Journal Home Online First Current Issue Archive For Authors Journal Information 中文版

Strategic Study of CAE >> 2022, Volume 24, Issue 5 doi: 10.15302/J-SSCAE-2022.05.012

Water Resource Effectiveness of Vegetation Conservation and Restoration in North China

1. Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100085, China;

2. State Key Laboratory of Urban and Regional Ecology, Beijing 100085, China;

3. College of Resources and Environment, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China;

4. Nanjing Hydraulic Research Institute, Nanjing 210029, China;

5. State Key Laboratory of Hydrology-Water Resources and Hydraulic Engineering, Nanjing 210029, China

Funding project:Chinese Academy of Engineering project “Strategic Research on Coordinated Development of Water Balance and Land Space (Phase I)” (2020-ZD-20) Received: 2022-07-28 Revised: 2022-09-05 Available online: 2022-09-30

Next Previous

Abstract

In recent years, a series of ecological protection and restoration projects has been implemented in North China, and the vegetation conditions have changed significantly. Exploring the impact of regional vegetation restoration on the water circulation process and the balance of water supply and demand is important for improving ecological restoration strategies and realizing the sustainable utilization of regional water resources. This study conducted a comprehensive analysis using the Pearson correlation coefficient and Moran’s I index and based on multi-source water covariate data. The spatial and temporal variation of vegetation and different water covariates is analyzed, the water resource effects of vegetation conservation and restoration are identified, and the tradeoff between water resources and vegetation restoration is discussed. The results show that the effects of ecological protection and restoration projects are remarkable, with the net primary productivity increasing at a rate of approximately 2.3 times faster than that outside the project area; the vegetation expansion and evapotranspiration show strong spatial and temporal correlations; and the increase in evapotranspiration owing to vegetation restoration is the main reason for the deficit or significant reduction in water storage. Therefore, it is necessary to improve the implementation strategy of ecological restoration while considering the restriction of water resources on vegetation conservation and restoration, strengthen the dominant position of the ecosystem’s own resilience, and promote the sustainability of vegetation restoration and the sustainable use of regional water esources.

Figures

Fig. 1

Fig. 2

Fig. 3

Fig. 4

Fig. 5

Fig. 6

Fig. 7

Fig. 8

References

[ 1 ] Wang F, Pan X B, Gerlein-Safdi C, et al. Vegetation restoration in Northern China: A contrasted picture [J]. Land Degradation & Development, 2020, 31(6): 669–676.

[ 2 ] Ren H, Lu H F, Li Y D, et al. Vegetation restoration and its research advancement in Southern China [J]. Journal of Tropical and Subtropical Botany, 2019, 27(5): 469–480. Chinese.

[ 3 ] Liu J G, Li S X, Ouyang Z Y, et al. Ecological and socioeconomic effects of China’s policies for ecosystem services [J]. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2008, 105(28): 9477–9482.

[ 4 ] Zhao Q, Yang L, Wang X, et al. Effects of two typical revegetation methods on soil moisture in the semi-arid Loess Plateau, China [J]. Hydrology Research, 2019, 50(5): 1453–1462.

[ 5 ] Hu C J, Guo L. Advances in the research of ecological effests of vegetation restoration [J]. Ecology and Environmental Sciences, 2012, 21(9): 1640–1646. Chinese.

[ 6 ] Feng S Y, Liu X, Zhao W W, et al. Key areas of ecological restoration in Inner Mongolia based on ecosystem vulnerability and ecosystem service [J]. Remote Sensing, 2022, 14(12): 1–15.

[ 7 ] Wang H, Zhao W W, Li C J, et al. Vegetation greening partly offsets the water erosion risk in China from 1999 to 2018 [J]. Geoderma, 2021, 401: 1–10.

[ 8 ] Wen X, Deng X Z, Zhang F. Scale effects of vegetation restoration on soil and water conservation in a semi-arid region in China: Resources conservation and sustainable for management [J]. Resources Conservation and Recycling, 2019, 151: 1–15.

[ 9 ] Li W F, Hai X, Han L J, et al. Does urbanization intensify regional water scarcity? Evidence and implications from a megaregion of China [J]. Journal of Cleaner Production, 2020, 244: 1–10.

