Water Resour Manage (2009) 23:1157–1170
DOI 10.1007/s11269-008-9320-2
Variability of Water Resource in the Yellow River
Basin of Past 50 Years, China
Qiang Zhang · Chong-Yu Xu · Tao Yang
Received: 4 October 2007 / Accepted: 7 July 2008 /
Published online: 25 July 2008
© Springer Science + Business Media B.V. 2008
Abstract We use Mann–Kendall trend test and Lepage method to study spatial
and temporal variations of the streamflow series over the past 50 years based on
daily hydrologic data from six gauging stations in the Yellow River basin. Research
results indicate that: (1) The streamflow of the Yellow River basin is decreasing
and water resource deficit tends to be more serious from the upper to the lower
Yellow River basin; (2) Zero-flow days are observed after 1970 and overwhelmingly
prevail during 1990–2000. Moreover, zero-flow events are observed mainly during
spring and summer; (3) Low flow events are more sensitive to climatic changes and
human activities when compared to the high flow events, which is mainly reflected
by larger fluctuation of timing of change points. Furthermore, the timing of change
point of hydrologic events tends to be earlier from the upper to the lower Yellow
River basin, indicating more intensive impacts of human activities on water resource
Q. Zhang (B)
State Key Laboratory of Lake Science and Environment,
Nanjing Institute of Geography and Limnology, Chinese Academy of Sciences,
Nanjing, 210008, China
e-mail: zhangqnj@gmail.com
Q. Zhang
Institute of Space and Earth Information Science,
The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, Hong Kong, China
C.-Y. Xu
Department of Geosciences, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway
C.-Y. Xu
Department of Earth Sciences, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
T. Yang
State Key Laboratory of Hydrology–Water Resources and Hydraulics Engineering,
Hohai University, Nanjing, 210098, China
1158
Q. Zhang et al.
in the lower Yellow River basin. The current research will be greatly helpful for
sound and effective water resource management in the Yellow River basin, being
characterized by serious water deficit.
Keywords Mann–Kendall trend · Lepage test · Water resource · Yellow River basin
1 Introduction
The tremendous importance of water in both society and nature underscores the necessity of understanding how a change in climate could affect regional water supplies
(Xu and Singh 2004; Zhang et al. 2005). Labat et al. (2004) suggested that global trend
of water resource should be qualified at the regional scale where both increasing
and decreasing trends are identified. Therefore, availability of water resources is
different from region to region over the world under the current changing climate
(Zhang et al. 2006a). Climatic changes and associate impacts on global/regional water
resources are receiving increasing concerns from academic circles (Camilloni and
Barros 2003; Loukas et al. 2002). More and more researches indicated that water
resources are sensitive to climate changes, particularly the ground surface water
resources (WMO 1987). Xu (2000) investigated the effects of climate changes on flow
regimes of 25 catchments (from 6 to 1,293 km2 ) in central Sweden using a conceptual
monthly water balance model. Hydrologic responses of fifteen hypothetical climate
change scenarios were simulated. The results suggested that all the hypothetical
climate change scenarios would cause major decreases in winter snow accumulation.
Significant increase of winter flow and decrease of spring and summer streamflow
were resulted from most scenarios. More and more hydrologists and meteorologists
come to focus more attentions on variability and availability of regional water
resources under current climatic changes (e.g. Kundzewicz 2004). Streamflow of
the South American rivers demonstrated increasing trends starting during the 1970s
(Garcia and Mechoso 2005). Annual streamflow and annual sediment load of the
Yangtze River basin were systematically studied using Mann–Kendall trend method.
Increasing annual streamflow, especially in the lower Yangtze River basin was
identified (Zhang et al. 2006b). High and low flows occurred to certain periods were
also detected in the Swedish rivers (Lindström and Bergström 2004).
