The Impact of Climate Change & Human Activity on Water & Sediment: Artificial Neutral Network Modelling in the Longchuanjiang Catchment, Upper Yangtze River

Abstract

Climate change coupled with intensified human activity could significantly affect the hydrological processes. This research investigated the impact of climate change and human activities on river water discharge and, particularly, suspended sediment flux with a case study in the Longchuanjiang catchment, the Upper Yangtze River, China. Non-updating artificial neural network (ANN) was used as a modelling tool. The results indicated that, compared with background condition (1960-1990), intensified human activity since the 1990b s was the main factor for the sharp increase of sediment flux during this period, accounting for 66~75% of the change. When human activity remained at the background condition, under the possible future climate change in the catchment till 2050, the change of sediment flux was estimated to be between -0.7%~13.7%. The results also suggested that ANN provides a competitive alternative to physical and conventional empirical models in hydrological modelling, especially in sediment modelling.