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Water Supply, Demand, and Quality Indicators for Assessing the Spatial Distribution of Water Resource Vulnerability in the Columbia River Basin
Atmosphere -- Ocean
  • Heejun Chang, Portland State University
  • Il-Won Jung, Portland State University
  • Angela L. Strecker, Portland State University
  • Daniel Wise, U.S. Geological Survey
  • Martin Lafrenz, Portland State University
  • Vivek Shandas, Portland State University
  • Hamid Moradkhani, Portland State University
  • J. Alan Yeakley, Portland State University
  • Yangdong Pan, Portland State University
  • Robert Allen Bean, Portland State University
  • Gunnar Johnson, Portland State University
  • Mike Psaris, Portland State University
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
3-13-2013
Subjects
  • Water supply,
  • Water demand management,
  • Water quality,
  • Water -- Distribution,
  • Columbia River
Abstract

We investigated water resource vulnerability in the US portion of the Columbia River basin (CRB) using multiple indicators representing water supply, water demand, and water quality. Based on the US county scale, spatial analysis was conducted using various biophysical and socio-economic indicators that control water vulnerability. Water supply vulnerability and water demand vulnerability exhibited a similar spatial clustering of hotspots in areas where agricultural lands and variability of precipitation were high but dam storage capacity was low. The hotspots of water quality vulnerability were clustered around the main stem of the Columbia River where major population and agricultural centres are located. This multiple equal weight indicator approach confirmed that different drivers were associated with different vulnerability maps in the sub-basins of the CRB. Water quality variables are more important than water supply and water demand variables in the Willamette River basin, whereas water supply and demand variables are more important than water quality variables in the Upper Snake and Upper Columbia River basins. This result suggests that current water resources management and practices drive much of the vulnerability within the study area. The analysis suggests the need for increased coordination of water management across multiple levels of water governance to reduce water resource vulnerability in the CRB and a potentially different weighting scheme that explicitly takes into account the input of various water stakeholders.

Description

This is the publishers final PDF.

To the best of our knowledge, one or more authors of this paper were federal employees when contributing to this work. Published by Taylor & Francis, and available at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/07055900.2013.777896

DOI
10.1080/07055900.2013.777896
Persistent Identifier
http://archives.pdx.edu/ds/psu/11544
Citation Information
Heejun Chang , Il-Won Jung , Angela Strecker , Daniel Wise , Martin Lafrenz , Vivek Shandas , Hamid Moradkhani , Alan Yeakley , Yangdong Pan , Robert Bean , Gunnar Johnson & Mike Psaris (2013) Water Supply, Demand, and Quality Indicators for Assessing the Spatial Distribution of Water Resource Vulnerability in the Columbia River Basin, Atmosphere-Ocean, 51:4, 339-356, DOI: 10.1080/07055900.2013.777896