Estimation of climatic and anthropogenic contributions to streamflow change in southern Romania

ABSTRACT

This research investigated the contributions of climate- and human-induced change to streamflow alteration between 1966 and 2010 in four catchments in southern Romania (Vedea, Argeș, Ialomița and Buzău). We examined trends and break points in streamflow, precipitation and potential evapotranspiration and we estimated climate elasticity with Fu’s equation within the Budyko framework to further separate the contributions of climate and human changes to streamflow alterations. Results showed break points in streamflow in all catchments between 1981 and 1985, followed by decreases in average annual streamflow that varied between −28.1% and −53.4%. Most of the streamflow decline was found to be due to climate contribution: 63.1% in Argeș (the most anthropized catchment), 71.2% in Buzău, 79.2% in Ialomița and 80.2% in Vedea basin. Due to the environmental changes impacting water resources in Romania, estimating the contribution of the main drivers of streamflow change is highly important for their sustainable management.

KEYWORDS:

• Budyko framework
• elasticity
• streamflow
• climate change
• human impacts
• Romania

Editor A. Castellarin Associate Editor M. Rahman

Editor A. Castellarin Associate Editor M. Rahman

Acknowledgements

We acknowledge the data providers, the Argeș-Vedea and Buzău-Ialomița Water Basin Administrations and the Global Runoff Data Centre (GRDC, 56068 Koblenz, Germany), for providing the streamflow data. The authors thank the anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments, which greatly improved the quality of the manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

The authors have no funding to report.