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Using GIS Technology to Assess the Impact of Climate Change on Water Resources in Saudi Arabia Faisal Macci Al Zawad

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Using GIS Technology to Assess the Impact of Climate Change on Water Resources in Saudi Arabia Faisal Macci Al Zawad Using GIS Technology to assess the Impact of Climate Change on Water Resources in Saudi Arabia Faisal Macci Al Zawad Presidency of Meteorology and Environment, Dammam 31911 Saudi Arabia, [email protected] , (+966)38571428 1. ABSTRACT An attempt to use GIS technology (ArcGIS 9.2) to compare the present climate to the future is carried out using local meteorological data and output data from an advanced climate model. Surface temperature, precipitation, surface evaporation, surface wind speeds, and runoff will be studied to gain insight on the impacts of climate change on water resources of Saudi Arabia. Historical data from various meteorological stations is provided by the Presidency of Meteorology and Environment (PME). The United Kingdom Meteorological Office provided future General Circulation Model (GCM) data, reanalysis griddled data that best represent the actual observation (ERA40), and a software called “PRECIS” stands for “Providing Regional Climates for Impact Studies” that can be run on a personal computer. The results of running PRECIS by using GCM and reanalysis data will provide high resolution information (50 km) about various climate fields. Precipitation, surface evaporation, wind speed and near surface temperature (1.5 m height) are investigated. The subtractions of evaporation from precipitation will lead to identifying the sensitive locations affected by climate change with respect to water resources perspective. Adapting A 2 scenario which is described by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel of Climate Change (IPCC), an increase of more than 4 degrees Celsius of the daily mean temperature over Saudi Arabia is apparent. The results of precipitation, winds, and evaporation vary, but a dominant increase of both precipitation and evaporation, and a decrease in wind speed at the surface are common. Substantial percentages increases in runoff are detected from 100 to 350 percents. Saudi Arabia is divided into six regions and thirty seven locations to be analyzed in this study. GIS technology presented an excellent opportunity to present my findings, and help me achieve my objectives with relative ease. In short, GIS made the results of my research look good, and helped me in validating the climate model I am using and assisted in analyzing the selected climate fields. Key wards: GIS, Climate Change, Water Resources, Saudi Arabia 1 2. Introduction Climate change issues are discussed widely around the world. Many scientists relate global warming and its consequences to human activities and not to natural fluctuations. The reasoning of this approach is the time scale of climate change. Recent warming of the earth is considered to be abrupt compared to the time scale usually accompanied with natural climate change episodes. Earth’s natural climate changes happen gradually in a long period of time (tens of thousands to millions of years), but we are witnessing an abrupt change over the past 200 years. The industrial revolution with fossil fuels as its main source of energy is setting a steady emission increase of Carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases which trap heat causing an increase of temperature in the lower atmosphere. Climate change is recognized as an important issue, and international communities through the United Nations created special groups to focus on climate change effects and initiated protocols to organize a global response to deal with its consequences. Unusually strong tropical storms, heavy precipitations causing a devastating floods, more frequent heat waves, frequents drought and other similar events are connected to a modern climate change. The UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, refer to climate change as the “defining issue of our era,” and the government of Saudi Arabia has recognized that by signing Kyoto Protocol. This calls, among others, for implementation of commitment to stabilize greenhouse emissions and furnish a report about the current status of climate change to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) on the status of greenhouse gases and climate change impacts and mitigation. 2.1 Climate Change and Hydrology: C limate is a complex system (Figure 1a); it involves air, water, ice, land and various interactions like water cycle and greenhouse effects. Water is the bond that brings climate and hydrology together. Figure 1a Figure 1b Figure 1a shows the climate system’s interactions. Any changes in solar inputs, the atmosphere, or the hydrological cycle will affect the interactions among the atmosphere, the hydrosphere, the cryosphere and the biosphere. The impacts of climate change will be devastating to rivers, lakes, sea level, vegetation, ecosystems and many others. Figure 1b represents published studies showing the increase in global mean surface temperature’s. The studies point to a steady increase in temperature during the 20 th century and unprecedented increase in the last 50 years. The source is (Treut, and et al, AR4WG1, 2007). 