Evaluating future water availability in Texas through the lens of a data-driven approach leveraged with CMIP6 general circulation models

Wenzhao Li; Dongfeng Li; Hesham El-Askary; Joshua B Fisher; Zheng N Fang

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2024.171136

Evaluating future water availability in Texas through the lens of a data-driven approach leveraged with CMIP6 general circulation models

Sci Total Environ. 2024 Apr 15:921:171136. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2024.171136. Epub 2024 Feb 22.

Authors

Wenzhao Li¹, Dongfeng Li², Hesham El-Askary³, Joshua B Fisher⁴, Zheng N Fang⁵

Affiliations

¹ Earth Systems Science and Data Solutions Lab, Chapman University, Orange, CA 92866, USA; Schmid College of Science and Technology, Chapman University, Orange, CA 92866, USA.
² Department of Civil Engineering, the University of Texas at Arlington, Arlington, TX, USA.
³ Earth Systems Science and Data Solutions Lab, Chapman University, Orange, CA 92866, USA; Schmid College of Science and Technology, Chapman University, Orange, CA 92866, USA; Department of Environmental Sciences, Faculty of Science, Alexandria University, Moharem Bek, Alexandria, 21522, Egypt.
⁴ Schmid College of Science and Technology, Chapman University, Orange, CA 92866, USA.
⁵ Department of Civil Engineering, the University of Texas at Arlington, Arlington, TX, USA. Electronic address: nickfang@uta.edu.

PMID: 38401723
DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2024.171136

Abstract

Climate change is escalating the frequency and intensity of extreme precipitation events, significantly influencing the spatial and temporal distributions of water resources. This is particularly evident in Texas, a rapidly growing state with a pronounced west-east gradient in water supply. This study utilizes Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 (CMIP6) data and data-driven methodology to improve projections of Texas's future water resources, focusing on actual evapotranspiration (AET) and water availability through enhanced Multi-Model Ensembles. The results reveal that the data-driven model significantly outperforms the CMIP5 and CMIP6 models across all skill metrics, underscoring the potential of data-driven methodologies in advancing climate science. Furthermore, the study provides an in-depth analysis of the projected changes in net water availability (NWA) and estimated water demand for different regions in Texas over the next six decades from 2015 to 2074, which reveal fluctuating patterns of water stress, with the regions (nine out of sixteen water planning regions in Texas, especially for the most populated regions) poised for heightened challenges in reconciling water demand and availability. While increasing trends are found in precipitation, AET, and NWA for the northern region of Texas based on SSP2-4.5, decreasing trends are found over the southern region for all three parameters based on SSP5-8.5. These findings underscore the importance of factoring both spatial and temporal variations in water availability and demand for effective water management strategies and the need for adaptive water management strategies for the changing water availability scenarios.

Keywords: CMIP6; Climate change; Data-driven modeling; Precipitation and evapotranspiration; Texas water development Board; Water resource planning.