Impacts of climate change on the water balance of a large nonhumid natural basin in China.

Water resources are contingent on the combined effects of climate change and watershed characteristics. An analytical model devised from the Budyko framework was used to investigate the partitioning of precipitation ( P) into actual evapotranspiration ( E) and streamflow ( Q) parameters for the Yellow River Basin (YRB), a water-limited basin, to estimate the response of E and Q to P and potential evapotranspiration ( E). Although a steady state was assumed, the analytical model, incorporating an adjustable parameter characteristic of catchment conditions ( ω), can be run to analyze the sensitivity of catchment characteristics on water resources. The theory predicts that Q and E are more sensitive to P than to E. For example, a 10 % increase in P will result in a 22.8 % increase in Q, while a 10 % increase in E will decrease Q by 13.2 %. The model shows that, to some extent, water balance is governed by changing catchment characteristics (such as changes in vegetation on annual scales). These findings indicate that additional elucidative data can be drawn from the Budyko framework when taking into account catchment characteristics. Furthermore, the model can analyze the response of water resources to climate change on different temporal and spatial scales. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]