ORIGINAL PAPER

Climate changes and their impacts on water resources in the aridregions: a case study of the Tarim River basin, China

Qiang Zhang Æ Chong-Yu Xu Æ Hui Tao ÆTao Jiang Æ Yongqin David Chen

Published online: 25 June 2009

� Springer-Verlag 2009

Abstract Streamflow series of five hydrological stations

were analyzed with aim to indicate variability of water

resources in the Tarim River basin. Besides, impacts of

climate changes on water resources were investigated by

analyzing daily precipitation and temperature data of 23

meteorological stations covering 1960–2005. Some inter-

esting and important results were obtained: (1) the study

region is characterized by increasing temperature, how-

ever, only temperature in autumn is in significant increas-

ing trend; (2) precipitation changes present different

properties. Generally, increasing precipitation can be

detected. However, only the precipitation in the Tienshan

mountain area is in significant increasing trend. Annual

streamflow of major rivers of the Tarim River basin are not

in significant trends, except that of the Akesu River which

is in significantly increasing trend. Due to the geomor-

phologic properties of the Tienshan mountain area, pre-

cipitation in this area demonstrates significant increasing

trend and which in turn leads to increasing streamflow of

the Akesu River. Due to the fact that the sources of

streamflow of the rivers in the Tarim River basin are pre-

cipitation and melting glacial, both increasing precipitation

and accelerating melting ice has the potential to cause

increasing streamflow. These results are of practical and

scientific merits in basin-scale water resource management

in the arid regions in China under the changing

environment.

Keywords Climate change � Mann–Kendall trend test �Water resources � The arid regions � Tarim River basin

1 Introduction

Water plays the key role in human society and nature

which greatly underscores the better understanding of how

changes in climate could affect regional water supplies,

particularly in the arid regions (Houghton et al. 2001; Xu

and Singh 2004; Hagg et al. 2007). The well-evidenced

global warming and associated impacts on human society

have drawn considerable concerns from academic circles,

public and governments. Labat et al. (2004) indicated that

the global warming led to alterations of the global hydro-

logical cycle and to the increase amplitude of the global

and continental runoff. Higher air temperatures result in

higher evaporation rates, higher atmospheric water vapor

content, and consequently, an accelerated hydrological

cycle (Menzel and Burger 2002; Xu et al. 2006; Zhang

et al. 2008a, b). Among the most significant potential

consequences of regional climate change are alterations in

regional hydrological cycles and subsequent changes in

river regimes. However, the model intercomparison

revealed that the relationship between the intensity of the

Q. Zhang (&) � T. Jiang

Department of Water Resources and Environment,

Sun Yat-sen University, 510275 Guangzhou, China

e-mail: zhangqnj@gmail.com

C.-Y. Xu

Department of Geosciences, University of Oslo,

PO Box 1047, Blindern, 0316 Oslo, Norway

H. Tao

Nanjing Institute of Geography and Limnology,

Chinese Academy of Science, 210008 Nanjing, China

Y. D. Chen

Department of Geography and Resource Management,

The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China

123

Stoch Environ Res Risk Assess (2010) 24:349–358

DOI 10.1007/s00477-009-0324-0

global hydrological cycle and global warming is not very

robust (Douville et al. 2006). In terms of a specific regional

scale, many studies reported large uncertainties in response

of precipitation changes to global warming (e.g. Douville

2006). Even though several studies indicated that the

anticipated global increase in precipitation may not be in

association with accelerated or accelerating water cycle as

a result of global warming (Bosilovich et al. 2005), many

studies have shown that the impacts of climatic changes on

global/regional water resources hinge on the influences of

climatic changes on the spatial and temporal distribution of

precipitation (e.g. Gao et al. 2007). Booij (2005) studied

the impact of climate change on floods in the river Meuse

(in western Europe), investigating variability and uncer-

tainty of impacts of climate changes on river floods. Thus,

it is necessary to better understand climate changes and

possible impacts on water resource from the viewpoint of

regional scale.

