Modeling Hydrologic Response to Land Use and Climate Change in the Krueng Jreu Sub Watershed of Aceh Besar

• Main Authors: Teuku Ferijal, Mustafril Bachtiar, Dewi Sri Jayanti, Dahlan Jafaruddin
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Syiah Kuala University 2016-12-01
• Series: Aceh International Journal of Science and Technology
• Online Access: http://jurnal.unsyiah.ac.id/AIJST/article/view/5762

Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) model was used to simulate impact of landuse and climate change on water resources in Krueng Jreu subwatershed located in Aceh Province – Indonesia. The subwatershed is a primary source of water to irrigated 233.52 km2 paddy field area through a surface irrigation system. The model performance was considerably good in predicting streamflow. The coefficients of determination varied between 0.58 and 0.72, while the Nash-Sutcliffe coefficients (ENS) ranged between 0.65-0.72 and the percentage bias were in the range of -0.36 to 2.30. Scenarios were applied to the best fit model to evaluate watershed responses to land use and climate changes. The model predicted increases in both runoff and water yield by 1% and 0.1% respectively as the result of increasing 15% settlement area. When all agricultural land within subwatershed converted to forest, water yield would increase by 1% during dry period and runoff contribution would decrease by 5%. Increases in surface flow by 23.6% and water yield by 15.1% were found under scenario of increasing 10% of daily precipitation. Increasing in evapotranspiration caused by an increase of 1.5⁰C in daily air temperature would decrease surface flow and water yield by 0.8% and 1.3%, respectively. Combination scenarios of changes in daily temperature and precipitation would increase evapotranspiration rate, annual water yield and runoff contribution.