Poor correlation between large-scale environmental flow violations and freshwater biodiversity: Implications for water resource management and the freshwater planetary boundary

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dc.contributor.authorMohan, Chinchu
dc.contributor.authorGleeson, Tom
dc.contributor.authorFamiglietti, James S.
dc.contributor.authorVirkki, Vili
dc.contributor.authorKummu, Matti
dc.contributor.authorMiina, Porkka
dc.contributor.authorWang-Erlandsson, Lan
dc.contributor.authorHuggins, Xander
dc.contributor.authorGerten, Dieter
dc.contributor.authorJähnig, Sonja C.
dc.date.accessioned2023-01-26T19:28:42Z
dc.date.available2023-01-26T19:28:42Z
dc.date.copyright2022en_US
dc.date.issued2022
dc.description.abstractThe freshwater ecosystems around the world are degrading, such that maintaining environmental flow¹ (EF) in river networks is critical to their preservation. The relationship between streamflow alterations (subsequent EF violations²) and the freshwater biodiversity response is well established at the scale of stream reaches or small basins (~< 100 km²). However, it is unclear if this relationship is robust at larger scales, even though there are large-scale initiatives to legalize the EF requirement. Moreover, EFs have been used in assessing a planetary boundary³ for freshwater. Therefore, this study intends to conduct an exploratory evaluation of the relationship between EF violation and freshwater biodiversity at globally aggregated scales and for freshwater ecoregions. Four EF violation indices (severity, frequency, probability of shifting to a violated state, and probability of staying violated) and seven independent freshwater biodiversity indicators (calculated from observed biota data) were used for correlation analysis. No statistically significant negative relationship between EF violation and freshwater biodiversity was found at global or ecoregion scales. These findings imply the need for a holistic bio-geo-hydro-physical approach in determining the environmental flows. While our results thus suggest that streamflow and EF may not be the only determinant of freshwater biodiversity at large scales, they do not preclude the existence of relationships at smaller scales or with more holistic EF methods (e.g., including water temperature, water quality, intermittency, connectivity, etc.) or with other biodiversity data or metrics.en_US
dc.description.reviewstatusRevieweden_US
dc.description.scholarlevelFacultyen_US
dc.description.sponsorshipThis research has been supported by the Canada First Research Excellence Fund (grant no. C150-2017-8).en_US
dc.identifier.citationMohan, C., Gleeson, T., Famiglietti, J. S., Virkki, V., Kummu, M., Porkka, M., Wang-Erlandsson, L., Huggins, X., Gerten, D., & Jähnig, S. C. (2022). Poor correlation between large-scale environmental flow violations and freshwater biodiversity: implications for water resource management and the freshwater planetary boundary. Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 26(23), 6247–6262. https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-6247-2022en_US
dc.identifier.urihttps://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-6247-2022
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/1828/14694
dc.language.isoenen_US
dc.publisherHydrology and Earth System Sciencesen_US
dc.subject.departmentDepartment of Civil Engineering
dc.subject.departmentSchool of Earth and Ocean Sciences
dc.titlePoor correlation between large-scale environmental flow violations and freshwater biodiversity: Implications for water resource management and the freshwater planetary boundaryen_US
dc.typeArticleen_US

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