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http://arks.princeton.edu/ark:/88435/dsp01hm50tv92t
Title: | Changing water availability in the São Francisco River Basin, Brazil: exploring the role of expanding agriculture and climate change |
Authors: | Fleury, Maria |
Advisors: | Maxwell, Reed |
Department: | Civil and Environmental Engineering |
Certificate Program: | Environmental Studies Program |
Class Year: | 2022 |
Abstract: | Human activities, such as agriculture, not only depend on but can also substantially affect the availability of water. Therefore, it is a concern that water resources are quickly being depleted in regions which already experience drought, like the São Francisco River Basin in Brazil. This thesis explores how the growth of large-scale agriculture, in the face of climate change affects water availability at the São Francisco River Basin and its sub-basins the Alto, Submédio, Médio and Alto São Francisco. The work combines remote-sensing observations of land-use change, water surface area and center pivot irrigation by MapBiomas, GRACE observations of total water storage and GLDAS climate re-analysis data to quantify trends in agricultural land-use, climate patterns and decreased water resources. As part of the analysis, climate and land-use datasets are combined to estimate water used by center pivot irrigation systems. It is found across the basin that agricultural land-use is growing, air temperature is increasing, rainfall rate is decreasing, and water storage is decreasing. Through the sub-basin analysis, it is shown that depletion of water resources is most pronounced in the Médio and Alto São Francisco sub-basins where the largest growth in agriculture and center-pivot irrigation is also observed. |
URI: | http://arks.princeton.edu/ark:/88435/dsp01hm50tv92t |
Type of Material: | Princeton University Senior Theses |
Language: | en |
Appears in Collections: | Civil and Environmental Engineering, 2000-2023 |
Files in This Item:
File | Description | Size | Format | |
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FLEURY-MARIA-THESIS.pdf | 4.86 MB | Adobe PDF | Request a copy |
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