2 The mean earth temperature has been on the rise for the past 150 years in an abrupt manner (Figure 1b), and expected to increase further by the end of the twenty first century with the doubling of the current atmospheric carbon dioxide. Climate change interacts with various natural processes in the atmosphere, the hydrosphere, the cryosphere and the biosphere. There is an increasing evidence that anthropogenic (caused by human’s activities) gases are to blame in causing the climate change (Treut, and et al, AR4WG1, 2007). Studying the future state of water resources in a changing climate requires a common ground of approximation. The hydrologist would like to get specific information about future precipitation, temperature, evaporation, runoff and others on a specific location like an aquifer or a watershed which is mostly on a scale of less than 10 5 km 2 (Loaiciga 1997). On the other hand Climatologist run global climate models (GCMs) with a resolution around 300 km to predict the future. From here the need to run a Regional Climate Model (RCM) arise, to include topographical and higher resolution to give more precise reading for the hydrologist. This technique is called nesting and presented in figure 2. Figure 2: nesting from GCM to RCM to a watershed (Loa´iciga, 2007). Using précis as the RCM with grid resolution of 50 km, it was possible to assess the regional changes in temperature, precipitations, and other climate fields, and assign highly accurate values for each station in this study. Climate change is a global issue, but knowing its effect on water resources in a small area requires a great deal of information and analysis. The climate of Saudi Arabia is arid with insignificant contribution to water recharging. Overexploitation of fossil groundwater is apparent everywhere in the Kingdom. No matter what will the future bring, being aware of the state of climate change and its impacts on water resources can be of a great benefit to the nation and consist of essential information to aid in protecting and managing the water resources. 3. Problem Statement The importance of water and air in our daily life is clear to everyone, though they represent fragile earth resources that can change abruptly at times. Understanding the mechanics of climate change provide us with an essential need to prepare for the future. Saudi Arabia has huge ancient groundwater 3 reserves that are continuously under increasing demand. The total number of wells in Saudi Arabia increased by more than 100 % from 1982 to 1990, and the total irrigation demand in 1997 was 22933.4 million cubic meters (Rasheeduddin, Abderrahman, Lloyd, 2001). This type of research is applied over Saudi Arabia for the first time and will open many opportunities to investigate the effects of climate change on various sectors and resources in Saudi Arabia. In this study we will shed a light on what is expected to face us with regards to precipitation, wind speeds, runoff, temperature and evaporation. This information can point the sensitive areas that might be affected by climate change, and help in designing a proper plan to manage our water resources. This research will provide future climate variables for scenario A2 which calls for high emission of Carbon Dioxide and explosion of the world population (Treut, and et al, AR4WG1, 2007). Those climate variables can be used by hydrologist to predict the effects of climate change on the recharge of aquifers, and consequently the future status of aquifers in terms of storage and yields by implementing available hydrologic models. 4. PRECIS GCM data covering the region of Saudi Arabia are provided by United Kingdom Met Office. Those data will be used to run a licensed RCM called “PRECIS” that can be initiated at a resolution of 50 km or 25 km. The resolution of 50 km is chosen. because a 25 km run will take 6 times the amount of times needed to run experiments with 50 km resolution. PRECIS (Providing Regional Climates for Impact Studies) is a regional climate modeling system that can be run on a PC. The United Kingdom Met Office’s Hadley Center for Climate Prediction and Research is the provider and the developer of this software. The data for the boundary condition is supplied by the Hadley Center Global Climate Model (GCM), UK Met Office. PRECIS comes with a user interface to carry on climate experiments (Jones, and etal, 2004). Prediction of future climate change is done globally with world wide support through United Nations organizations. Very few countries have the capability to designate a dedicated group of highly trained scientists and provide extremely fast computers to run GCMs’ models to generate climate change scenarios, and perform the necessary analysis to investigate the regional impacts of climate change on their specific regions. The United Nations Development Program (UNDP), The UK Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA), and the UK Department of International Development started funding PRECIS to be available to developing countries to generate their own climate change scenarios with using a personal computer only.
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