Global warming has the potential to alter the spatial and

temporal distribution of water resource, which exerts tre-

mendous influences on the ecological environment and the

agriculture development. Furthermore, the arid regions are

more sensitive to variability and availability of water

resource (in this study we only focus on ground-surface

water) when compared to the humid regions. Therefore,

good knowledge of variations of the water resource under

the changing climate by taking a typical arid region as a

case study is of great scientific and practical merits in

sound understanding of the hydrological response to the

climate changes and also in the water resource manage-

ment in the arid regions of the world. This is the major

motivation of this study. The north-west China is charac-

terized by arid and semi-arid climate. Variability and

availability of water resources have direct influences on

local eco-environmental conservation and sustainable

socio-economic development. The Tarim River is the

longest inland river in China with an annual flow of 4–6

billion cubic meters. About 10 million population including

ethnic minorities of Uyghurs and Mongolians live in this

valley. The climate of this river basin is characterized by

precipitation deficit and strong evaporation. Scientific

problems of climate changes and water resources have

drawn considerable concerns from academic circle (Feng

et al. 2001; Song et al. 2002; Ye et al. 2006). Shi et al.

(2003) indicated a transition from dry and warm climate to

wet and warm climate in the north-west China. Due to

paramount role of water resource in the sustainable

development of socio-economy in the northwest China and

distinct influences of climate changes on variability of

water resource, it is desirable to analyze climate changes of

the past decades, focusing on changes of precipitation and

temperature, and the possible influences on streamflow

variations, which forms the objective of the present study.

2 Study region: the Tarim River basin

The Tarim River is 1,321 km in length, running west to

east along the northern edge of the Taklimakan Desert. The

drainage area of the Tarim River Basin is 1.02 9 106 km2,

it is the largest inland river in China and is highly depen-

dent on the water supply by the TienShan, Kunlun, Eastern

Pamir and Karakorum high mountains that surround the

basin. There are 114 rivers in the Tarim River Basin,

forming 9 drainage systems: Aksu, Hotan, Yarkant,

Qarqan, Keriya, Dina, Kaxgar, Kaidu–Konqi Rivers. There

are only four headstreams (Hotan, Yarkand, Akesu and

Kaidu Rivers) feeding the mainstream of the Tarim River.

The annual mean air temperature is 10.6–11.5�C. Monthly

mean temperature is between 20 to 30�C in July and -10 to

-20�C in January. The extreme maximum and minimum

temperature of the Tarim River basin are 43.6 and

-27.5�C, respectively. The multi-annual mean precipitation

is 116.8 mm, wherein more than 80% of total precipitation

falls during May–September. The river is the most

important source of water in the arid lowlands of Tarim

Basin, with more than 8 million people living in oases

clustered along its banks and in an alluvial plain down-

stream. Due to its exceptional role in sustainable devel-

opment of local socio-economy, the central government of

China launched a five- year emergency water diversion

program in 2000 with 10.7 billion yuan (US$1.3 billion)

earmarked for the reclamation of the river and Taitema

Lake (Tao et al. 2008). There are some studies focusing on

the impacts of climate changes on water resource in the

Tarim River basin (e.g. Chen et al. 2006). However, the

previous studies focused on site-specific station, but not

comprehensive study in space and time, which tends to

limit our understanding of influences of climate changes on

water resources from the viewpoint of time and space.

Actually, climate changes do impact water resource vari-

ability in space and time. Therefore, it is necessary to

comprehensively analyze the climate changes and associ-

ated influences on water resource changes in time and

space. However, no such reports are available from view-

point of both space and time.

3 Data and methods

3.1 Data

Daily precipitation and temperature data for 1960–2005

were collected from 24 national standard rain stations in

the Tarim River basin (Fig. 1). There are a few missing

data in the daily precipitation and temperature dataset (less

than 0.01% of the total observations). The missing pre-

cipitation and temperature data are filled by the mean

350 Stoch Environ Res Risk Assess (2010) 24:349–358

123

values of the neighboring days. If more than two days have

missing data, we filled them with values of its neighboring

stations by building regressive relations between stations.

The results show the R2 value as high as [0.85. We con-

sider the gap filling method will have no influence on the

long-term temporal trend. Furthermore, the data consis-

tency was checked by the double-mass method and the

result revealed that all the data series used in the study are

consistent. Moreover, annual total streamflow dataset for

1957–2003 from six hydrological stations are collected and

analyzed to demonstrate long-term trend of streamflow

variations. Locations of these six hydrological stations can

be referred to Fig. 1 and more detailed information can be

referred to Table 1. The trends in this study only represent

the time interval considered in this study.

