regions such as Tunisia. The scarcity of on-site data with accurate temporal and spatial measurements and resolution in such areas hinders the clear assessment of these recharge systems' performances. This article presents an approach based on the on-site monitoring of groundwater level and salinity measurements and recharge rate records spanning over the 6-year period to investigate the performances of a wastewater-based recharge system located in the Korba-El Mida site in Tunisia. The analysis showed that the artificial recharge did not have an impact on groundwater level. Controversially, a decrease in water salinity in and around the study site was observed. Findings emphasize on the weak wastewater volumes applied to the recharge system and the clogging phenomena that occurred in the pool and in the vadose zone. Furthermore, analyzing the information over a short period of time could be misleading as the results of a 6-year period of monitoring show clearly that the way the site was managed and the local conditions have a role in understanding and interpreting the results even if the artificial recharge was appropriately designed.

An Investigation into the Future Changes in Onset and Cessation of Rain and Their Variability over the Aswa Catchment, Uganda

Future global warming may result in extreme precipitation events leading to crop, environment and infrastructure damage. Rainfall is a major input for the livelihood of peasant farmers in the Aswa catchment where the future rainfall variability, onset and cessation are also likely to be affected. The Aswa catchment has limited rainfall data; therefore, use of secondary datasets from Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) is considered in this study, based on the close correlation of the recorded and TRMM rainfall. The latter was used to calibrate the statistical downscaling model for downscaling of two general circulation models to simulate future changes in rainfall. These data were analyzed for trends, wet and dry conditions/variability; onset and cessations of rain using the Mann–Kendall test, Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) and the cumulative percentage mean rainfall method, respectively. Results show future rainfall is likely to increase, accompanied by increasing variability reaching as high as 118.5%. The frequency of SPI values above 2 (extreme wetness) is to increase above current level during mid and end of the century. The highest rainfall variability is expected especially during the onset and cessation months, which are generally expected to come earlier and later, by up to four and five weeks, respectively. The reliability worsens from the midterm (2036–2065) to long term (2066–2099). These likely changes in rainfall quantities, variability, onset and cessation months are some of the key rainfall dynamics that have implications for future arable agriculture, environment and water resource availability and planning over the Aswa catchment, as is increasingly the case elsewhere.

Trends of rainfall and temperature in Northeast Brazil

ABSTRACT For climate change scenarios, there is a high degree of complexity, with impacts on the future availability of water resources. In this context, studies related to changes in rainfall time series are essential in order to identify environmental vulnerability. The objective of this study was to analyze trends in the rainfall regime, number of rainy days and temperature for stations located at different continentality and altitude conditions in Northeast Brazil. Meteorological data of the Instituto Nacional de Meteorologia were used, being classified according to the location in relation to the continent: coastal strip (14 stations), strip of 150-300 km up to 300 m altitude (14 stations) and above 300 m (five stations), between 400 and 600 km from the coast up to 300 m (four stations) and above 300 m (eight stations). All the 45 stations used have a historical series with a data period of more than 30 years. The trend of rainfall and rainy days was obtained through the Mann-Kendall and regression analyses, at significance levels of 0.01 and 0.05, respectively. There were trends of reduction in the number of rainy days, in the coastal strip, as well as reduction in rainfall and rainy days, both in the strip of 150-300 km from the coast and in the Sertão region, with no significant effect of continentality in the strip of 400-600 km from the coast. For temperature, except for Maceió, AL, Brazil, there is a trend of increase in near future.