The Impact of Climate Change on Water Availability and Recharge of Aquifers in the Jordan River Basin

Cornelia van Wesenbeeck, Fayez Abdulla, Wim van Veen, Hani Abu Qdais and Ben Sonneveld

A chapter in Climate Change and Global Warming from IntechOpen

Abstract: Climate change can seriously affect the Middle East region by reduced and erratic rainfall. Formulating appropriate coping policies should account for local effects and changing flows interconnecting spatial units. We apply statistical downscaling techniques of coarse global circulation models to predict future rainfall patterns in the Yarmouk Basin, using a linear regression to extrapolate these results to the entire Jordan River Basin (JRB). Using a detailed water economy model for the JRB we predict rainfall patterns to evaluate the impact of climate change on agriculture and groundwater recharge. For the JRB, rainfall in 2050 will be around 10% lower than present precipitation, but with substantial spatial spreading. An overall reduction of net revenue from crop cultivation is estimated at 150 million USD, with major losses in Israel, Jordan, and the West Bank; Syrian revenues will slightly increase. The recharge of groundwater is affected negatively, and outflow to the Dead Sea is substantially lower, leading to further increases in salinization.

Keywords: Jordan basin; water economy model; climate change (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q54 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ito:pchaps:160323

DOI: 10.5772/intechopen.80321

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