Monitoring and analysis of snow cover change in an alpine mountainous area in the Tianshan Mountains, China

doi:10.1007/s40333-022-0071-3

Journal of Arid Land

2022, Vol. 14

Issue (9): 962-977 DOI: 10.1007/s40333-022-0071-3

Research article

Monitoring and analysis of snow cover change in an alpine mountainous area in the Tianshan Mountains, China

ZHANG Yin¹^,²^,³, GULIMIRE Hanati⁴, SULITAN Danierhan¹^,²^,^*(

), HU Keke¹^,²^,³

¹State Key Laboratory of Desert and Oasis Ecology, Xinjiang Institute of Ecology and Geography, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Urumqi 830011, China
²Aksu National Station of Observation and Research for Oasis Agro-ecosystem, Aksu 843017, China
³University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China
⁴Xinjiang Institute of Water Resources and Hydropower Research, Urumqi 830049, China

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Abstract

Estimating the snow cover change in alpine mountainous areas (in which meteorological stations are typically lacking) is crucial for managing local water resources and constitutes the first step in evaluating the contribution of snowmelt to runoff and the water cycle. In this paper, taking the Jingou River Basin on the northern slope of the Tianshan Mountains, China as an example, we combined a new moderate-resolution imaging spectroradiometer (MODIS) snow cover extent product over China spanning from 2000 to 2020 with digital elevation model (DEM) data to study the change in snow cover and the hydrological response of runoff to snow cover change in the Jingou River Basin under the background of climate change through trend analysis, sensitivity analysis and other methods. The results indicate that from 2000 to 2020, the annual average temperature and annual precipitation in the study area increased and snow cover fraction (SCF) showed obvious signs of periodicity. Furthermore, there were significant regional differences in the spatial distribution of snow cover days (SCDs), which were numerous in the south of the basin and sparse in the central of the basin. Factors affecting the change in snow cover mainly included temperature, precipitation, elevation, slope and aspect. Compared to precipitation, temperature had a greater impact on SCF. The annual variation in SCF was limited above the elevation of 4200 m, but it fluctuated greatly below the elevation of 4200 m. These results can be used to establish prediction models of snowmelt and runoff for alpine mountainous areas with limited hydrological data, which can provide a scientific basis for the management and protection of water resources in alpine mountainous areas.

Key words： snow cover fraction snow cover days snowmelt runoff sensitivity analysis climate change Jingou River Basin Tianshan Mountains

Received: 08 March 2022 Published: 30 September 2022

Corresponding Authors: ^*SULITAN Danierhan (E-mail: sulitan@ms.xjb.ac.cn)

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	ZHANG Yin
	GULIMIRE Hanati
	SULITAN Danierhan
	HU Keke

Cite this article:

ZHANG Yin, GULIMIRE Hanati, SULITAN Danierhan, HU Keke. Monitoring and analysis of snow cover change in an alpine mountainous area in the Tianshan Mountains, China. Journal of Arid Land, 2022, 14(9): 962-977.

URL:

http://jal.xjegi.com/10.1007/s40333-022-0071-3 OR http://jal.xjegi.com/Y2022/V14/I9/962

Fig. 1 Location of the Jingou River Basin (JRB) and distribution of the meteorological stations (a), and the overview of the JRB. Note that the figures are based on the standard map (新S(2021)047) of the Map Service System (https://xinjiang.tianditu.gov.cn/main/bzdt.html) marked by the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region Platform for Common Geospatial Information Services, and the administrative boundaries are not modified.

Fig. 2 Monthly variation of SCF (a) and annual variation of SCF (b) from 2000 to 2020 in the JRB. SCF, snow cover fraction.

Fig. 3 Spatiotemporal variations of snow cover days (SCDs) from 2003 to 2020 in the JRB

Fig. 4 Spatial distributions of mean SCDs (a) and standard deviation of SCDs (b) from 2003 to 2020 in the JRB

Fig. 5 Variations in the annual average temperature (a) and annual precipitation (b) from 1964 to 2020 in the JRB

Fig. 6 Mann-Kendall (M-K) tests of the annual average temperature (a) and annual precipitation (b) from 1964 to 2020 in the JRB. UF_k and UB_k are two statistics in M-K test, which are used to determine the upward and downward trends and the location of the abrupt change point.

Fig. 7 Distribution of snow cover from an image taken on 18 March 2008 (a) and the composite image of SCF for the seven elevation zones (b) in the JRB. E1-E7 respectively refer to the seven different elevation zones: 1243-1700, 1700-2200, 2200-2700, 2700-3200, 3200-3700, 3700-4200 and 4200-5152 m.

Fig. 8 Variations of monthly mean SCF in the different elevation zones (a-g) from 2000 to 2020 in the JRB

Fig. 9 Variations of annual mean SCF in the different elevation zones (E1-E7) from 2000 to 2020 in the JRB. The dotted lines represent the linear trends.

Fig. 10 Variations of monthly mean SCF on the different slopes at the annual scale (a) and mean SCF of different slopes (b) from 2000 to 2020 in the JRB. Spring, March, April and May; Summer, June, July and August; Autumn, September, October and November; Winter, December, January and February.

Fig. 11 Variations of annual mean SCF on the different slopes from 2000 to 2020 in the JRB. The dotted lines represent the linear trends.

Fig. 12 Variations of monthly mean SCF on the different aspects at the annual scale (a) and mean SCF of different aspects (b) from 2000 to 2020 in the JRB

Fig. 13 Variations of annual mean SCF on the different aspects from 2000 to 2020 in the JRB. The dotted lines represent the linear trends.

Table 1 Correlation between snow cover fraction (SCF) and runoff from 2006 to 2019 in the Jingou River Basin (JRB)

Fig. 14 Daily runoff time series from 2006 to 2019 in the JRB

Fig. 15 Changes in the sensitivity coefficients of SCF to monthly runoff from 2006 to 2019. (a), multi-year monthly mean runoff; (b), monthly mean runoff at the annual scale.


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