Hydrology and Climatology Integrated water resource management in Central Asia

• Duration: 2010-2014
• Project leader: Prof. Dr. Lucas Menzel
• Project participants: Benjamin Kopp, Stefanie Minderlein, Dr. Tobias Törnros

The MoMo IWRM project is funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and managed by the Jülich Project Management Organization (PTJ) as part of the Research for Sustainable Development (FONA) program. The primary goal of the project is to develop measures for the pilot implementation of IWRM in Mongolia. The Kharaa River basin (a tributary of the Selenga, which flows into Lake Baikal) in northern Mongolia was selected as the model region. The area through which the Kharaa flows is typical of conditions in Mongolia and its neighboring regions, with its extreme climatic conditions, water scarcity, and numerous water-related problems.

The MoMo project consists of three thematic modules that address hydrology and land use, water quality, and urban water management. In addition, there are three interdisciplinary project modules that coordinate and manage activities in the areas of monitoring and modeling, substance quantities and balances, training, and institutional analysis. The project is carried out in close collaboration with Mongolian partners from academia, government, and industry and has numerous links to the population of the project area.

Our subproject focuses on hydrology and climate research. It examines the impacts of global change on water resources at various levels of scale. In collaboration with project partners, we use field studies and hydrological models to determine the hydrological conditions and water availability for human use and for maintaining ecological functions – both for the model region, the Kharaa watershed in northern Mongolia, and for the entire country and Central Asia. This includes taking into account both historical and projected future changes in climate and land use.

Our monitoring program focuses on the upper reaches of the Kharaa River in the remote Khentii Mountains (Sugnugur River watershed), as the Kharaa’s headwaters play a crucial role in water availability throughout the entire region. Since 2010, we have been operating permanent and temporary monitoring stations that record a wide range of components of the water cycle, energy balance, and climatic conditions along the hydro-climatic gradient between semi-arid steppe, boreal coniferous forest, and alpine tundra. Additional surveys are conducted during field campaigns. These focus primarily on the sources and flow paths of water, as well as the impacts of changing environmental conditions on the delicate ecological balance of this mountainous region. A key focus here is on the extensive wildfires, which have increased significantly in intensity and range and are substantially altering hydrological dynamics. Our research investigates whether this also affects water availability in the middle and lower reaches of the Kharaa River, where most of the region’s population lives.

Our hydrological models are applied at three staggered scale levels (point or slope scale, upper Sugnugur, and the entire Kharaa region) with varying degrees of detail and temporal resolution. The results of the model simulations include hourly to monthly values for simulated runoff and its subcomponents, snow cover, snow water equivalent, soil moisture, groundwater recharge, and evaporation. Key tools for modeling include maps based on remote sensing data that document factors such as the temporal evolution of the snowpack, land cover, or the extent of wildfires.

In Mongolia, we also offer various educational modules for Mongolian students that, in addition to practical fieldwork, introduce them to overarching issues such as water scarcity, water resource management, and aspects of global change. We have a cooperation agreement with the National University of Mongolia (NUM) regarding educational collaboration.