Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 18, 3837–3853, 2014 www.hydrol-earth-syst-sci.net/18/3837/2014/ doi:10.5194/hess-18-3837-2014 © Author(s) 2014. CC Attribution 3.0 License. Flow regime change in an endorheic basin in southern Ethiopia F. F. Worku1,4,5, M. Werner1,2, N. Wright1,3,5, P. van der Zaag1,5, and S. S. Demissie6 1UNESCO-IHE Institute for Water Education, P.O. Box 3015, 2601 DA Delft, the Netherlands 2Deltares, P.O. Box 177, 2600 MH Delft, the Netherlands 3University of Leeds, School of Civil Engineering, Leeds, UK 4Arba Minch University, Institute of Technology, P.O. Box 21, Arba Minch, Ethiopia 5Department of Water Resources, Delft University of Technology, P.O. Box 5048, 2600 GA Delft, the Netherlands 6Ethiopian Institute of Water Resources, Addis Ababa University, P.O. Box 150461, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia Correspondence to: F. F. Worku (
[email protected]) Received: 29 December 2013 – Published in Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci. Discuss.: 29 January 2014 Revised: – – Accepted: 20 August 2014 – Published: 30 September 2014 Abstract. Endorheic basins, often found in semi-arid and 1 Introduction arid climates, are particularly sensitive to variation in fluxes such as precipitation, evaporation and runoff, resulting in Understanding the hydrology of a river and its historical flow variability of river flows as well as of water levels in end- characteristics is essential for water resources planning, de- point lakes that are often present. In this paper we apply veloping ecosystem services, and carrying out environmen- the indicators of hydrological alteration (IHA) to characterise tal flow assessments.