Showing 72 results for Drought
M. Shamaeizadeh, S. Soltani,
Volume 18, Issue 70 (3-2015)
Abstract
Hydrologic drought which usually affects wide regions can be studied through Low flow index. In this study, to predict hydrologic drought in North Karoon watershed, 14 stations with suitable and long enough duration data were recorded in the 1387-88 water year. Then 13 physiographic and climatic characteristics of the chosen stations were used to perform homogeneity test for cluster analysis. 7 day low flow series were calculated in each station and according to chi-square and Kolomogragh smirnov tests and parameter, 2 parameter gamma distribution was selected as the best regional distribution for this region. Therefore, a seven day low flow index was estimated using FREQ for 5,10,20,50,100 return periods. Regional analysis was performed using a multiple regression method. Moreover, flow duration curves were delineated to obtain Q95 index. Then, zoning maps for Q95، Q7,2 ،Q7,10, Q7,100 were prepared. The results of regional analysis indicated that the averages of height and slope were the two most effective parameters in low flow in this watershed. The investigation of zoning maps showed that southeastern part of this watershed experiences severe droughts compared with other parts.
S. Azadi, S. Soltani Kopaei, M. Faramarzi, A. Soltani Tudeshki, S. Pourmanafi,
Volume 19, Issue 72 (8-2015)
Abstract
The Palmer Drought Severity Index (PDSI), which uses hydrometeorological variables to solve a simple water balance equation in the soil and considers the drought or wet conditions as dynamic phenomena, is used for the assessment of drought conditions in many parts of the world. The main goal of this study was to assess the PDSI based on its original assumptions, its regionalized status, using the outputs of already calibrated and validated SWAT model in central regions of Iran. The PDSI was assessed through five methods: 1) original Palmer Index without calibration in which the climate coefficients and the severity equation were derived for Kansas and central Iowa 2) original Palmer Index in which the coefficients of severity equations were adjusted 3) the Palmer Index with the calibration of equations in central areas of Iran 4) the Palmer Index using the soil moisture and potential evapotranspiration from SWAT model and 5) the Palmer Index using the soil moisture, potential evapotranspiration and runoff from SWAT model. The evaluation was conducted for 17 major basins covering the entire country with a monthly time step for the period 1990-2002. Then, using all five methods, the severity of the drought for 160 sub basins located in central Iran was calculated and evaluated. The results of this study indicated that method 4 provides more acceptable results. Also, the results of this research showed these methods clearly demonstrated (1992) as the wettest year and (2001) as the driest year. The approach used in this study is applicable to regional calibration of Palmer Index and the outputs of other hydrological models.
M. Khoshoei Esfahani, H.r. Safavi, A. R. Zamani,
Volume 20, Issue 75 (5-2016)
Abstract
Drought is an extended period of low precipitation which resulted in injuries to consumers of water and reducing their performance, especially in agriculture. Different indices have already been proposed for evaluating drought, based on one of the varieties of meteorological, hydrological and agricultural droughts, but no indices has been identified yet, encompassing all factors. This study has been carried out to assess existing indices for drought monitoring and proposing an integrated index including main factors of drought and is applied to the Zayandehrood river basin as study area, because of its sensitive situation in the central Iran plateau. An integrated index includes various drought factors such as meteorological, hydrological, agricultural, socio - economical and environmental factors. In designing of this integrated index, a combination of static and dynamic layers has been used. Static layers include land use, slope and soil type. Dynamic layers include precipitation, evaporation, temperature, surface water storage, groundwater levels position, and environmental needs. All these layers are analyzed in GIS software and drought zoning maps is prepared. Results showed that based on values of integrated index, water year 1371-72 was a wet year and water year 1378-79 was the most critical, in terms of drought.