The Yellow River, being the second largest river in China, acts as the important
source for water supply in the North-western China and Northern China, however
it is also the area of shortage of water resource (Wang et al. 2001). Since 1986, due
to climatic change and intensifying human activities, particularly increasing human
withdrawal of water because of increasing agriculture irrigation, the streamflow of
the lower Yellow River has significantly decreased (Xu 2002). Annual precipitation
over the Yellow River basin has been in decreasing tendency since the 1970s,
which together with increasing abstraction from the Yellow River leads frequent
desiccation (dry up; Xu 2001). Previous researches on the similar topic mainly focus
on regional precipitation and annual streamflow variability (e.g. Wang et al. 2006;
Liu and Zheng 2004) or on certain part of the Yellow River basin (Lan et al.
2002). Thorough analysis of hydrologic events exceeding/below certain thresholds
with respect to different parts of the Yellow River basin based on daily hydrologic
dataset is paramount for effective water resource management in the Yellow River
Variability of water resource in the Yellow River basin
1159
basin. This is the main motivation for this research. Therefore, the main objectives
of this paper are to: (1) detect trends of hydrologic events exceeding/below certain
thresholds in different parts of the Yellow River basin; (2) explore the change
point of annual and seasonal streamflow series defined as exceeding/below certain
thresholds and discuss possible underlying causes.
2 Study Region and Data
The Yellow River (95◦ 53 E-119◦ 5 E; 32◦ 10 N–41◦ 50 N; Fig. 1) is the second largest
river in China and the fifth largest river in the world. The length of the Yellow
River is 5,464 km with drainage area of 752,440 km2 , running through the arid and
semi-arid region. From the origination to Hekou is the upper Yellow River, being
3,472 km long; from Hekou to Taohuayu is the middle Yellow River with the length
of 1,206 km; from Taohuayu to the mouth of the Yellow River is the lower Yellow
River, the length is 786 km (Fig. 1). Daily streamflow data (unit: m3 /s) covering 1956–
2005 from six hydrologic stations have been analyzed in this study (Table 1; Fig. 1).
These six hydrologic stations are the main controlling stations and can present the
variability and availability of the water resource in the Yellow River basin. The data
series are of good quality with no missing data. The hydrologic events are defined
as the daily streamflow exceeding/below certain priori determined thresholds: 90%
percentile and 10% percentile. In the current text, the streamflow exceeding/below
90%/10% percentile is defined as high flow/low flow. In this paper, relative frequency
(defined as ratio of number of days with streamflow exceeding or falling below
Fig. 1 Location of the study region and the hydrologic stations (the river reach upstream to Hekou
is upper Yellow River; the river reach between Hekou and Taohuayu is the middle Yellow River and
the river downstream to the Taohuayu is the lower Yellow River)
1160
Q. Zhang et al.
Table 1 Detailed information of the hydrologic gauging stations
Station name
Drainage area km2
Series length
Tangnaihai st.
Lanzhou st.
Toudaoguai st.
Longmen st.
Huayuankou st.
Lijin st.
121,972
222,551
367,898
497,552
730,036
751,869
1956–2005
1967–2005
1958–2005
1965–2005
1957–2005
1964–2005
The location of the stations can be referred to Fig. 1
certain percentiles to all the days of 1 year or every seasons studied in this paper)
of hydrological events defined by percentiles and associated streamflow discharge
(defined as total streamflow discharge of defined hydrological events) are analyzed
by using different methods.
3 Methods
Two methods, i.e. Mann–Kendall trend test and Lepage test are used in the study to
detect trend and variations of the daily streamflow series. Each method has its own
strength and weakness.
The rank-based Mann–Kendall method (MK; Mann 1945; Kendall 1975) is a
nonparametric and commonly used method to assess the significance of monotonic
trends in hydro-meteorological time series (Yue et al. 2003) and is highly recommended for general use by the World Meteorological Organization (Mitchell et al.
