HIGH ASIAN MELTWATER RESOURCES: MAJOR RIVER BASIN PERSPECTIVE

Introduction

In many major Asian river basins, glaciers and seasonal snow play special role in regional water cycle as the principal meltwater resources. Climate Change (CC) in the past 50 years had profound impact on the water storage capacity of glaciers and seasonal snow, which in turn affected the amount of meltwater entering stream flow. The materials at this site present the results of the first comprehensive basin-scale assessment of the storage properties of glaciers and seasonal snow, and their contribution to Mean Annual River Flow (MAF) in six major Asian river basins: the Indus, Ganges, Brahmaputra, Amu Darya, Syr Darya and Mekong, which was carried at IWMI in 2012-2013. These are supplementary materials illustrating the states of melt water resources at two time slices: 1961-90 (baseline) and 2001-2010 (current) and the differences in their states between these two time periods. The key findings, methodology and accuracy ranges of the meltwater resources assessment can be found in issues 149 and 150 of IWMI Research reports series (Savoskul and Smakhtin, 2013-a, 2013-b)

Maps

Tables

Graphs

Data Sources

Glacier-covered Area in 1961-90: Dataset covering 48,607 individual glaciers compiled from
  • World Glacier Inventory. Zurich, Switzerland: WGMS, USA, Boulder: NSIDC. http://nsidc.org/data/glacier_inventory/ Accessed on March 09, 2011)
  • WGI-XF (World Glacier Inventory Extended Format) http://people.trentu.ca/~gcogley/glaciology/index.htm Accessed on March 09, 2011
  • ICIMOD: Inventory of glaciers, glacial lakes and identification of potential glacial lake outburst floods. 2007. Kathmandu: ICIMOD. digital media.
  • Savoskul, O.S.; Smakhtin, V. 2013-a. Glacier systems and seasonal snow cover in six major Asian river basins: water storage properties under changing climate. IWMI Research Report 149
Glacier Runoff Annual Total and Contribution to MAF:
  • Savoskul, O.S.; Smakhtin, V. 2013-b. Glacier systems and seasonal snow cover in six major Asian river basins: hydrological role under changing climate. IWMI Research Report 150
Snow Cover and Surface snowmelt: Seasonal Snowmelt, Annual Total and Contribution to MAF:
  • Savoskul, O.S.; Smakhtin, V. 2013-b. Glacier systems and seasonal snow cover in six major Asian river basins: hydrological role under changing climate. IWMI Research Report 150

Key Publication

Iternationl Water Management Institute

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This page was last updated on Friday, Aprial 25, 2014