3.2 Methodology

There are many statistical techniques available to detect

trends within the time series such as moving average, linear

regression, Mann–Kendall trend test, filtering technology,

etc. Each method has its own strength and weakness in

trend detection. However, non-parametric trend detection

methods are less sensitive to outliers than are parametric

statistics such as Pearson’s correlation coefficient. More-

over, the rank-based nonparametric Mann–Kendall test

(Kendall 1975; Mann 1945) can test trends in a time series

without requiring normality or linearity, and is therefore

highly recommended for general use by the World

Meteorological Organization (Mitchell et al. 1966). The

Mann–Kendall trend test has been widely used in detection

of trends in meteorological and hydrological series (Chen

et al. 2007; Burn 2008). This paper also uses the Mann–

Kendall (MK) test method to analyze trends within the

precipitation, temperature and annual streamflow series

across the Tarim River basin. The procedure of MK trend

test adopted in this study is as follows:

First the MK test statistic is calculated as

S ¼Xn�1

i¼1

Xn

j¼iþ1

sgnðxj � xiÞ ð1Þ

where sgnðxj � xiÞ ¼þ1; xj [ xi

0; xj ¼ xi

�1; xj\xi

8<

:

Fig. 1 Location of the Tarim

River basin, rain gauging

stations and hydrological

stations

Table 1 Annual streamflow changes in the headstreams of Tarim River basin (1957–2005)

Water system Hydrological stations Drainage

area (km2)

Multi-annual

average streamflow

(108m3)

Percentage of

melting ice (%)

Significance

(0.05)

M–K

trend

Hotan River Tommguziluoke 14,575 22.27 61.11 No -0.52

Wuluwati 19,983 21.39 45.91 No -0.46

Aksu River Xiehela 12,816 48.67 21.9 Yes 4.41

Shaliguilanke 19,166 27.67 28.9 Yes 3.88

Yarkant River Kaqun 50,248 65.43 56.2 No 1.11

Kaidu River Dashankou 19,000 34.2 14.6 No 1.79

Stoch Environ Res Risk Assess (2010) 24:349–358 351

123

and n is the sample size. The statistics S is approximately

normally distributed when n C 8, with the mean and the

variance as follows:

E Sð Þ ¼ 0 ð2Þ

VðSÞ ¼ nðn� 1Þð2nþ 5Þ �Pn

i¼1 tiiði� 1Þð2iþ 5Þ18

ð3Þ

where ti is the number of ties of extent i.The standardized statistics (Z) for one-tailed test is

formulated as:

Z ¼

S�1ffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiVarðSÞp S [ 0

0 S ¼ 0Sþ1ffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiVarðSÞp S\0

8><

>:ð4Þ

At the 5% significance level, the null hypothesis of no

trend is rejected if |Z| [ 1.96.

Influence elimination of serial correlation (if it is sig-

nificant at [95% confidence level) on the Mann–Kendall

(MK) test has been discussed (Khaled and Rao 1998; Yue

and Wang 2002). 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 the

presence of serial correlation on the MK test. The proce-

dure 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

significance of the trend was tested at [95% confidence

level.

Moreover, the simple linear regression method, a

parametric T test method, is also used in this paper to

detect long-term trends within the hydro-meteorological

series. The computation procedure consists of two steps,

fitting a linear simple regression equation with the time t

as independent variable and the hydrological variable (in

this case areal average temperature, precipitation and

annual streamflow series), Y as dependent variable, and

testing the statistical significance of the slope of the

regression equation. The parametric T test requires the

data to be tested is normally distributed. The normality

of the data series is first tested in the study by applying

the Kolmogorov–Smirnov test. The method first com-

pares the specified theoretical cumulative distribution

function (in our case normal distribution) with the

sample cumulative density function based on observa-

tions, then calculates the maximum deviation, D, of the

two. If, for the chosen significance level, the observed

value of D is greater than or equal to the critical tabu-

lated value of the Kolmogorov–Smirnov statistic, the

hypothesis of normal distribution is rejected.