1966). The procedure of MK trend test used in this study is as follows:
First the MK test statistic is calculated as
S=
n−1 n
sgn x j − xi
(1)
i=1 j=i+1
Where
⎧
⎨ +1
0,
sgn x j − xi =
⎩
−1
x j > xi
x j = xi
x j < xi
and n is the sample size. The statistics S is approximately normally distributed when
n ≥ 8, with the mean and the variance as follows:
E (S) = 0
n (n − 1) (2n + 5) −
V (S) =
Where ti is the number of ties of extent i.
n
i=1
18
(2)
ti i (i − 1) (2i + 5)
(3)
Variability of water resource in the Yellow River basin
The standardized statistics (Z ) for one-tailed test is formulated as:
⎧
S−1
⎪
⎪√
S>0
⎪
⎪
⎨ Var (S)
0
S=0
Z =
⎪
⎪
S+1
⎪
⎪
S<0
⎩√
Var (S)
1161
(4)
At the 5% significance level, the null hypothesis of no trend is rejected if |Z | >
1.96. Yue and Wang (2002) discussed elimination of influence of serial correlation
(if it is significant at >95% confidence level) on the Mann–Kendall (MK) test. In
this paper, effective sample size (ESS) proposed by Yue and Wang (2004) is used to
modify the variance of the MK statistic to reduce the influence of serial correlation
on the MK trend. The procedure is as follows (Yue and Wang 2004): (1) remove the
existing trend from the series if it exists; (2) the sample serial correlation is estimated
using the detrended series; and (3) the MK test modified by ESS is applied to assess
the significance of trend in the original time series.
The Lepage test is a non-parametric, two-sample test for location and dispersion
(Lepage 1971) which has been used to detect step-like changes for rainfall (Yonetani
1993; Benjamin and Roger 2005; Matsuyama et al. 2002). The Lepage assumes that
the size of the studied series is equal to or greater than ten and the Lepage statistic
(HK) follows the Chi-squares (χ 2 ) distribution with two degrees of freedom. The
Lepage statistic (HK) is a sum of the squares of the standardized Wilcoxon’s and
Ansari–Bradley’s statistics, i.e.
2
A − E (A)
[W − E (W)]2
HK =
+
(5)
V (W)
V (A)
If HK exceeds 5.99 (9.21), the difference between two sample means is judged as
significant at 95% (99%) confidence level. HK is calculated as follows. Let x = (x1 ,
x2 , . . . , xn1 ) and y = (y1 , y2 , . . . , yn2 ) be two independent samples of size n1 and n2 .
Assume that ui = 1 if the ith smallest observation in a combined sample of the size
(n1 + n2 ) belongs to x and ui = 0 if it belongs to y.
The terms in Eq. 5 can be derived based on the following equations:
W=
n
1 +n2
i · ui
(6)
n1 (n1 + n2 + 1)
2
(7)
n2 n1 (n1 + n2 + 1)
2
(8)
i=1
E (W) =
V (W) =
A=
n1
i=1
i · ui +
n
1 +n2
i=n1 +1
(n1 + n2 − i + 1) ui
(9)
1162
Q. Zhang et al.
If n1 + n2 is even, E(A) and V(A) will be estimated as:
n1 (n1 + n2 + 2)
4
(10)
n1 n2 (n1 + n2 − 2) (n1 + n2 + 2)
48 (n1 + n2 − 1)
(11)
E (A) =
V (A) =
If n1 + n2 is odd, E(A) and V(A) will be estimated as:
E (A) =
V (A) =
n1 (n1 + n2 + 1)2
4 (n1 + n2 )
n1 n2 (n1 + n2 + 1) (n1 + n2 )2 + 3
48 (n1 + n2 )2
(12)
(13)
4 Results
4.1 Trends of Relative Frequency of High and Low Flow and Associated
Streamflow Discharge
Table 2 displays MK trends of relative frequency of high and low flow regimes and
associated streamflow discharge. Bold characters denote significant trends at >95%
confidence level. For the sake of better understanding of trends across the Yellow
River basin, we will discuss changing properties of hydrological regimes for the
upper, middle and lower Yellow River basin separately.
4.1.1 The Upper Yellow River Basin
Tangnaihai and Lanzhou stations are located in the upper Yellow River basin.
