Future Water Supply Projections in Ethiopia Under Climate Change Using
NASA NEX-GDDP and LDAS Simulations
Abstract
Ethiopia’s socioeconomic development is strongly dependent on both its
natural resources and hydroclimatic dynamics. Current and projected
effects of climate change and variability in the Horn of Africa pose an
enormous challenge to the country’s water resources management. We
modeled multi-basin runoff scenarios in the country by calibrating
statistical models first followed by extrapolation of the regressed
functions into a future data domain under assumptions of stationarity.
Precipitation and average near-surface air temperature predictors were
used to calibrate Generalized Linear Models (GLM) to project 2011-2070
monthly runoff in a high-emission scenario (RCP 8.5) for selected
General Circulation Models (GCM). Gridded fields of downscaled and
bias-corrected precipitation, Tmax and
Tmin for 10 CMIP5 GCMs were obtained from the NASA
NEX-GDDP database. Hydrologic simulations from the NASA Land Data
Assimilation System (LDAS) were used as proxies of observational basin
response. Noah-MP’s climate forcings (CHIRPS precipitation and MERRA
temperatures) were used to perform additional bias-correction over
basin-averaged predictors extracted from the NEX-GDDP ensemble models.
Monthly mean estimates for precipitation/temperature projections showed
wetter/warmer conditions than the baseline for almost all regions.
2011-2040 July temperature climatology in most GCMs exhibited the
strongest warming (> 1.5C o) in Central
Ethiopia and it gradually decreased northwards and southwards.
Correlation analysis showed that precipitation variations explain most
of runoff variability during the rainy seasons. Future GLM runoff
estimates suggest a generalized national increase of mean annual water
supply when compared with historical LDAS, although spatio-temporal
differences were observed across the country. The mentioned hydrological
gains are driven by spatially distributed changes in precipitation with
the biggest positive trends in the southeastern region followed by
moderate precipitation increases in the Central Highlands and neutral
changes in the Northwest. Few GCMs (e.g., GFDL-CM3) project drier
conditions in the rainy seasons and a slight decrease in the mean annual
runoff for most basins. The wettest model in the Abay basin,
IPSL-CM5A-LR, predicts 15% increase in annual runoff when compared to
historical averages.