4 Results and discussion

4.1 Precipitation and temperature changes

In the Tarim River basin, precipitation mainly occurs during

May–August. November, December, January and February

are the dry months (Fig. 2). High monthly mean temperature

is observed mainly during June-August and low monthly

mean temperature in December, January and February

(Fig. 2). Before further trend detection analysis, we per-

formed thorough analysis on the serial persistence within the

meteor-hydrological series station by station in the Tarim

River basin. For the size of this paper, we can not demon-

strate all the results here. Thus, we just show autocorrelation

analysis results of three series randomly selected from the

dataset. Figure 3 illustrates parts of the results for case

studies. It can be seen from Fig. 3 that the series include

independent observations both for annual streamflow series

and for annual mean temperature and annual precipitation

series at 95% confidence level. This result justifies the

application of MK trend detection technique in this study.

Even so, we still considered possible influences of serial

persistence within the series on the MK trend detection based

on the method mentioned in the Methodology section.

4.2 Spatial distribution of trends of precipitation

and temperature changes

Precipitation and temperature changes exert considerable

influence on availability of water resources from the

viewpoint of space and time. Figures 4 and 5 demonstrate

spatial patterns of seasonal precipitation and temperature

changes in the Tarim River basin. It can be seen from

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 120

0.2

0.4

0.6

0.8

Pre

cipi

tatio

n (m

m) A

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12−10

0

10

20

30

Tem

pera

ture

( o C

) B

Fig. 2 Long term areal monthly average precipitation (a) and

temperature (b) of the Tarim River basin (1960–2005)

352 Stoch Environ Res Risk Assess (2010) 24:349–358

123

Fig. 4a that stations characterized by significant increasing

annual precipitation changes mainly concentrated in the

regions north to the Taklimakan Desert. Specifically, sig-

nificant increasing precipitation can be observed mainly in

the Toxkan River, Kargar River, Weigan River and Kaidu

River. No significant annual precipitation changes can be

detected in west, south-west and south parts of the Tarim

River basin. With respect to precipitation changes in spring

(Fig. 4b), summer (Fig. 4c), autumn (Fig. 4d) and winter

(Fig. 4e), more stations show significant increasing pre-

cipitation in summer when compared to other three sea-

sons, i.e. spring, autumn and winter. In summer, 10 out of

24 stations exhibit significant increasing precipitation,

accounting for 41.7% of total stations studied in this paper.

Only 1–3 stations show significant increasing precipitation

in other three seasons (Figs. 4b, d, e). Stations with sig-

nificant increasing precipitation in summer distribute spo-

radically and widely across the whole Tarim River basin.

However, comparatively, stations also seem to converge to

the north parts of the Tarim River basin, Weigan and Dina

rivers in particular. Stations with significant precipitation in

winter also concentrate in this area (Fig. 4e).

When compared to precipitation changes, more stations

in the Tarim River basin show significant increasing tem-

perature (Fig. 5). For annual temperature changes, only 3

out of 24 stations show no significant temperature trends.

Comparatively, more stations show no significant temper-

ature changes in spring than in summer, autumn and

winter. This point is further corroborated by our previous

study (Zhang et al. 2008c). In autumn, 22 out of 24 stations

show significant increasing temperature trend, accounting

for 91.7% of total stations studied in this paper. In general,

more significant increasing temperature trends are identi-

fied in autumn and winter. In summer, 16 out of 24 stations

exhibit significant increasing temperature trends, account-

ing for 66.7% of the total stations studied in the paper.

Generally, stations characterized by no significant tem-

perature trends are found mainly in the west part of the

Tarim River basin.

4.3 Changes of streamflow and glacier in the main

tributaries

Generally speaking, streamflow changes are mainly the

results of precipitation changes. Runoff in the June–August

flood season accounts for 60–80% of the annual total

runoff (Chen et al. 2003). However, due to unique climatic

properties and geographical location of the Tarim River

basin, streamflow changes of the Tarim River basin are also

partly influenced by temperature changes due to the fact

that temperature can impact melting of glacier and evap-

oration variations. Glacier melt and snowmelt make up

48.2% of the total runoff of the river (Chen et al. 2006).

Glaciers, snowmelt and precipitation in the surrounding

mountains are the source of runoff for the Tarim River.

Therefore, it is important to analyze the streamflow chan-

ges and possible impacts from temperature and melting ice,

and to discuss possible contribution of snowmelt to the

changes of streamflow variations of the Tarim River basin.