[10] Chen F, Ding Y Y, Li Y Y, et al. Practice and consideration of groundwater overexploitation in North China Plain [J]. South-to-North Water Transfers and Water Science & Technology, 2020, 18(2): 191–198. Chinese.

[11] Zhu T F. Land use/cover change and their impact on water resource in North China Mountain Region: A case in Mengtougou District, Beijig [D]. Beijing: China Agricultural University(Doctoral dissertation), 2014. Chinese.

[12] Wang L N, Han S M, Li H L, et al. Variation of evapotranspiration and its response to vegetation productivity in the North China Plain [J]. Chinese Journal of Eco-Agriculture, 2022, 30(5): 735–746. Chinese.

[13] Skerlep M, Steiner E, Axelsson A L, et al. Afforestation driving long-term surface water browning [J]. Global Change Biology, 2020, 26(3): 1390–1399.

[14] Li Y, Piao S L, Li L Z X, et al. Divergent hydrological response to large-scale afforestation and vegetation greening in China [J]. Science Advances, 2018, 4(5): 1–15.

[15] Bonnesoeur V, Locatelli B, Guariguata M R, et al. Impacts of forests and forestation on hydrological services in the Andes: A systematic review [J]. Forest Ecology and Management, 2019, 433: 569–584.

[16] Menz M H M, Dixon K W, Hobbs R J. Hurdles and opportunities for landscape-scale restoration [J]. Science, 2013, 339(6119): 526–527.

[17] Zastrow M. China’s tree-planting could falter in a warming world [J]. Nature, 2019, 573(7775): 474–475.

[18] Xiao Y, Xiao Q. The ecological consequences of the large quantities of trees planted in Northwest China by the Government of China [J]. Environmental Science and Pollution Research, 2019, 26(32): 33043–33053.

[19] Feng X M, Fu B J, Piao S L, et al. Revegetation in China’s Loess Plateau is approaching sustainable water resource limits [J]. Nature Climate Change, 2016, 6(11): 1019–1022.

[20] Zhao S Y, Gong Z N, Liu X Y. Correlation analysis between vegetation coverage and climate drought conditions in North China during 2001—2013 [J]. Acta Geographica Sinica, 2015: 2015, 70(5): 717–729. Chinese.

[21] Yan W Q, Liu J, Zhao X R, et al. Attribution of runoff variation in Jinxi Basin based on Budyko hypothesis[J]. [EB/OL]. (2022-08-17)[2022-09-02]. Chinese. link1

[22] Ru S F, Ma R H. Evaluation, spatial analysis and prediction of ecological environment vulnerability of Yellow River Basin [J]. Journal of Natural Resources, 2022, 37(7): 1722–1734. Chinese.

[23] Stahl K, Tallaksen L M, Hannaford J, et al. Filling the white space on maps of European runoff trends: Estimates from a multi-model ensemble [J]. Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 2012, 16(7): 2035–2047.

[24] Beck H E, Van Dijk A I J M, Levizzani V, et al. MSWEP: 3-hourly 0.25 degrees global gridded precipitation (1979—2015) by merging gauge, satellite, and reanalysis data [J]. Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 2017, 21(1): 589–615.

[25] He J, Yang K, Tang W J, et al. The first high-resolution meteorological forcing dataset for land process studies over China [J]. Scientific Data, 2020, 7: 1–10.

[26] Huffman G, Bolvin D T, Nelkin E J, et al. Integrated multi-satellitE retrievals for GPM (IMERG) technical documentation [EB/OL]. (2020-10-06)[2022-05-15]. link1

[27] Hijmans R J, Cameron S E, Parra J L, et al. Very high resolution interpolated climate surfaces for global land areas [J]. International Journal of Climatology, 2005, 25(15): 1965–1978.

[28] Abatzoglou J T, Dobrowski S Z, Parks S A, et al. TerraClimate, a high-resolution global dataset of monthly climate and climatic water balance from 1958—2015 [J]. Scientific Data, 2018, 5: 1–10.

[29] Rodell M, Houser P R, Jambor U, et al. The global land data assimilation system [J]. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, 2004, 85(3): 381–394.