H. Nazaripour, Z. Karimi, M. Sedaghat,
Volume 20, Issue 75 (5-2016)
Abstract
Drought is a climatic anomaly that associates with a significant decrease (lack) of precipitation and water resources availability, which spreads on vast temporal and spatial scales, and significantly affects various aspects of life and environment. One of the most common methods of drought assessing and monitoring is calculating drought indices (DIs). Drought areal and temporal extent and its severity are determined by these indices. In this study, an aggregate drought index (Hydro-Meteorological) has been developed for the assessment of hydrological and meteorological droughts in Sarbaz river basin located in southeastern of Iran. The Aggregate Drought Index (ADI) comprehensively considers all physical forms of drought (meteorological, hydrological, and agricultural) through selection of variables that are related to each drought type. In this case, monthly values of Stream flow Drought Index (SDI) and Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) indicators were used for four similar reference periods with principle component analysis and aggregate hydro-meteorological index was defined based on its first component. The study time span was set between 1981-82 to 2010-11, which begins of October in Iran. Results based on the aggregate drought index (ADI) revealed that a long period of hydro-meteorological drought occurred from 1999-2000 to 2005/06 in southeast of Iran, in which, 2003/04 water year has been extremely a drought year. The ADI methodology provides a clear, objective approach for describing the intensity of drought. This index is appropriately able to represent the behavior of Hydro-Meteorological droughts and recommended as an integrated index for assessing and monitoring of regional droughts. Finally, different states of hydro-meteorological drought have been extracted based on conventional regional thresholds, and have been modeled by Markov chain. This made the estimation of drought state transition frequency possible, and made the prediction of next drought state time more real. State transition frequency matrices, are the main instruments for predicting drought states in real time. Results of validation tests and conforming the predicted results with real data indicate that predicting hydrological drought state transitions in the study area using Markov chain method is valid.
M. Sadeghian, H. Karami, S. F. Mousavi,
Volume 21, Issue 4 (2-2018)
Abstract
Nowadays, greater recognition of drought and introducing its monitoring systems, particularly for the short-term periods, and adding predictability to these systems, could lead to presentation of more effective strategies for the management of water resources allocation. In this research, it is tried to present appropriate models to predict drought in city of Semnan, Iran, using time series, adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference system (ANFIS) and artificial neural networks (MLP and RBF). For these modeling processes, average monthly meteorological parameters of rainfall, temperature, minimum temperature, maximum temperature, relative humidity, minimum relative humidity, maximum relative humidity and SPI drought index were used during the period 1966 to 2013. The results showed that among the many developed models, the ANFIS model, with input data of average rainfall, maximum temperature, SPI and its last-month value, 10 rules and Gaussian membership function, showed appropriate performance at each stage of training and testing. The values of RMSE, MAE and R at training stage were 0.777, 0.593 and 0.4, respectively, and at testing stage were 0.837, 0.644 and 0.362, respectively. Then, the input parameters of this model were predicted for the next 12 months using ARIMA model, and SPI values were predicted for the next 12 months. The ANN and time series methods with low difference in error values were ranked next, respectively. The input parameters SPI and temperature had better performance and rainfall parameter had weaker performance.
H. R. Moradi, M. Rahmati, H. Karimi,
Volume 22, Issue 1 (6-2018)
Abstract
Groundwater is a major source of drought. Karstic aquifers are important sources of groundwater in the West and Kermanshah province. This study was performed to investigate the effects of the meteorological drought on the karstic aquifer with different conditions of development. The studied areas in this research included two karstic aquifers, Bistoon-Parau and Patagh mountain in Kermanshah province. In this study, we used monthly precipitation and springs discharge during a period of 20 years. Accordingly, the SPI and SDI indices were used to investigate the different states of meteorological and hydrological droughts, respectively. To determine the relationship between meteorological droughts and groundwater, Pearson correlation was used; aalso, to determine the time delay, the correlation between the different time conditions (no delay and delay 1 to 6 months) of the SDI index and the SPI index was investigated. The results of the relationship between the meteorological drought and groundwater showed that both had a significant correlation (p-value: 0.01). Also, based on the results of the correlation between different time conditions (no delay and delay 1 to 6 months) ,the SDI index was compared to the SPI index, showing that the time delay between the occurrence of meteorological drought and groundwater in the studied areas without time delay or a maximum one-month delay had happened. Based on the results, Pearson correlation coefficients between the SPI and SDI indices in the Bistoon-Parav region were more than those of the Patagh mountain region indicating the development of the Bistoon-Parav karst region, as compared with the Patagh Mountain.
