Baccour Safa, Goelema Gerwin, Kahil Taher, Albiac Jose, van Vliet Michelle T H, Zhu Xueqin, Strokal Maryna
Department of Agricultural Economics, Finance and Accounting, University of Cordoba, 14071, Cordoba, Spain.
Independent researcher, Groningen, The Netherlands.
Nat Commun. 2024 Jul 6;15(1):5669. doi: 10.1038/s41467-024-49929-z.
Reducing water scarcity requires both mitigation of the increasing water pollution and adaptation to the changing availability and demand of water resources under global change. However, state-of-the-art water scarcity modeling efforts often ignore water quality and associated biogeochemical processes in the design of water scarcity reduction measures. Here, we identify cost-effective options for reducing future water scarcity by accounting for water quantity and quality in the highly water stressed and polluted Pearl River Basin in China under various socio-economic and climatic change scenarios based on the Shared Socio-economic Pathways (SSPs) and Representative Concentration Pathways (RCPs). Our modeling approach integrates a nutrient model (MARINA-Nutrients) with a cost-optimization procedure, considering biogeochemistry and human activities on land in a spatially explicit way. Results indicate that future water scarcity is expected to increase by a factor of four in most parts of the Pearl River Basin by 2050 under the RCP8.5-SSP5 scenario. Results also show that water quality management options could half future water scarcity in a cost-effective way. Our analysis could serve as an example of water scarcity assessment for other highly water stressed and polluted river basins around the world and inform the design of cost-effective measures to reduce water scarcity.
减少水资源短缺既需要缓解日益严重的水污染，又需要适应全球变化下水资源可利用量和需求的变化。然而，当前最先进的水资源短缺建模工作在设计减少水资源短缺的措施时，往往忽视水质及相关生物地球化学过程。在此，我们基于共享社会经济路径（SSPs）和代表性浓度路径（RCPs），在中国水资源高度紧张且污染严重的珠江流域，考虑各种社会经济和气候变化情景下的水量和水质，确定具有成本效益的减少未来水资源短缺的方案。我们的建模方法将一个营养物模型（MARINA - Nutrients）与一个成本优化程序相结合，以空间明确的方式考虑陆地生物地球化学和人类活动。结果表明，在RCP8.5 - SSP5情景下，到2050年珠江流域大部分地区未来水资源短缺预计将增加四倍。结果还表明，水质管理方案能够以具有成本效益的方式将未来水资源短缺减半。我们的分析可为世界其他水资源高度紧张且污染严重的流域进行水资源短缺评估提供范例，并为设计具有成本效益的减少水资源短缺措施提供参考。