It can be seen from Fig. 6 that different changing

characteristics can be observed for streamflow changes of

hydrological gauging stations in the main tributaries of the

Tarim River basin. More detailed information of these

hydrological stations and significance of trends can be

referred to Table 1. Increasing streamflow trends can be

detected in Xiehela station, Shaliguilanke station, Kaqun

station and Dashankou station and it is particularly the case

for the Xiehela, Shaliguilanke and Dashankou stations.

Figure 1 shows that these three stations are located in the

north Tarim River basin. Figure 6 also demonstrates larger

increasing magnitude of streamflow of the Xiehela,

Shaliguilanke and Dashankou stations can be found after

about 1990s when precipitation and temperature are also

characterized by abrupt increase (Xu et al. 2004).

Decreasing trends of streamflow changes can be identified

in Tommguziluoke station and Wuluwati station (Fig. 6).

Table 1 indicates that significant trends can be detected

only for Xiehela station and Shaliguilanke station of the

Aksu River. The streamflow changes of other four stations

are not significant at[95% confidence level. Figure 6 also

indicates slight trough values of streamflow for the six

0 5 10 15−0.5

0

0.5

1A

CF

0 5 10 15−0.5

0

0.5

1

AC

F

0 5 10 15−0.5

0

0.5

1

Lag time

AC

F

Autocorrelation analysis for annual streamflow series

Autocorrelation analysis for annual precipitation series

Autocorrelation analysis for annual temperature series

Fig. 3 Autocorrelation analysis of meteor-hydrological series of the

Tarim River basin. All the meteor-hydrological series of the Tarim

River basin were analyzed station by station for serial persistence

detection. The series in this figure are shown as a case study. The

dashed lines denote 95% confidence level. ACF means autocorrela-

tion functions

Stoch Environ Res Risk Assess (2010) 24:349–358 353

123

hydrological stations during about 1980–1995. Figures 1

and 4 indicate that hydrological stations with significant

increasing streamflow changes are located in the regions

where stations with significant increasing annual precipi-

tation stand. Because most stations show significant

increasing temperature trends and these stations distribute

sporadically and widely across the Tarim River basin, no

fixed and confirmed relations can be established between

streamflow changes and temperature changes. Decreasing

streamflow of Tommguziluoke station and Wuluwati

station may be partly due to no significant precipitation

trends in the west and southwest parts of the Tarim River

basin. Furthermore, although the glacial meltwater account

a large proportion of the streamflow of Hotan river

(Table 1), most of the glaciers of this sub-basin mainly

locate in the temperature dropping belt in the north of

Tibetan Plateau (Shi et al. 2006). This result also further

elucidated the possible causes behind the decreasing

streamflow in Wuluwati and Tommguziluoke stations.

Changes of glacier and number of advancing glaciers

may well explain streamflow changes (Table 2; Liu et al.

2006). Table 2 lists glacier changes of four major tribu-

taries: Aksu River, Kaidu River, Hotan River and Yarkant

River. The least percentage of glacier area changes and

large number of advancing of glaciers are observed in the

Hotan River basin. Glaciers in the Kaidu River and Aksu

River have the large percentage of changes and also large

number of advancing glaciers. This may be due to signifi-

cant increasing precipitation and no significant changes

of temperature in this particular region. Streamflow of

Dashankou, Xiehela and Shaliguilanke stations is in

increasing trends and the increasing trends of streamflow

series of Xiehela and Shaliguilanke stations are significant

at 95% confidence level.

A

B C

D E

Fig. 4 Spatial distribution of MK trends within precipitation changes

in the Tarim basin, China. a Annual, b spring, c summer, d autumn,

e winter. Filled triangle denotes significant increasing trend; filled

inverted triangle denotes significant decreasing trend; and open circledenotes no significant trend

354 Stoch Environ Res Risk Assess (2010) 24:349–358

123

5 Conclusions and discussions

Based on daily temperature and precipitation dataset of 24

stations and annual streamflow series of 6 hydrological

stations in the Tarim River basin, the typical arid region in

China, we analyzed changing characteristics of seasonal

precipitation and temperature changes from the standpoint

of space and time. Possible impacts of snowmelt, precipi-

tation and temperature on hydrological process of the

Tarim River basin during past 40 years have also been

discussed. Some interesting conclusions can be drawn in

terms of climatic changes and associated impacts on

availability and variability of water resource of the Tarim

River basin.