M. Nouri, M. Homaee, M. Bannayan,
Volume 22, Issue 1 (6-2018)
Abstract
In this study, the trends of changes of the standardized precipitation index in a 12-month timescale (SPI-12) and seasonal and annual precipitation were investigated in 21 humid and semi-arid stations of Iran during the 1976-2014 time period. After removing the serial correlation of some series, the trend of precipitation and SPI-12 was detected using the Mann-Kendall nonparametric trend test. The results revealed that the trends of annual precipitation had been declining in all stations over the past 39 years. The seasonal precipitation trend in winter, spring, autumn and summer was downward in approximately 90, 95, 47 and 37% of the studied stations, respectively. In addition, the descending trend of wintertime precipitation was significant in Sanandaj, Khoy, Urmia, Hamedan, Mashhad, Torbat-e-heydarieh, Nozheh and Qazvin. Also, the temporal trend of SPI-12 was decreasing in all surveyed stations except Shahrekord. Furthermore, SPI-12 showed a significant downward trend only in Sanandaj and Fasa. Moreover, the most severe meteorological drought occurred in the period 1999-2000, in Ramsar, Urmia and Hamedan, and in the period 2008-2009, in Tabriz, Sanandaj, Shiraz, Fasa, Qazvin, Mashhad, Torbat-e-heydarieh, Shahrekord, Gorgan and Kermanshah stations. Overall, the results of this study indicated that the trend of precipitation in most studied sites, particularly in semi-arid parts of the northeast and southwest of Iran, has changed due to the severe and long metrological drought that has occurred in the recent decade (2005-2015).
S. Pourhossein, S. Soltani,
Volume 22, Issue 2 (9-2018)
Abstract
Bhalme & Mooley Drought index is one of common indices used in drought studies. Due to the fact that drought indices can have different sensitivities to different region conditions and the length of data recorded, 62 synoptic and climatological stations were selected within a homogonous region to study this index advantages and to assess the effect of climate, precipitation regime, and data record on the index. The best results were found for the humid climate. Also, this index had acceptable results for semi- mediterranean regimes regarding all different time scales,; however the situation was different for Mediterranean regimes, showing the best results for the time scales simultaneous with the precipitation period. From the data record point of view, the best results were estimated during the first 31- years of the common period which has correspondence with the results of the 36-year period.
M. Jahan, B. Amiri,
Volume 22, Issue 3 (11-2018)
Abstract
Factor analysis is one of the multivariate statistical techniques that considers the interrelationships between apparently irrelevant variables and helps researchers to find the hidden reasons for the occurrence of an event. In order to evaluate the effects of different irrigation levels and humic acid foliar application and identify the factors affecting water use efficiencies of sesame (Sesamum indicum L.), maize (Zea mays L.) and common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.), a split plots experiment based on RCBD design with three replications was conducted during the 2014-15 growing season, at the Research Farm of Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, Iran. Irrigation levels (50 and 100% of water requirement) and foliar application and non-application of humic acid were assigned to main and sub plots, respectively. The results showed that in sesame, the highest seed yield and biological yield were obtained from 100% of water requirement and humic acid spraying treatment. In maize, humic acid spraying under condition of supplying 50% of water requirement increased seed weight per plant, plant height, and leaf area index and soil pH In bean, the highest seed weight per plant, plant height, leaf area index, crop growth rate and soil phosphorous content were observed in the treatment of 100% of water requirement and humic acid spraying. Factor analysis results also showed that in sesame, the variables of seed yield, biological yield, seed weight per plant, plant height, leaf area index, crop growth rate, soil phosphorous and water use efficiency were assigned to the first factor and the variables of soil nitrogen, soil pH and EC were assigned to the second one. In maize, seed yield was assigned in the same group with the variables of biological yield, leaf area index, crop growth rate, soil phosphorous, EC and pH and water use efficiency; in bean, this was with the variables of seed yield and water use efficiency. In general, the research results revealed that identifying the effective variables in each factor and those logical nominations according to Eco physiological knowledge can lead to the direct management of effective variables with regard to associated factor, thereby leading to water efficiency improvement.
S. Ekhtiary Khajeh, F. Negahban, Y. Dinpashoh,
Volume 23, Issue 2 (9-2019)
Abstract
In this study, drought characteristics of Arak, Bandar Anzali, Tabriz, Tehran, Rasht, Zahedan, Shiraz and Kerman stations during the statistical period of 1956 to 2015 were studied by Reconnaissance Drought Index (RDI) and Standardized Precipitation Index. Precipitation and temperature data were needed to calculate RDI. Precipitation data was also required to estimate SPI. In this study, Drinc software was used to calculate RDI, SPI and potential evapotranspiration (PET). The software calculated PET by the Thornthwaite method. One of the main challenges in drought monitoring is to determine the indicator that has a high reliability based on its monitoring purpose. Therefore, in this research, two methods used for selecting the appropriate index based on the minimum rainfall and normal distribution were evaluated. The results of the evaluation of the minimum rainfall method for selecting the appropriate index showed that most drought indices with the occurrence of minimum rainfall level indicated severe or very severe drought situations; in most cases, it could not lead to selecting an exact and unique index. Based on the results of the normal distribution method for the stations of Arak, Tabriz, Rasht, Zahedan, Shiraz and Kerman, SPI index, and for the stations of Bandar Anzali and Tehran, RDI index were selected as the most appropriate ones.
