Dataset Information

Dependence of hydropower energy generation on forests in the Amazon Basin at local and regional scales.

ABSTRACT: Tropical rainforest regions have large hydropower generation potential that figures prominently in many nations' energy growth strategies. Feasibility studies of hydropower plants typically ignore the effect of future deforestation or assume that deforestation will have a positive effect on river discharge and energy generation resulting from declines in evapotranspiration (ET) associated with forest conversion. Forest loss can also reduce river discharge, however, by inhibiting rainfall. We used land use, hydrological, and climate models to examine the local "direct" effects (through changes in ET within the watershed) and the potential regional "indirect" effects (through changes in rainfall) of deforestation on river discharge and energy generation potential for the Belo Monte energy complex, one of the world's largest hydropower plants that is currently under construction on the Xingu River in the eastern Amazon. In the absence of indirect effects of deforestation, simulated deforestation of 20% and 40% within the Xingu River basin increased discharge by 4-8% and 10-12%, with similar increases in energy generation. When indirect effects were considered, deforestation of the Amazon region inhibited rainfall within the Xingu Basin, counterbalancing declines in ET and decreasing discharge by 6-36%. Under business-as-usual projections of forest loss for 2050 (40%), simulated power generation declined to only 25% of maximum plant output and 60% of the industry's own projections. Like other energy sources, hydropower plants present large social and environmental costs. Their reliability as energy sources, however, must take into account their dependence on forests.

SUBMITTER: Stickler CM

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3677497 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Dependence of hydropower energy generation on forests in the Amazon Basin at local and regional scales.

Stickler Claudia M CM Coe Michael T MT Costa Marcos H MH Nepstad Daniel C DC McGrath David G DG Dias Livia C P LC Rodrigues Hermann O HO Soares-Filho Britaldo S BS

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 20130513 23

Tropical rainforest regions have large hydropower generation potential that figures prominently in many nations' energy growth strategies. Feasibility studies of hydropower plants typically ignore the effect of future deforestation or assume that deforestation will have a positive effect on river discharge and energy generation resulting from declines in evapotranspiration (ET) associated with forest conversion. Forest loss can also reduce river discharge, however, by inhibiting rainfall. We use ...[more]

PMID: 23671098

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Project description:Understanding the trait-environment relationships has been a core ecological research topic in the face of global climate change. However, the strength of trait-environment relationships at the local and regional scales in temperate forests remains poorly known. In this study, we investigated the local and regional scale forest plots of the natural broad-leaved temperate forest in northeastern China, to assess what extent community-level trait composition depends on environmental drivers across spatial scales. We measured five key functional traits (leaf area, specific leaf area, leaf carbon content, leaf nitrogen content, and wood density) of woody plant, and quantified functional compositions of communities by calculating the "specific" community-weighted mean (CWM) traits. The sum of squares decomposition method was used to quantify the relative contribution of intraspecific trait variation to total trait variation among communities. Multiple linear regression model was then used to explore the community-level trait-environment relationships. We found that (i) intraspecific trait variation contributed considerably to total trait variation and decreased with the spatial scale from local to regional; (ii) functional composition was mainly affected by soil and topography factors at the local scale and climate factor at the regional scale, while explaining that variance of environment factors were decreased with increasing spatial scale; and (iii) the main environment driver of functional composition was varied depending on the traits and spatial scale. This work is one of the few multi-scale analyses to investigate the environmental drivers of community functional compositions. The extent of intraspecific trait variation and the strength of trait-environment relationship showed consistent trends with increasing spatial scale. Our findings demonstrate the influence of environmental filtering on both local- and regional-scale temperate forest communities, and contribute to a comprehensive understanding of trait-environment relationships across spatial scales.

Dataset Information

Dependence of hydropower energy generation on forests in the Amazon Basin at local and regional scales.

Publications

Dependence of hydropower energy generation on forests in the Amazon Basin at local and regional scales.

Similar Datasets

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