Impacts of Climate Change on Water Resources ) A Case Study of Matapedia River, Quebec, Canada )

Abstract

Changing in universal climate will cause a major effect on hydrological systems which will has a direct impact on ecological, economic and social systems. Climate change will be varied from location to another in the globe, therefore a specific site models are important to determine the impact on the aimed region. In this study the impacts of climate change been analyzed on the Matapedia River watershed located in Quebec, Canada; by developing a hydrological process based model to simulate the current and future river flows and the region precipitation. Matapedia hydrological model used Canadian Regional Circulation Model (CRCM) climate data to simulate future scenario of the watershed. Delta method been used for downscaling and Quantile-Quantile method used to correct the model results distributions. Then used corrected data for the hydrological model for the stream flow records between (1982-2001) to forecast stream flow, precipitations and other climate parameters such as temperature (max, min), wind and humidity. Results shows flow increased in future flow simulation even though extreme flood discharges by some means decreased in study area during winter and spring months due to an increased in maximum and minimum temperature about (2.65oC to 3.02oC) respectively during (2011-2100) period. Also an increase in precipitation in the future about (1.038) in study area headed to make the flood event of 100 and 1000 year return period more extreme.