Assessment of climate change impacts on water resources

Abstract

Rapid socio–economic development leads to a great increase in water demand of many sectors and conflicts between water users. Moreover, studies have warned about serious degree of influence of climate change (CC) on Vietnam, particularly on the water resources. Therefore, assess CC impacts on water balances are very necessary task. The Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment has completed the appropriate climate change scenarios in Vietnam [1]. In this study, water balance results will be presented including three scenarios: high emissions scenario (A2), medium emission scenario (B2), and low emission scenario (B1). The water balanced in Hong-Thai Binh river basin was calculated, which is one of the largest basins in Vietnam. The basin is very complicated: Under the influence of flow regime of international rivers [2], a system of reservoirs and irrigation structures serving diverse purposes, such as of water supply, irrigation, flood control and hydropower [3-5]. MIKE BASIN model was applied to describe exploitation, utilization and to identify the water shortage areas according to the climate change scenarios.