TY - JOUR
T1 - River discharge in South America
T2 - agreement and contradictions between recent alteration and projected changes
AU - Miranda, Pedro Torres
AU - de Paiva, Rodrigo Cauduro Dias
AU - de Araújo Gama, Cléber Henrique
AU - Brêda, João Paulo Lyra Fialho
PY - 2023
Y1 - 2023
N2 - Climate scenarios are important information for water planning, but, in some cases, they disagree with recent climate alterations, which affects their robustness and reliability. Robustness evaluation can help identifying areas that should be prioritized by in water sector adaptation to climate change. Although crucial, this kind of analysis has been overlooked in most climate change assessments, for instance in South America. This study assesses the robustness and reliability of river discharge scenarios by comparing them with observed and modelled data. Areas where current changes and scenarios agree are more likely to experience changes and, therefore, water planners should pay special attention to them. Tocantins-Araguaia, São Francisco, Western Northeast Atlantic and upper La Plata basins agreed with a discharge decrease, indicating that climate change should be prioritized in planning. Orinoco and upper-western Amazon basins showed strong disagreement between recent and projected discharge alterations, with positive change in last decades, showing that scenarios in these regions should be carefully interpreted. With this, water planners could interpret Northeastern and upper-central South America as presenting more likely scenarios in comparison to Amazon and Orinoco basins.
AB - Climate scenarios are important information for water planning, but, in some cases, they disagree with recent climate alterations, which affects their robustness and reliability. Robustness evaluation can help identifying areas that should be prioritized by in water sector adaptation to climate change. Although crucial, this kind of analysis has been overlooked in most climate change assessments, for instance in South America. This study assesses the robustness and reliability of river discharge scenarios by comparing them with observed and modelled data. Areas where current changes and scenarios agree are more likely to experience changes and, therefore, water planners should pay special attention to them. Tocantins-Araguaia, São Francisco, Western Northeast Atlantic and upper La Plata basins agreed with a discharge decrease, indicating that climate change should be prioritized in planning. Orinoco and upper-western Amazon basins showed strong disagreement between recent and projected discharge alterations, with positive change in last decades, showing that scenarios in these regions should be carefully interpreted. With this, water planners could interpret Northeastern and upper-central South America as presenting more likely scenarios in comparison to Amazon and Orinoco basins.
KW - Climate change impacts
KW - Discharge alteration
KW - Robustness
KW - South America
U2 - 10.1590/2318-0331.282320220085
DO - 10.1590/2318-0331.282320220085
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85169796323
SN - 2318-0331
VL - 28
JO - Revista Brasileira de Recursos Hidricos
JF - Revista Brasileira de Recursos Hidricos
M1 - e18
ER -