Dr.  Zhe Zhang

University of Saskatchewan

10:30, May 31, 2019

Room 319, Building 40, IAP

The groundwater regime in the Prairie Pothole Region (PPR) in North America is strongly impacted by the semi-arid climate and seasonally freeze-thaw soil processes. This complex two-way water exchange between sub-surface soil and groundwater aquifer is underrepresented in previous coupled earth system models. Furthermore, the impacts of climate change on groundwater regime are uncertain. In this paper, we investigate the hydrologic cycle of shallow groundwater in the PPR using a coupled land-groundwater model (NoahMP-MMF) and study its response to climate change at the end of the 21st century. This study provides valuable information about the hydrologic cycle under climate change in cold regions and is important for improving the coupling processes between atmosphere and hydrology cycle in earth system models.