You et al. (2026) Quantifying climate-induced cascading effects on runoff in a cold region using a glacier-enhanced Budyko framework

Identification

• Journal: Journal of Hydrology
• Year: 2026
• Date: 2026-03-10
• Authors: Yang You, Pingan Jiang, Yakun Wang, Wene Wang, Dianyu Chen, Xiaotao Hu
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jhydrol.2026.135285

Research Groups

• Key Laboratory of Agricultural Soil and Water Engineering in Arid and Semiarid Areas, Ministry of Education, Northwest A&F University, Yangling, China
• Xinjiang Agricultural University, Urumuqi, China

Short Summary

This study introduces a novel Budyko-based attribution framework, integrating glacier mass balance and ridge regression, to comprehensively separate the impacts of direct climate change, cascading climate effects, and human activities on runoff in cold regions. Applied to an alpine watershed, the framework robustly quantified these drivers, revealing an antagonistic effect where direct climate increased runoff while cascading effects and human activities suppressed it.

Objective

• To develop and apply a new attribution framework that integrates glacier mass balance into the Budyko equation and couples it with ridge regression to achieve a complete and distinct separation of the impacts on runoff from direct climate change, cascading climate effects (transmitted through underlying surface alterations), and human activities.

Study Configuration

• Spatial Scale: Upper Tailan River Basin, an alpine watershed in Central Asia.
• Temporal Scale: Annual scale for runoff attribution, over recent decades.

Methodology and Data

• Models used:
  • Modified Budyko equation (incorporating glacier mass balance and glacier fraction).
  • Ridge regression (coupled with the modified Budyko framework to identify relationships between the watershed characteristic parameter 'n' and climatic/human factors).
  • Multiple regression model.
• Data sources:
  • Climate data (for direct climate effects).
  • Data on underlying surface conditions (for cascading effects).
  • Human activity data (e.g., GDP growth, irrigation efficiency).
  • Glacier mass balance data.
  • Runoff observations.

Main Results

• The proposed framework performed robustly, with ridge regression achieving significantly superior accuracy (coefficient of determination R² = 0.83) in simulating the watershed characteristic parameter 'n' compared to principal component regression (R² = 0.48).
• Runoff changes exhibited a distinct antagonistic effect: the direct climate effect (+80.44 mm) was the primary driver of the observed runoff increase, while the cascading effect (−21.78 mm) and human activities (−11.65 mm) collectively suppressed runoff growth.
• Strong internal offsetting mechanisms existed among driving factors; for instance, GDP growth pushed the parameter 'n' upward, whereas enhanced irrigation efficiency significantly suppressed its increase, thereby modulating runoff.

Contributions

• Proposes a novel methodology for in-depth analysis of hydrological change mechanisms in complex environments, particularly cold regions with glaciers.
• Addresses critical limitations of conventional Budyko-based frameworks by explicitly incorporating glacier melt contributions and resolving the cascading effect of climate change.
• Provides fresh insights for scientific and sustainable water resource management by demonstrating that neglecting the cascading effect can distort the true response of the hydrological system to climate change.
• Offers a robust tool for complete separation of direct climate, cascading climate, and human activity impacts on runoff.

Funding

• Not explicitly stated in the provided text.

Citation

@article{You2026Quantifying,
  author = {You, Yang and Jiang, Pingan and Wang, Yakun and Wang, Wene and Chen, Dianyu and Hu, Xiaotao},
  title = {Quantifying climate-induced cascading effects on runoff in a cold region using a glacier-enhanced Budyko framework},
  journal = {Journal of Hydrology},
  year = {2026},
  doi = {10.1016/j.jhydrol.2026.135285},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2026.135285}
}