Laboratory of Hydraulics, Hydrology and Glaciology (VAW), ETH Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland.
Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research (WSL), Birmensdorf, Switzerland.
Nature. 2019 Nov;575(7782):341-344. doi: 10.1038/s41586-019-1740-z. Epub 2019 Nov 13.
Climate change is causing widespread glacier retreat, and much attention is devoted to negative impacts such as diminishing water resources, shifts in runoff seasonality, and increases in cryosphere-related hazards. Here we focus on a different aspect, and explore the water-storage and hydropower potential of areas that are expected to become ice-free during the course of this century. For roughly 185,000 sites that are glacierized at present, we predict the potentially emerging reservoir storage volume and hydropower potential. Using a climate-driven glacier-evolution model and topographical analysis, we estimate a theoretical maximal total storage and hydropower potential of 875 ± 260 cubic kilometres and 1,355 ± 515 terawatt-hours per year, respectively (95% confidence intervals). A first-order suitability assessment that takes into account environmental, technical and economic factors identifies roughly 40 per cent of this potential (355 ± 105 cubic kilometres and 533 ± 200 terawatt-hours per year) as possibly being suitable for realization. Three quarters of the potential storage volume is expected to become ice-free by 2050, and the storage volume would be enough to retain about half of the annual runoff leaving the investigated sites. Although local impacts would need to be assessed on a case-by-case basis, the results indicate that deglacierizing basins could make important contributions to national energy supplies in several countries, particularly in High Mountain Asia.
气候变化导致冰川大范围退缩，人们普遍关注其对水资源减少、径流量季节性变化以及冰冻圈相关灾害增加等方面的负面影响。本文聚焦于一个不同的方面，探讨本世纪内预计无冰地区的蓄水和水电潜力。对于目前有冰川覆盖的约 18.5 万个地点，我们预测了潜在的新增水库储水体积和水电潜力。利用气候驱动的冰川演化模型和地形分析，我们估算出理论上最大的总储水量和水电潜力分别为 875 ± 260 立方公里和 1355 ± 515 太瓦时/年（95%置信区间）。考虑到环境、技术和经济因素的初步适宜性评估，该潜力中约有 40%（355 ± 105 立方公里和 533 ± 200 太瓦时/年）可能适合实现。到 2050 年，四分之三的储水体积预计将变为无冰，储水体积足以保留调查地点每年离开的一半径流量。尽管需要逐个案例评估当地的影响，但结果表明，冰川消退流域可能会为多个国家的国家能源供应做出重要贡献，特别是在高山亚洲地区。
