| Abstract: | California‘s primary hydrologic system, the San Francisco Estuary and its upstream watershed, is vulnerable to the regional hydrologic consequences of projected global climate change. Previous work has shown that a projected warming would result in a reduction of snowpack storage leading to higher winter and lower spring-summer streamflows and increased spring-summer salinities in the estuary. The present work shows that these hydrologic changes exhibit a strong dependence on elevation, with the greatest loss of snowpack volume in the 1300-2700 m elevation range. Exploiting hydrologic and estuarine modeling capabilities to trace water as it moves through the system reveals that the shift of water in mid-elevations of the Sacramento river basin from snowmelt to rainfall runoff is the dominant cause of projected changes in estuarine inflows and salinity. Additionally, although spring-summer losses of estuarine inflows are balanced by winter gains, the losses have a stronger influence on salinity since longer spring-summer residence times allow the inflow changes to accumulate in the estuary. The changes in inflows sourced in the Sacramento River basin in approximately the 1300-2200 m elevation range thereby lead to a net increase in estuarine salinity under the projected warming. Such changes would impact ecosystems throughout the watershed and threaten to contaminate much of California‘s freshwater supply. |
| Genre: | Article |
| ProdID: | 70027095 |
| Citation Author: | Knowles, N.; Cayan, D. R. |
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| Citation End Page: | 336 |
| Citation Issue: | 1-3 |
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| Citation Language: | English |
| Citation Larger Work Title: | Climatic Change |
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| Citation Number Of Pages: | 18 |
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| Citation Search Results Text: | Elevational dependence of projected hydrologic changes in the San Francisco Estuary and watershed; 2004; Article; Journal; Climatic Change; Knowles, N.; Cayan, D. R. |
| Citation Start Page: | 319 |
| Citation Volume: | 62 |
| Citation Year: | 2004 |
| Type: | citation/reference |
| Text: | Elevational dependence of projected hydrologic changes in the San Francisco Estuary and watershed; 2004; Article; Journal; Climatic Change; Knowles, N.; Cayan, D. R. |
| URL (THUMBNAIL): | http://pubs.er.usgs.gov/thumbnails/outside_thumb.jpg |
| URL (DIGITAL OBJECT IDENTIFIER): | http://dx.doi.org/10.1023/B:CLIM.0000013696.14308.b9 |
| Date Other: | Thu, 1 Jan 2004 00:00 -0600 |
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