M. Saeidipour, F. Radmanesh, S. Eslamian, M. R. Sharifi,
Volume 23, Issue 2 (9-2019)
Abstract
The current study was conducted to compute SPI and SPET drought indices due to their multi-scale concept and their ability to analyze different time-scales for selected meteorological stations in Karoon Basin. Regionalization of SPI and SPEI Drought indices based on clustering analysis was another aim of this study for hydrological homogenizing. Accordingly, to run test through data and determine similar statistical periods, 18 stations were selected. SPI and SPEI values were plotted in the sequence periods graphs and their relationships were analyzed using the correlation coefficient. The results were compared by Pearson correlation coefficient at the significance level of 0.01. The results showed that correlation coefficients (0.5-0.95) were positive and meaningful for all stations and the correlation coefficient between the two indices were increased by enhancing the time-scales. Also, time-scales enhancement decreased the frequency of dry and wet periods and increased their duration. Through regionalization of basin stations based on clustering analysis, the stations were classified into 7 classes. The results of SPEI regionalization showed that the frequency percentage of the normal class was more than those of dry and wet classes.
Zahra Shahrokhi, M. Zare, A. Mirmohammadi Maybodi, F. Arabi Aliabad,
Volume 23, Issue 3 (12-2019)
Abstract
Droughts are natural events and could lead to declining surface water quality of regional basin. Understanding the complex impacts of drought may help authorities to monitor changes in different regional basin and to make appropriate decision on development of a river basin management plan. In this study 20 years annual precipitation time series from 1994-2013 from 7 synoptic weather stations located in the Halil-Rood basin were analysed using both Standard Precipitation Index (SPI) and Reconnaissance Drought Index (RDI) and then dry (-1.35 to -1.75) and wet years (1/7 to 2.45) were determined by model simulation studies. Several climate based drought indices and remotely sensed based drought indices were used for monitoring and evaluating of drought. The impact of drought on the water quality parameters in the study area was evaluated. Results showed that there was significant relationship between most of the examined water quality parameters (Ca2+, Mg2+, HCO3-, SO42+, Na+, total dissolved solids TDS, SAR) and drought, however there was no significant relationship between water pH and drought. The study indicated that focus on the drought indices might be helpful as a tool in improving surface water resources management under drought condition and may promote sustainable water resources utilization and management in the study area. Also, dividing the Halil-Rood basin into several homogeneous regions is recommended for future studies to prepare a better ground for studying the effect of drought on the quality of water at a regional scale.
H. Ghorbani, A. Vali, H. Zarepour,
Volume 23, Issue 4 (2-2020)
Abstract
Drought as a natural hazard is a gradual phenomenon, slowly affecting an area; it may last for many years and can have devastating effects on the natural environment and in human lives. Although drought forecasting plays an important role in the planning and management of water resource systems, the random nature of contributing factors contributing to the occurrence of and severity of droughts causes some difficulties in determination of the time when a drought begins or ends. The present research was planned to evaluate the capability of linear stochastic models, known as multiplicative Seasonal Autoregressive Integrated Moving Average (SARIMA) model, in the quantitative forecasting of drought in Isfahan province based on the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI). To this end, the best SARIMA models were chosen for modelling the monthly rainfall data from 1990 to 2017 for every 10 synoptic stations in Isfahan province to forecast their monthly rainfall up to five years. The monthly time scale SPI values based on these predictions were used to assess the drought severity of different stations for the 2018- 2022 time period. The station results indicated a weak drought at the 2019- 2022 period for Isfahan, Kashan and Naeen, a severe drought in 2019 for Ardestan and Golpaygan, and a weak one in 2019 for the East of Isfahan, KabootarAbad and Shahreza stations. All other stations, except Golpayegan, Isfahan, Kashan and Naeen, faced a severe drought in 2018.
