| The adverse impacts of global warming on a range of natural and socio-economic systems are unavoidable in the future. Thus, reliable assessments of climate change impacts on water resources are essential for developing efficient adaptation and mitigation strategies. General Circulation Model (GCM) projections provide an important basis to draw those strategies for policy making. Accordingly, this study evaluated the impact of future (2081-2100) climate change on the water resources of the Andong watershed in South Korea by investigating changes in precipitation and river discharges. A ranking method was employed based on the representation of the simulated regional climate conditions of a particular region and their performance indices during historical period (1981-200) and selected 11 GCMs out of 45 GCMs, which were participated in CMIP-5 experiments. The selected GCMs were statistically bias-corrected and used to project mean and extreme precipitations at the basin scale and river discharges at Andong Dam location using the calibrated hydrological model under two Representative Concentration Pathways (RCPs) scenarios (i.e., RCP4.5 and RCP8.5). The results showed that the basin averaged precipitation will increase under both RCP4.5 (~15%) and RCP8.5 (~22%) scenarios on average. Particularly, the mean intensity of daily extreme precipitation will increase for both scenarios. Conversely, the mean number of long dry spells (continuous dry days ? 10 days) were projected to increase for both RCP4.5 (~8%) and RCP8.5 (~16%) scenarios. The mean annual discharge will increase in future, particularly for RCP8.5 scenario. These results can support for the water resources management of the Andong watershed under the changing climate. |
