Pervasive Permafrost Thaw Exacerbates Future Risk of Water Shortage Across the Tibetan Plateau

Abstract

Rivers originating from the Tibetan Plateau (TP) provide water to more than 1 billion people living downstream. Almost 40% of the TP is currently underlain by permafrost, which serves as both an ice reserve and a flow barrier and is expected to degrade drastically in a warming climate. The hydrological impacts of permafrost thaw across the TP, however, remain poorly understood. Here, we quantify the permafrost change on the TP over 1980–2100 and evaluate its hydrological impacts using a physically-based cryospheric-hydrological model at a high spatial resolution. Using the ensemble mean of 38 models from the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 (CMIP6), the near-surface permafrost area and the total ground ice storage are projected to decrease by 86.4% and 61.6% during 2020–2100 under a high-emission scenario, respectively. The lowering of the permafrost table and removal of permafrost as a flow barrier would enhance infiltration and raise subsurface storage capacity. The diminished water supply from ground ice melt and enhanced subsurface storage capacity could jointly reduce annual runoff and lead to exacerbated regional water shortage when facing future droughts. If the most severe 10-year drought in the historical period occurs again in the future, the annual river runoff will further decrease by 9.7% and 11.3% compared with the historical dry period due to vanishing cryosphere in the source area of Yellow and Yangtze River. Our findings highlight the importance to get prepared for the additional water shortage risks caused by pervasive permafrost thaw in future water resources management across the TP.