Table 2 indicates, for the Tangnaihai station, that relative frequency of low flow in
spring, autumn and winter is increasing, of which the increasing trends are significant
in spring and winter. No low flow regime can be detected in summer. On the contrary,
relative frequency of high flow regime in spring, summer and autumn is decreasing,
and in autumn the decreasing trend is significant. No high flow regime can be
observed in winter. With respect to annual changes of low and high flow regimes,
relative frequency of low flow regime is in significant increasing trend, and no high
flow regime can be detected. Table 2 also indicates that no zero-flow regimes can
be observed in Tangnaihai station. In term of streamflow discharge of flow regimes,
seasonal and annual changes of streamflow discharge of various flow regimes show
similar changing characteristics. Low flow discharge is in increasing trend and high
flow discharge is in decreasing trend. Particularly, streamflow discharge of low flow
in spring and winter is in significant increasing trend, and that in autumn is in no
significant trend. However, significant increasing low flow discharge and significant
decreasing high flow discharge are observed in terms of annual changes. For Lanzhou
station similar features are showing when compared to those of the Tangnaihai
station (Table 2). Generally, relative frequency of low flow regimes is increasing
except in autumn. Streamflow discharge of low flow is decreasing except in autumn.
Spring
Increasing
Decreasing
/
/
Decreasing
/
Increasing
Decreasing
/
Increasing
/
/
Increasing
/
/
Increasing
Decreasing
/
Decreasing
Increasing
Decreasing
Increasing
/
Increasing
Decreasing
Tangnaihai
Increasing
Decreasing
/
Increasing
Decreasing
/
Decreasing
Decreasing
/
Increasing
/
/
Increasing
/
/
Increasing
Decreasing
Increasing
Decreasing
Decreasing
Decreasing
Increasing
/
Increasing
Decreasing
Lanzhou
Increasing
Increasing
/
Increasing
Decreasing
/
Increasing
Decreasing
/
Decreasing
/
/
Decreasing
/
/
Increasing
Increasing
Increasing
Decreasing
Increasing
Decreasing
Decreasing
/
Increasing
Decreasing
Toudaoguai
Bold characters denote significant increasing or decreasing trend at >95% confidence level
Annual
Winter
Autumn
Summer
Spring
Annual
Winter
Autumn
Summer
Hydrological events
RF of low flow
RF of high flow
RF of zero flow
RF of low flow
RF of high flow
RF of zero flow
RF of low flow
RF of high flow
RF of zero flow
RF of low flow
RF of high flow
RF of zero flow
RF of low flow
RF of high flow
RF of zero flow
Low flow discharge
High flow discharge
Low flow discharge
High flow discharge
Low flow discharge
High flow discharge
Low flow discharge
High flow discharge
Low flow discharge
High flow discharge
Seasonal
Increasing
Increasing
/
Increasing
Decreasing
/
Increasing
Decreasing
/
Increasing
Increasing
/
Increasing
Increasing
/
Increasing
Increasing
Increasing
Decreasing
Increasing
Decreasing
Increasing
Increasing
Increasing
Decreasing
Longmen
Table 2 Trends of relative frequency (RF) and streamflow discharge of hydrological events defined by percentiles
Increasing
Decreasing
/
Increasing
Decreasing
/
Increasing
Decreasing
/
Increasing
/
/
Increasing
/
/
Increasing
Decreasing
Increasing
Decreasing
Increasing
Decreasing
Increasing
/
Increasing
Decreasing
Huayuankou
Increasing
Decreasing
Increasing
Increasing
Decreasing
Increasing
Increasing
Decreasing
Increasing
Increasing
Decreasing
Increasing
Increasing
Decreasing
Increasing
Increasing
Decreasing
Increasing
Decreasing
Increasing
Decreasing
Increasing
Decreasing
Increasing
Decreasing
Lijin
Variability of water resource in the Yellow River basin
1163
1164
Q. Zhang et al.
All these changes are, however, not significant. However significant decreasing
relative frequency and streamflow discharge of high flow regimes is observed in
summer and autumn. No zero-flow regimes can be identified in the Lanzhou station.