K. Mohammadi Babadi, A. Nikbakht Shahbazi, H. Fathian,
Volume 24, Issue 2 (7-2020)
Abstract
The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between time and spatial features of meteorological, hydrological and agricultural droughts in Karoon 1 Dam basin. Meteorological and statistical data were accordingly selected to evaluate the drought situation between 1993 and 2016. The results showed that hydrological droughts occurred in the meteorological drought and had a very high correlation with this year's meteorological drought. The most severe droughts occurred between 2006 and 2011. Studies also showed that every three years, the basin was accompanied by a meteorological drought and then a hydrological drought. The results also showed that the highest correlation was observed with the 12-month meteorological index, with a delay of 3 months, and the 6-month meteorological and hydrological index with a delay of 3 months and a three-month hydrological drought index with a delay of two months. Therefore, it could be concluded that hydrological droughts showed a delay of almost two to three months in the entire catchment area; since this period was 4 months or more, the correlation between these two indicators was eliminated and decreased. Also, due to drought zones, during the period from 1993 to 2009, most of the droughts were caused by rainfall reduction in the southwest of the province, and this was associated with a reduction in runoff in its hydrometric stations. Of course, in 2009-2012, the runoff status had been temporarily improved, and from 2012 to 2017, the drought situation had again returned spatially to the previous routine.
P. Mohit Esfahani, S. Soltani, R. Modarres, S. Pourmanafi,
Volume 24, Issue 3 (11-2020)
Abstract
Drought, as one of the most complicated natural events, causes many direct and indirect damages each year. Hence, single variable identification and monitoring of drought may not be appropriate enough for decision-making and management. In this study, in order to monitor the meteorological-agricultural drought in Chaharmahal and Bakhtiari province, Multivariate Standardized Drought Index (MSDI) was calculated using precipitation and soil moisture variables. In addition, to evaluate the performance of MSDI in drought identification and monitoring, Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) and Standardized Soil Moisture Index (SSI) were used for meteorological and agricultural drought monitoring, respectively. MSDI was calculated based on the soil moisture and precipitation joint probabilities. We used the Gringorten probability as an empirical method and Archimedean copulas as the parametric method to calculate the joint probability between soil moisture and precipitation time series. The results indicated that MSDI was twice more capable of detecting drought as SSI and SPI. Furthermore, the MSDI-based drought monitoring results showed Charmahal and Bakhtiari province had experienced severe meteorological-agricultural drought in 2000, 2008, 2011 and 2014.
S. Abdi Ardestani, B. Khalili, M. M. Majidi,
Volume 25, Issue 1 (5-2021)
Abstract
Long-term drought effect is one of the main factors of global climate change, with consequences for soil biogeochemical cycling of carbon and nitrogen and the function of soil ecosystem under drought conditions. We hypothesized that 1) the Bromus inermis, Dactylis glomerata and festuca arundinacea species would differ in their rhizosphere responses to drought and 2) combined plant species and drought would have offsetting effects on the soil biological traits. We tested these hypotheses at the long-term drought field expreiment at the Lavark Farm of Isfahan University of Technology by analyzing soil microbial biomass carbon and nitrogen and activity of β-glucosaminidase in the rhizosphere of Bromus inermis, Dactylis glomerata and festuca arundinacea species. Soil microbial biomass carbon and nitrogen responses to drought depended on plant species, such that the highest MBC was recorded in the Bromus inermis rhizosphere, while the lowest was in the Dactylis glomerata rhizosphere, thereby suggesting the greater microbial sensitivity to drought in the Dactylis glomerata rhizosphere. Genotype variations (drought tolerate and sensitive) mostly affected the change in the β-glucosaminidase activity, but they were not significantly affected by drought treatment and plant species. In general, the positive effects of the plant genotype could offset the negative consequences of drought for soil microbial biomass and traits.
F. Saniesales, S. Soltani, R. Modarres,
Volume 25, Issue 2 (9-2021)
Abstract
Several indices are used for drought identification and quantification. In this paper, the new Standardized Palmer Drought index (SPDI) was introduced and then the drought condition of Chaharmahal-Va-Bakhtiari Province was studied using this index. For this study, 11 synoptic, climatology, and evaporation meteorology stations were selected. Essential information in this investigation includes monthly temperature, monthly precipitation, and soil moisture measurement. To estimate SPDI, moisture departure, was first calculated on a monthly time scale. Then, converted to cumulative moisture departure values in different time scales including 3, 6, 9, 12, and 24 months. The best statistical distribution (GEV) was then fitted to cumulative departure. These values were then standardized to have the SPDI. The results showed that, as soil moisture affects SPDI estimation, it will be more valid for analyzing and monitoring drought conditions, especially for agricultural drought. Also, the results showed that 2000, 2001, and 2008 years were the driest time in this Province from 1988 to 2012. Moreover, drought frequency was found out in the western half of the Province more than in the other parts.
