Assessment of Climate Change Scenarios on the Yukon River Basin

• Main Author: Yembu, John Ngwembo
• Format: Text
• Language: unknown
• Published: InSPIRe @ Redlands 2012
• Subjects: GIS; climate change; climate modeling; hydrologic impact; Yukon River; Climate; Fresh Water Studies; Geographic Information Sciences; Water Resource Management; Yukon; Yukon river
• Online Access: https://inspire.redlands.edu/gis_gradproj/158; https://inspire.redlands.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1159&context=gis_gradproj

There are indications that the climate is going to experience drastic change in the future, as it has occurred in the past and is currently happening now. Climate simulations have shown some potential hydrologic effects of climate change in the Yukon River Basin due to changes in temperature and precipitation. The Yukon River Inter-Tribal Watershed Council currently does not utilize spatial software to manage, analyze, or produce maps of climate change scenarios in the Yukon River basin. It is important to create a geodatabase, determine differences in climate change scenarios, and calculate peak discharge rates in the different regions using geospatial techniques. Climate modeling is one of the best tools available to determine the trends in future climate. In this project, the temperature and precipitation differences for the 20th century (1980-1999) and mid-century (2040-2059), were determined with data from the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), Community Climate System Model (CCSM), indicating a future increase in temperature and precipitation. The U.S. Geological Survey regression equations, basin characteristics, and PythonWin were used to create a Python script and tool to calculate peak discharge rates. The methods used in this project allow it to be easily adapted for future projects in the Yukon River Basin.