4.1.2 The Middle Yellow River Basin
The Toudaoguai and Longmen stations are located in the middle Yellow River
basin (Fig. 1). As for Toudaoguai station, relative frequency of both low and high
flow in spring is in significant increasing trend, implying larger fluctuation over
time (Table 2). In summer however, relative frequency of low flow is in significant
increasing trend and significant decreasing trend can be detected in the relative
frequency of high flow regimes. Similar trends exist for relative frequency of low
flow in autumn as compared with that of summer flow except the increasing trend
of relative frequency of low flow is insignificant in summer. The relative frequency
of low flow regimes in winter and on annual base is decreasing, but not significant.
At Toudaoguai station, the changing trend in streamflow discharge is the same as for
relative frequency in all four seasons. As for annual changes, significant increasing
and decreasing trend can be detected in low flow and high flow regimes respectively.
Changes of relative frequency and streamflow discharge of Longmen station have the
similar features when compared to those of Toudaoguai station except in winter. In
spring and winter, relative frequency and streamflow discharge of both low and high
flow are in increasing trend and the increasing trend of relative frequency of low
flow in spring is significant. The increasing trends of high streamflow in winter and
low stream flow in spring are significant. These results indicate larger fluctuations of
hydrological regimes in spring and winter. Significant decreased fluctuation (increase
in low flow and decrease in high flow) of hydrological regimes can be observed in
summer and autumn. No zero-flow regimes can be observed in the middle Yellow
River basin.
4.1.3 The Lower Yellow River Basin
Hydrological variations in the lower Yellow River basin can be reflected by streamflow changes of Huayuankou and Lijin stations (Fig. 1, Table 2). As for Huayuankou
station, relative frequency of low flow regimes is increasing in all seasons and the
increasing trend in autumn is significant (Table 2). Relative frequency of high flow
regimes is in significant decreasing trend in spring, summer and autumn. No high flow
regimes can be observed in winter. Similar phenomenon can be detected in annual
changes of low and high flow regimes. No zero-flow regimes can be observed in
Huayuankou station. Streamflow discharge changes present similar properties when
compared to those of relative frequency changes. Hydrological regimes of the Lijin
station show distinctly different properties when compared to other stations studied
in this paper (Table 2). Most hydrological regimes of the Lijin station defined by
percentiles are in significant trends at >95% confidence level. Significant increasing
relative frequency of low flow regimes can be observed in spring, autumn and winter.
Significant decreasing trend can be found for the relative frequency of high flow
regimes in spring, summer and autumn. The same trends can be observed for the
streamflow discharge of low and high flow regimes for the Lijin station, namely,
significant decreasing trends are identified in streamflow discharge of high flow
regimes in spring, summer and autumn. Decreasing trend of streamflow discharge
Variability of water resource in the Yellow River basin
1165
Fig. 2 Relative frequency of
zero-flow days in Lijin station
of high flow in winter is not significant. Streamflow discharge of low flow regimes
is significantly increasing in all seasons except in summer the increasing trend is
not significant. There is a special phenomenon in the Lijin station that there occurs
zero-flow hydrological regime. It can be seen from Table 2 that relative frequency
of zero-flow hydrological regimes is increasing, and the increasing trends in spring
and winter are significant at >95% confidence level. Figure 2 illustrates the seasonal
changes of zero-flow events in the Lijin station. It can be seen from Fig. 2 that
more frequent zero-flow events can be observed in summer and spring. Zero-flow
hydrological events start to occur after 1970 and flourish during 1990 and 2000. After
2000, zero-flow hydrological events seem to disappear.
