Yucaipa Integrated Hydrologic Model: simulating future climate scenarios in the Yucaipa Valley Watershed, San Bernardino and Riverside Counties, California (In Press)
Dates
Publication Date
2024-11-20
Start Date
1947-01-01
End Date
2099-12-31
Citation
Ryter, D.W., and Alzraiee, A.H., 2024, Yucaipa Integrated Hydrologic Model: simulating future climate scenarios in the Yucaipa Valley Watershed, San Bernardino and Riverside Counties, California: U.S. Geological Survey data release, https://doi.org/10.5066/P14WPCUQ.
Summary
Managing water resources in semiarid watersheds is challenging because of limited water supply and uncertain impacts of future climate conditions on groundwater resources. This paper examines the impact of future climate changes on the urban Yucaipa Valley watershed in southern California using an integrated hydrological model referred to herein as the Yucaipa model. Coupled Groundwater and Surface-water FLOW (GSFLOW) modeling software was used to simulate the nonlinear relationships between climate trends and precipitation partitioning into evapotranspiration (ET), runoff, and subsurface storage. Four global climate models (also known as general circulation models or GCMs), each with two greenhouse-gas (GHG) scenarios: Representative [...]
Summary
Managing water resources in semiarid watersheds is challenging because of limited water supply and uncertain impacts of future climate conditions on groundwater resources. This paper examines the impact of future climate changes on the urban Yucaipa Valley watershed in southern California using an integrated hydrological model referred to herein as the Yucaipa model. Coupled Groundwater and Surface-water FLOW (GSFLOW) modeling software was used to simulate the nonlinear relationships between climate trends and precipitation partitioning into evapotranspiration (ET), runoff, and subsurface storage. Four global climate models (also known as general circulation models or GCMs), each with two greenhouse-gas (GHG) scenarios: Representative Concentration Pathway 4.5 (RCP45) (low emissions) and RCP85 (high emissions) are used to project varying future climate conditions. GCMs include the Canadian Earth System Model (CanESM2), Centre National de Recherches Météorologiques Climate Model version 5 (CNRM-CM5), Hadley Centre Global Environment Model version 2 – Earth System (HadGEM2-ES), and Model for Interdisciplinary Research on Climate version 5 (MIROC5) models. RCP85 scenarios tend to be wetter and warmer than RCP45, and in some cases the increased precipitation offsets increased loss to ET. The Yucaipa model's simulated hydrological conditions using climate projections predict decreased groundwater in storage in most scenarios due to increased natural ET, vegetation consumptive use, and streamflow out of the watershed. Only scenarios with substantial increases in annual precipitation were able to maintain groundwater in storage approximately the same as at the end of the historical period. The study also highlights increased future aridity despite increased precipitation, and larger precipitation events, which increase the risk of urban floods and decrease stream leakage.
The purpose of this model is to better understand and quantify the hydrologic system of the Yucaipa subbasin and the effects of future climate scenarios forecast by selected global climate models. The Yucaipa model was developed using the USGS groundwater and surface-water flow model (GSFLOW; Markstrom and others, 2008). GSFLOW simulation software consists of two integrated model components: (1) a watershed-component model developed by using Precipitation Runoff Modeling System (PRMS), and (2) a groundwater-component model developed by using the MODFLOW Newton-Raphson formulation MODFLOW-NWT. The integrated surface water and groundwater model was developed for the Yucaipa Valley Watershed, a 316 square kilometer watershed that encompasses the Yucaipa subbasin. The historical simulation period is 1947 through 2014 and the future simulation period is 2015 through 2099. Daily time steps are used to represent climate stresses and monthly stress periods are used to represent groundwater stresses (groundwater pumping, anthropogenic recharge, etc.).
Rights
This work is marked with Creative Commons Zero v1.0 Universal (https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/).
