Hydrology and Earth System Sciences
www.hydrol-earth-syst-sci.net
1027-5606
1607-7938
12
1
2008
10.5194/hess-12-239-2008
http://www.hydrol-earth-syst-sci.net/12/239/2008/
http://www.hydrol-earth-syst-sci.net/12/239/2008/hess-12-239-2008.html
http://www.hydrol-earth-syst-sci.net/12/239/2008/hess-12-239-2008.pdf
239
255
2008-02-11
Assessment of impact of climate change on water resources: a long term analysis of the Great Lakes of North America
E. McBean
emcbean@uoguelph.ca
H. Motiee
School of Engineering, University of Guelph, Guelph, N1G 2W1, Canada
Water Eng. Faculty, Power and Water University of Technology (PWUT), Tehran, Iran
In the threshold of the appearance of global warming from theory to reality,
extensive research has focused on predicting the impact of potential climate
change on water resources using results from Global Circulation Models
(GCMs). This research carries this further by statistical analyses of long
term meteorological and hydrological data. Seventy years of historical
trends in precipitation, temperature, and streamflows in the Great Lakes of
North America are developed using long term regression analyses and
Mann-Kendall statistics. The results generated by the two statistical
procedures are in agreement and demonstrate that many of these variables are
experiencing statistically significant increases over a seven-decade period.
The trend lines of streamflows in the three rivers of St. Clair, Niagara and
St. Lawrence, and precipitation levels over four of the five Great Lakes,
show statistically significant increases in flows and precipitation.
Further, precipitation rates as predicted using fitted regression lines are
compared with scenarios from GCMs and demonstrate similar forecast
predictions for Lake Superior. Trend projections from historical data are
higher than GCM predictions for Lakes Michigan/Huron. Significant
variability in predictions, as developed from alternative GCMs, is noted.
<br><br>
Given the general agreement as derived from very different procedures,
predictions extrapolated from historical trends and from GCMs, there is
evidence that hydrologic changes particularly for the precipitation in the
Great Lakes Basin may be demonstrating influences arising from global
warming and climate change.
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