4.2 Change Points of Hydrologic Series
The Yellow River basin is located in the semi-humid, semi-arid and arid region. The
evaporation variations heavily impact hydrologic process, which has the potential
to alter the timing of the change point in the hydrologic series. Furthermore, increasingly intensified human activities, particularly increasing demand of agricultural
irrigation, will further complicate the change point changes for specific hydrological
regime. Therefore, changes of timing of change point are reflective of impacts of
various driving factors on hydrologic series. Figure 3 demonstrates timing of change
point of annual low/high flow series of the Yellow River basin. Similar changes of
change point can be identified in the relative frequency and streamflow discharge of
low flow and high flow regimes, implying similar changing properties of hydrologic
events defined by specific percentiles. In terms of annual variations, occurrence of
abrupt changes of low flow and high flow comes to be earlier from the middle to the
lower Yellow River basin, indicating more intensive impacts from human activities
and climatic changes in the middle and the lower Yellow River basin if compared
with the upper Yellow River basin. However, difference can still be identified within
timing of abrupt changes of low flow and high flow regimes. Timing of abrupt changes
of high flow events is in smaller fluctuations when compared to that of low flow
events. The timing of abrupt changes of high flow events ranges between 1985 and
1995, and that of low flow events ranges between 1975 and 2000. Figure 3 suggests
1166
2005
Low flow
2000
High flow
1995
Year
Fig. 3 Change point of annual
flow/high flow series of the
Yellow River basin.
TNH Tangnaihai station,
LZ Lanzhou station,
TDG Toudaoguai station,
LM Longmen station,
HYK Huayuankou station,
LJ Lijin station
Q. Zhang et al.
1990
1985
1980
1975
1970
TNH
LZ
TDG
LM
HYK
LJ
Station
that low flow events are more sensitive to impacts from climatic changes and human
activities than high flow events. As for abrupt changes of seasonal daily streamflow
series (Fig. 4), similar phenomena can be observed in summer. Changes of change
point of high flow events are in smaller fluctuations if compared to those of low
flow events in summer. Occurrence of abrupt changes seems to be earlier from the
upper to the lower Yellow River basin. The difference exists in changing patterns
of the timing of change point for hydrologic series in winter, particularly timing of
change point of low flow events. This indicates that low flow events in winter are less
influenced by climatic changes or human activities when compared to low flow events
in summer. The change point of high flow events in winter can not be detected.
5 Summary and Discussions
The water-related problems, especially the water shortage, in the Yellow River
basin are receiving overwhelming concerns from the academic circles and publics
(Liu and Xia 2004). Further research on water resource based on high-resolution
and updated dataset and more robust methods is of great importance and merits
effective water resource management in the Yellow River basin, which acts as
the major water source for about 107 million people, about 8.7% of the total
population in China (Wang et al. 2006) and 17% of China’s agricultural land (YRCC
2002). Different changing characteristics are thoroughly anatomized based on daily
hydrologic dataset from 6 major hydrologic stations along the mainstream of the
Yellow River. Some interesting conclusions and necessary discussions are as follows:
1. Generally, the water resource of the Yellow River basin is decreasing; however
different degrees of water resource deficit can be identified in the different
parts of the Yellow River basin. The decreasing water resource in the Yellow
River basin is reflected mainly by decreasing relative frequency and associated
streamflow discharge of high flow regimes and increasing relative frequency
and associated streamflow discharge of low flow regimes. Decreasing trends of
Variability of water resource in the Yellow River basin
2005
1167
2005
Summer
Winter
2000
1995
1995
1990
1990
1985
1985
Year
2000
High flow
1980
1980
Low flow
1975
1975
1970
1970
TNH
LZ
TDG
LM
HYK
LJ
TNH
LZ
TD G LM
HYK
LJ
Station name
Fig. 4 Change point of flow/high flow series in winter and summer of the Yellow River basin.
TNH Tangnaihai station, LZ Lanzhou station, TDG Toudaoguai station, LM Longmen station,
HYK Huayuankou station, LJ Lijin station
high flow events are more significant than increasing trends of low flow events.
Moreover, low flow events come to be in more significant increasing trends from
the upper to the lower Yellow River basin. Water deficit is more serious in spring
and autumn if compared to summer and winter. In the upper Yellow River basin,
the relative frequency of high flow events in autumn is in significant decreasing
trends. Significant decreasing relative frequency of high flow events in summer
and autumn is observed in the whole basin. In the lower Yellow River basin,
zero-flow events occur after 1970. Therefore, water deficit comes to be more
serious from the upper to the lower Yellow River basin. After 1970, the zeroflow days occurred in the lower Yellow River basin, and prevailed during 1990–
2000. In addition, zero-flow days are mainly observed in spring and summer. The
increasing frequency of zero-flow days is the warning of water problems in the
Yellow River basin. Change point analysis indicates that the abrupt changes of
the hydrologic events defined by certain percentiles are coming earlier from the
upper to the lower Yellow River basin. The low flow events are more sensitive
to impacts from climatic changes and human activities than the high flow events.