[30] Mcnally A, Arsenault K, Kumar S, et al. A land data assimilation system for sub-Saharan Africa food and water security applications [J]. Scientific Data, 2017, 4: 1–10.

[31] Yin L C, Tao F L, Chen Y., et al. Improving terrestrial evapotranspiration estimation across China during 2000—2018 with machine learning methods [J]. Journal of Hydrology, 2021, 600: 1–12.

[32] Running S, Mu Q, Zhao M, et al. MOD16A3GF MODIS/Terra Net Evapotranspiration Gap-Filled Yearly L4 Global 500 m SIN Grid V006[EB/OL]. [J]. NASA EOSDIS Land Processes DAAC., 2019. link1

[33] Miralles, D.G., Holmes T R H, De Jeu R A M, et al. Global land-surface evaporation estimated from satellite-based observations [J]. Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 2011, 15(2): 453–469.

[34] Chen Y Z, Feng X M, Tian H Q, et al. Accelerated increase in vegetation carbon sequestration in China after 2010: A turning point resulting from climate and human interaction [J]. Global Change Biology, 2021, 27(22): 5848–5864.

[35] Yu L, Wu Z T, Du Z Q, et al. Insights on the roles of climate and human activities to vegetation degradation and restoration in Beijing–Tianjin sandstorm source region [J]. Ecological Engineering, 2021, 159: 1–12.

[36] Jackson R B, Jobbagy E G, Avissar R, et al. Trading water for carbon with biological sequestration [J]. Science, 2005, 310(5756): 1944–1947.

[37] Bosch J M, Hewlett J D. A review of catchment experiments to determine the effect of vegetation changes on water yield and evapotranspiration [J]. Journal of Hydrology, 1982, 55(1–4): 3–23.

[38] Fang J Y, Guo Z D, Piao S L, et al. Terrestrial vegetation carbon sinks in China, 1981—2000 [J]. Science in China Series D: Earth Sciences, 2007, 50(9): 1341–1350.

[39] Wang S, Fu B J, Piao S L, et al. Reduced sediment transport in the Yellow River due to anthropogenic changes [J]. Nature Geoscience, 2016, 9(1): 38–41.

[40] Farley K A, Jobbagy E G, Jackson R B. Effects of afforestation on water yield: a global synthesis with implications for policy [J]. Global Change Biology, 2005, 11(10): 1565–1576.

[41] Zhou K X. Scientific conservation of natural ecosystems in the perspective of ecological civilization [J]. China Ecological Civilization, 2019 (2): 31–33. Chinese.

[42] Zhang D J, Ge W Y, Zhang Y. Evaluating the vegetation restoration sustainability of ecological projects: A case study of Wuqi County in China [J]. Journal of Cleaner Production, 2020, 264: 1–12.

[43] Wang J, Zhao W W, Zhang X, et al. Effects of reforestation on plant species diversity on the Loess Plateau of China: A case study in Danangou catchment [J]. Science of the Total Environment, 2019, 651: 979–989.

[44] Crouzeilles R, Ferreira M S, Chazdon R L, et al. Ecological restoration success is higher for natural regeneration than for active restoration in tropical forests [J]. Science Advances, 2017, 3(11): 1–12.

[45] Shao R, Zhang B Q, Su T X, et al. Estimating the increase in regional evaporative water consumption as a result of vegetation restoration over the Loess Plateau, China [J]. Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, 2019, 124(22): 11783–11802.

[46] Mcvicar T R, Van Niel T G, Li L T, et al. Parsimoniously modelling perennial vegetation suitability and identifying priority areas to support China’s re-vegetation program in the Loess Plateau: Matching model complexity to data availability [J]. Forest Ecology and Management, 2010, 259 (7): 1277–1290.

[47] Xu X. Evaluation of the effectiveness of global protected area vegetation conservation based on LAI/NPP [D]. Guiyang: Guizhou Normal University( Master’s thesis), 2022. Chinese.

[48] Zhou G Y, Xia J, Zhou P, et al. Not vegetation itself but mis-revegetation reduces water resources [J]. Scientia Sinica Terrae, 2021, 51 (2): 175–182. Chinese.

Related Research