S. Banihashemi , S. S. Eslamian, B. Nazari,
Volume 25, Issue 2 (9-2021)
Abstract
The upcoming climate change has become a serious concern for the human society. These changes, caused and aggravated by the industrial activities of the international community and the increase in the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, are seen as a threat to the food security and environment. Temperature change and precipitation are studied in the form of different probabilistic scenarios in order to have an outlook for the future. The present study was conducted to address the effects of climate changes on temperature and precipitation in Qazvin plain in the form of five AOGCMs including Hadcm3, CSIRO-MK3, GFDL, CGCM3 and MICROC3.2, and 3 greenhouse gas emission scenarios of A1B, A2 and B1, based on different possible scenario combinations in the next 30 years, 2021-2050 and 2051-2080 (near and far future). On basis of the study results, all 4 target stations, on average, will have experienced a change between two ratios of 0.5 and 1.4 of the observed precipitation period by the end of 2050, and the mean temperature will have had a change between -0.1 to 1.6 °C, relative to the observed period. By the end of 2080, the precipitation will also have fluctuated between the two proportions of 0.5 and 1.7 times of the observed precipitation period and the mean temperature will touch an increase between 0.6 and 2.6 °C. Both SPI and SPEI indices suggest the increment in the number of dry periods in the near and far future. However, the total number of negative sequences differed considering the 3, 12 and 24-month intervals at the stations level. Given the SPEI index, as compared to the base period, the total negative sequences of drought and number of dry periods will increase at 3 stations of Avaj, Bagh-Kowsar and Shahid-rajaei-powerhouse and decrease at Qazvin station in the future; however, SPI gives different results, such that for Bagh-Kowsar, there will be an increase in both total negative sequences of drought and number of dry periods, as compared to the baseline period; three other stations will have more dry periods, specifically, but less total negative sequences. The results reported that the drought events would become severe, and the wet events would become extreme in the future.
H. Ahmadzadeh, A. Fakheri Fard, M.a Ghorbani, M. Tajrishy,
Volume 25, Issue 3 (12-2021)
Abstract
In drought risk management, the regional analysis of drought is significant. In this paper, this important issue is investigated by presenting the new hydrological regional drought index (RDI). For this purpose, the Ajichai basin was selected as the study area. First, the time series of the streamflow drought index (SDI) was calculated for each of the hydrometric stations in the basin f regional analysis of hydrological drought. Then, to determine the homogeneous regions in terms of hydrological drought, the k-means method was used for clustering analysis. Based on the clustering results, 6 Homogeneous regions were identified in the basin. For each of these regions, the time series of the RDI index was calculated from 1365 to 1393. The results showed that during the study period in each of the regions 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6, mild Wet and mild drought has occurred at 82.1, 80.1, 78.9, 83.3, and 84.3 percent of regions, respectively. Also, the total percentage of drought events (moderate and high) is higher than the total percentage of wet events (moderate and high) in all regions. So, during the study period, the total percentage of drought events (moderate and high) is more than twice the total percentage of wet events (moderate and high) in regions 2 and 3.
A. Norouzi, M.r. Ansari,
Volume 25, Issue 3 (12-2021)
Abstract
At present, the occurrence of dust storms is one of the most important environmental problems in Khuzestan Province, and the south and southeast regions of Ahwaz have been recognized as one of the interior dust sources and are the priority of corrective operations. Given that land use change is one of the desertification factors in the mentioned region, therefore, modeling its changes is necessary and provides useful information for planners to control and revive the degraded lands. The objective of this study was to evaluate the efficiency of the CA-Markov model in predicting land use changes in the dust source of south and southeast of Ahwaz based on two long-term and short-term approaches. In the long-term approach, land use maps of 1986 and 2002 years and in the short-term approach, land use maps of 2002 and 2007 years have been used to predict land use for the year 2016 and then the simulation results were validated. The results showed that the values of allocation error, quantity error, and kappa coefficient for the long-term approach were 42.55%, 13.95%, and 0.08 respectively, and for the short-term approach were 12.56%, 10.42%, and 0.22 respectively, which indicates the weak ability of the CA-Markov model to evaluate the desertification trend in the dust Source of south and southeast Ahwaz. Use of uniform transition rule throughout the simulation period without considering the factors and processes affecting land use change, the non-same trend of land use change during study periods, changes due to human activities, drought, and long forecast period can be the reasons for the poor performance of the CA-Markov model to predict the desertification trend the dust Source of south and southeast Ahwaz.
