Climate Change Impacts on Missouri River Basin Water Yields: The Influence of Temporal Scales

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Abstract
Global climate change will likely modify the availability of surface and ground water. It is necessary to evaluate the potential impacts of climate change on water resources to assist in policy decisions. Water resources impact assessments are often completed with hydrologic models. This draws into question the temporal and spatial scales over which these models are developed and evaluated. The objective of this paper was to evaluate the impacts of climate change on Missouri River Basin water yields at multiple temporal scales. This was accomplished by developing a hydrologic model of the basin. The model was conducted for baseline and changed climate conditions. The climate change data was provided by a Global Circulation Model and downscaled with a Regional Climate Model. Water yield increased significantly under the changed climate simulation for all temporal scales. The insensitivity of results to temporal scale was likely due to the large sample size and the strong effects of climate change on water yield. Future research will expand this work to include assessment of spatial model scales.

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