Climatic changes of the Tarim River basin are charac-

terized by increasing precipitation and temperature.

Increasing precipitation can be observed mainly in

summer. Increasing temperature seems to occur mainly in

winter when compared to other three seasons. Besides,

increasing temperature changes seem to be more prevailing

when compared to changes of precipitation. Significant

increasing precipitation can be observed mainly in the

regions north to the Taklimakan Desert. More stations

show significant increasing precipitation in summer when

compared to that in spring, autumn and winter. More sta-

tions show significant increasing temperature. Stations with

no significant increasing temperature locate in the west and

north parts of the Tarim River basin.

Distribution of annual precipitation changes match well

with distribution of stations with significant increasing

streamflow, showing considerable impacts of annual

precipitation changes on annual streamflow variations.

Larger-magnitude of increase of annual streamflow can be

detected at the Xiehela, Shaliguilanke and Dashankou

A

B

D E

C

Fig. 5 Spatial distribution of MK trends within temperature changes

in the Tarim basin, China. a Annual, b spring, c summer, d autumn,

e winter. Filled triangle denotes significant increasing trend; filled

inverted triangle denotes significant decreasing trend; and open circledenotes no significant trend

Stoch Environ Res Risk Assess (2010) 24:349–358 355

123

stations. Increasing precipitation and temperature are also

found in these regions. Larger-magnitude of increase of

annual streamflow in this region after 1990s corresponds

well to the abrupt increase of precipitation and tempera-

ture. Southwest parts of the Tarim River basin where the

Tongguziluoke, Wuluwati and Kaqun stations locate are

dominated by not significant increasing precipitation and

temperature changes. Besides, the least percentage of

glacier area and large number of advancing of glaciers

observed in the Hotan River basin can also explain not

significant streamflow and even decreasing streamflow

changes in the southwest parts of the Tarim River basin.

What aforementioned further illustrates tremendous influ-

ences of climate changes on water resources within the

Tarim River basin. Increasing snowmelt also contributes to

the changes of streamflow. River basins with larger per-

centage of area changes of glacier are usually characterized

by significant increasing streamflow. Hydrological stations

in the Kaidu River, Aksu River and Yarkant River show

increasing streamflow series. However, decreasing

streamflow changes can be identified in the Hotan River

which seem to correspond to smaller percentage of area

changes of glacier.

It should be noted here that impacts of climatic

changes on water resources are complicated. Far more

driving factors than precipitation, temperature and snow-

melt can influence spatial and temporal changes of water

resource of the Tarim River basin. Furthermore, compli-

cated interplay can be expected between driving factors.

Increasing temperature may cause increasing snowmelt

and increasing precipitation may also give rise to

increasing area of glacier. It should be noted there that the

Tarim River basin is characterized by the extreme arid

climate with an annual rainfall of less than 50 mm but the

potential evaporation of more than 2,000 mm (Xu et al.

2004). Therefore, increasing temperature may cause

increasing evaporation and which may cause decreasing

loss of streamflow. Human activities, e.g. human with-

drawal of water, irrigation, and so on, will further alter

availability of water resource. Large-scale anthropogenic

1960 1970 1980 1990 2000

15

20

25

30

35

Str

eam

flow

(10

8 m3 )

1960 1970 1980 1990 2000

15

20

25

30

1960 1970 1980 1990 2000

40

50

60

Str

eam

flow

(10

8 m3 )

1960 1970 1980 1990 2000

20

25

30

35

40

1960 1970 1980 1990 2000

50

60

70

80

90

Str

eam

flow

(10

8 m3 )

1960 1970 1980 1990 2000

30

40

50

Tommguziluoke st. Wuluwati st.

Xiehela st. Shaliguilanke st.

Kaqun st. Dashankou st.

