Estimating the Impacts and Uncertainty of Climate Change on a Municipal Water Supply System
Publication: Journal of Water Resources Planning and Management
Volume 134, Issue 3
Abstract
The preponderance of evidence in the scientific community supports the premise that global climate is changing. The precise impacts of climate change on natural and man-made systems remain less certain. Municipal water supplies, particularly those that rely on summer snowmelt to augment storage capacity, may experience significant changes in their flow regimes in the future. This paper presents an evaluation of climate change impacts on a water resource system using a three-stage modeling approach: General circulation models (GCMs) to simulate global climate, basin scale hydrology models, and water resource system simulation models. This approach is applied to two river basins in the Puget Sound Region of the Pacific Northwest: The Cedar and South Fork Tolt Rivers, which are the principal sources of water for the Seattle metropolitan region. The greatest source of uncertainty associated with climate change impacts arises from the range of future scenarios produced by GCMs. This uncertainty is addressed by incorporating multiple climate models at every stage of the process and using the values produced to generate an ensemble average that quantifies the most likely impact. The ensemble average is characterized by an envelope of uncertainty based on the range and spread of the individual GCM ensemble members. Hydrologic impacts of climate change such as alteration of historic streamflow patterns and snow accumulation are explored, as well as impacts to the water supply system’s yield.
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Acknowledgments
This research has been partially funded by the Joint Institute for the Study of the Atmosphere and Ocean (JISAO) under NOAA Cooperative Agreement No. NA17RJ1232, Contribution 1356 and by Seattle Public Utilities. Additional funding has been provided by the Valle Scholarship and Scandinavian Exchange Program at the University of Washington. The writers would also like to thank the support of Edward Miles of the University of Washington and of Chuck Clarke of Seattle Public Utilities. Additionally the writers would like to thank two anonymous reviewers for their constructive and insightful comments.
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Water Resources Planning and Management
Volume 134 • Issue 3 • May 2008
Pages: 239 - 246
Copyright
© 2008 ASCE.
History
Received: Aug 21, 2006
Accepted: Jan 16, 2007
Published online: May 1, 2008
Published in print: May 2008
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