2. Human perturbation plays increasingly important roles in spatial and temporal
changes of water resource in the Yellow River basin. Figure 1 demonstrates
that there are two large water reservoirs upstream to Lanzhou station and
Huayuankou station. These two water reservoirs are the major reservoirs along
1168
Q. Zhang et al.
the mainstem Yellow River. Till 2001, more than 3,147 water reservoirs were
built in the Yellow River basin, with the total storage capacity of 5.74 × 109 m3
(Zhang et al. 2001; Wang et al. 2006). These reservoirs tremendously altered
spatial and temporal patterns of water resource in the Yellow River basin. The
research results indicate that water reservoirs greatly influenced variations of
streamflow series. Relative frequency and associated streamflow discharge of
low flow events of Lanzhou station in spring and winter are in no significant
trends, however, relative frequency and associated streamflow discharge of low
flow events of Tangnaihai station in spring and winter are in significant increasing
trends. Furthermore, relative frequency and streamflow discharge of low and
high flow in autumn are decreasing in Lanzhou station, and the decreasing trend
high flow events is significant, which implies decreasing fluctuation of hydrological process of Lanzhou station in autumn. These phenomena may be due to
hydrological regulation of large water reservoirs located between Tangnaihai
station and Lanzhou station. Larger fluctuation of hydrological process in the
middle Yellow River basin reflected by increasing relative frequency of high
and low flow regimes in spring may be due to increasing demand of agricultural
irrigation in the middle Yellow River basin in spring (Giordano et al. 2004).
3. Precipitation changes in the Yellow River basin indicate that the stations dominated by increasing precipitation are all located upstream to Lanzhou station and
decreasing precipitation are observed mainly in the watershed downstream to
Lanzhou station (Fu et al. 2004). The spatial distribution of precipitation changes
partly explained the phenomenon that high flow tends to be in significant decreasing trend and low flow tends to be in significant increasing trend from upper
to the lower Yellow River basin. Human activities also exerted overwhelming
impacts on spatial and seasonal shift of water resource. Thriving economic
development and fast growth of population in the Yellow River basin further
intensify water shortage. Precipitation mainly occurred during July to August.
The agricultural irrigation however is often conducted in the early summer (May
to June) for crops to mature before harvest and in the late autumn (October) for
planting seeds (Wang et al. 2006). The human use of water resource, to a certain
degree, offsets the impacts of precipitation on streamflow changes. The Yellow
River basin is located in the semi-humid, semi-arid and arid regions; evaporation
plays the important role in the local hydrologic cycle. Construction of water
reservoirs will be beneficial for human use of water resource and for evaporation,
which will further intensify the water resource deficit in the Yellow River basin.
This study indicates that the water deficit of the Yellow River tends to be more
serious from the upper to the lower Yellow River basin. The zero-flow days
occurred to the lower Yellow River basin are the warning signals for water deficit
in the Yellow River basin. Sound and effective water resource management is
desiderata for the Yellow River basin.
Acknowledgements The research was financially supported by Innovative Project of Nanjing Institute of Geography and Limnology, Chinese Academy of Sciences (grant no. CXNIGLAS200814), the
National Natural Science Foundation (NSFC) of China (grant no. 40701015), Outstanding Oversea
Chinese Scholars Fund from CAS (The Chinese Academy of Sciences), fully supported by a grant
from the Research Grants Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, China (project
no. CUHK4627/05H). Cordial thanks should be extended to anonymous reviewers and the editorin-chief, Prof. Dr. George P. Tsakiris, for their valuable comments and suggestions, which greatly
improved the quality of this paper.
Variability of water resource in the Yellow River basin
1169
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