Fig. 6 Annual streamflow

changes of major tributaries of

the Tarim River basin. Annual

streamflow changes of Xiehela

and Shaliguilanke are

significant at [95% confidence

level

Table 2 Glacier changes in the main tributaries of the Tarim River in recent 40 years

Rivers Time interval Number

of glaciers

Glacial

area (km2)

Changes

of area

Percentage

of changes (%)

Number of advancing

glaciers

Aksu River 1963–1999 247 1760.7 -58.6 -3.3 126

Kaidu River 1963–2000 462 333.1 -38.5 -11.6 98

Hotan River 1968–1999 757 2620.6 -37.1 -1.4 204

Yarkant River 1968–1999 565 2707.3 -111.1 -4.1 85

356 Stoch Environ Res Risk Assess (2010) 24:349–358

123

activities such as agriculture irrigation and random rec-

lamation in the upper and middle reaches of the Tarim

River have triggered the disintegration of the natural

hydrology (Tao et al. 2008). However, increasing pre-

cipitation in the headwater source, to a certain degree,

may mitigate deficit of water resource in the Tarim River

basin. This will definitely benefit the development of local

agriculture activities. However, extensive agricultural

activities caused increasing diversion of the freshwater to

the new reclamation land. Therefore, the increasing

streamflow in the headwater of the Tarim River basin

may not satisfy the water demand of human activities,

particularly the agricultural development, in the middle

and lower Tarim River basin. Thus, it still calls for sci-

entific, sound and effective water resource management

on the river basin scale aiming to cater for the booming

development of agriculture and fast population growth.

Investigation on the relationship between climate changes

and the availability of water resources is beneficial for the

efficient water resources management (Bordi and Sutera

2001). The results of this paper may provide scientific

framework for basin-scale water resource management

and human mitigation to water resource variability under

the changing environment in the Tarim River basin.

Acknowledgments The work described in this paper was finan-

cially supported by the ‘985 Project’ (Grant No.: 37000-3171315),

the innovative project from Nanjing Institute of Geography and

Limnology, CAS (Grant No.: CXNIGLAS200814), National Scientific

and Technological Support Program (Grant No.: 2007BAC03A0604),

Key Laboratory of Oasis Ecology and Desert Environment, Xinjiang

Institute of Ecology and Geography, CAS (Grant No.: 05710401), and

by Program of Introducing Talents of Discipline to Universities—the

111 Project of Hohai University. Cordial thanks should be extended to

the editor-in-chief, Prof. Dr. George Christakos and two anonymous

reviewers for their constructive suggestions and comments which

greatly helped to improve the quality of this paper.

References

Booij MJ (2005) Impact of climate change on river flooding assessed

with different spatial model resolutions. J Hydrol 303:176–198

Bordi I, Sutera A (2001) Fifty years of precipitation: some spatially

remote teleconnections. Water Resour Manag 15(4):247–280

Bosilovich MG, Schubert SD, Walker GK (2005) Global changes of

the water cycle intensity. J Clim 18:1591–1608

Burn DH (2008) Climatic influences on streamflow timing in the

headwaters of the Mackenzie River Basin. J Hydrol 352(1–2):

225–238

Chen YN, Li WH, Chen YP, Zhang HF (2003) Water resources and

ecological problems in Tarim River Basin, Xinjiang, China. In:

Wilderer PA, Zhu J, Schwarzenbeck N (eds) Water and

environmental management. IWA, London, pp 3–12

Chen YN, Takeuchi K, Xu C, Chen YP, Xu ZX (2006) Regional

climate change and its effects on river runoff in the Tarim Basin,

China. Hydrol Process 20:2207–2216

Chen H, Guo SL, Xu C-Y, Singh VP (2007) Historical temporal

trends of hydro-climatic variables and runoff response to climate

variability and their relevance in water resource management in

the Hanjiang basin. J Hydrol 344(3-4):171–184

Douville H (2006) Impact of regional SST anomalies on the indian

monsoon response to global warming in the CNRM climate

model. J Clim 19(10):2008–2024

Douville H, Salas-Melia D, Tyteca (2006) On the tropical origin of

uncertainties in the global land precipitation response to global

warming. Clim Dyn 26:367–385

Feng Q, Endo KN, Cheng GD (2001) Towards sustainable develop-

ment of the environmentally degraded arid rivers of China-a case

study from Tarim River. Environ Geol 4:229–238

Gao G, Chen D, Xu C-Y, Simelton E (2007) Trend of estimated actual

evapotranspiration over China during 1960-2002. J Geophys Res

Atmos 112:D11120. doi:10.1029/2006JD008010

Hagg W, Braun LN, Kuhn M, Nesgaard TI (2007) Modelling of

hydrological response to climate change in glacierized Central

Asian catchments. J Hydrol 332:40–53

Houghton JT, Ding Y, Griggs DJ, Noguer M, van der Linden PJ, Dai

X, Maskell K, Johnson CA (eds) (2001) Climate Change 2001:

