The impacts of climate change on meteorological drought in the Central Highlands region of Vietnam

• Published in: Journal of hydroinformatics Vol. 26; no. 9; pp. 2416 - 2442
• Main Author: Quoc Lap, Tran
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London IWA Publishing 01.09.2024
• Subjects: Agricultural production; Climate change; Climate models; Drought; El Nino; Environmental impact; Expenditures; Highlands; Hydrology; Impact analysis; Precipitation; Rain; Regions; Standardized precipitation index; Topography; Water resources; Weather stations; Asia; United States > US; Vietnam
• ISSN: 1464-7141; 1465-1734
• DOI: 10.2166/hydro.2024.182

This study aimed to analyse the characteristics of drought under the impacts of climate change in the Central Highlands of Vietnam. The standardized precipitation indices at 3-, 6-, 9- and 12-month time scales were calculated based on the average monthly precipitation at 11 meteorological stations between 1985–2014. The drought characteristics were analysed based on the modified Mann-Kendall test, Theil-Sen methods and the theory of runs. Analysing the impact of climate change on drought events, four CMIP6 GCM models, namely, CNRM-CM6-1-HR, MRI-ESM2-0, BCC-CSM2-MR and MIROC6, under the SSP2-4.5 and SSP5-8.5 scenarios were used to obtain the average monthly precipitation for the period 2031-2060 to compute the SPI3, SPI6, SPI9 and SPI12. The results indicate that the drought frequency under the SSP5-8.5 scenario ranges from moderate to severe. The BCC-CSM2-MR, CNRM-CM6-1-HR and MIROC6 models showed an increase in drought frequency from 2 to 4% for SPI3 and SPI6 and from 4 to 6% for SPI9 and SPI12. Under the SSP2-4.5 scenario, the frequency of severe droughts also increases by 2-4% compared with that in the 1985-2014 baseline periods for SPI6, SPI9 and SPI12. Consequently, moderate to severe drought episodes are predicted to occur more frequently in the research area.