the scientific basis, third assessment report of the intergovern-

mental panel on climate change. Cambridge University Press,

Cambridge

Kendall MG (1975) Rank correlation methods. Griffin, London

Khaled HH, Rao AR (1998) A modified Mann–Kendall trend test for

autocorrelated data. J Hydrol 204(1–4):182–196

Labat D, Godderis Y, Probst JL, Guyot JL (2004) Evidence for global

runoff increase related to climate warming. Adv Water Resour

27:631–642

Liu SY, Ding YJ, Shangguan DH (2006) Glacier retreat as a result of

climate warming and increased precipitation in the Tarim River

Basin, northwest China. Ann Glaciol 43:91–96

Mann HB (1945) Nonparametric tests against trend. Econometrica

13:245–259

Menzel L, Burger G (2002) Climate change scenarios and runoff

response in the Mulde catchment (Southern Elbe, Germany).

J Hydrol 267:53–64

Mitchell JM, Dzerdzeevskii B, Flohn H, Hofmeyr WL, Lamb HH,

Rao KN, Wallen CC (1966) Climate change, WMO Technical

Note No. 79, World Meteorological Organization, pp 79

Shi YF, Shen YP, Li DL (2003) Transition from warm and dry

climate to warm and humid climate in the north west China.

Meteorological Press, Beijing (in Chinese)

Shi YF, Liu SY, ShangGuan DH (2006) Two peculiar phenomena of

climatic and glacial variations in the Tibetan Plateau. Adv Clim

Change Res (in Chinese) 2(4):154–160

Song YD, Wang RH, Peng YS (2002) Water resources and ecological

conditions in the Tarim. Sci China (Ser D) 45:11–17

Tao H, Marco G, Song YD, Su BD, Jiang T (2008) Eco-hydrological

responses on water division in the lower reaches of the Tarim

River, China. Water Resour Res 44:W08422. doi:10.1029/

2007WR006186

Xu C-Y, Singh VP (2004) Review on regional water resources

assessment models under stationary and changing climate. Water

Resour Manag 18:591–612

Xu Z, Chen Y, Li J (2004) Impact of climate change on water

resources in the Tarim River basin. Water Resour Manag

18:439–458

Xu C-Y, Gong L, Jiang T, Chen D, Singh VP (2006) Analysis of spatial

distribution and temporal trend of reference evapotranspiration in

Changjiang (Yangtze River) catchment. J Hydrol 327:81–93

Ye M, Xu HL, Song YD (2006) Water resource and associate

changing trends of the Tarim River basin. Chinese Sci Bull

51:14–20 (in Chinese)

Yue S, Wang CY (2002) Applicability of prewhitening to eliminate

the influence of serial correlation on the Mann–Kendall test.

Water Resour Res 38(6):1068. doi:10.1029/2001WR000861

Stoch Environ Res Risk Assess (2010) 24:349–358 357

123

Yue S, Wang CY (2004) The Mann–Kendall test modified by

effective sample size to detect trend in serially correlated

hydrological series. Water Resour Manag 18:201–218

Zhang Q, Xu C-Y, Zhang Z, Chen YD, Liu C-L (2008a) Spatial and

temporal variability of precipitation maxima during 1960–2005

in the Yangtze River basin and possible association with large-

scale circulation. J Hydrol 353:215–227

Zhang Q, Xu C-Y, Gemmer M, Chen YD, Liu C-L (2008b) Changing

properties of precipitation concentration in the Pearl River basin,

China. Stoch Env Res Risk A 23(3):377–385

Zhang Q, Xu C-Y, Zhang Z, Chen YD (2008c) Changes of

temperature extremes for 1960–2004 in Far-West China. Stoch

Environ Res Risk Assess. doi:10.1007/s00477-008-0252-4

358 Stoch Environ Res Risk Assess (2010) 24:349–358

123