Human Activities Near Rivers May be Responsible for Severe Droughts, Flood

A team of researchers from the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada taking up this study examined more than 2,000 watersheds across North America from 1950 to 2009.

This examination was based on those with natural water flow compared with those maintained with a man-built infrastructure for management. The result shows changes in the activities of about 44% of waterflow managed by human development projects, as per USA Today.

These changes include rise and fall in the water flow at seasonal levels. According to a professor of global water sustainability and ecohydrology at Waterloo and study co-author Nandita Basu, these changes could lead to flood or drought.

Also Read: Prevention of Alien Tree Infestation on Mountains Can Reduce Climate Change Impact on Drought

Beneficial Effect of Managed Watersheds

Although these new studies have proven the side effects of this natural sustainability, there are still of course high advantages of these structures as water management practices could also reduce the risk of floods or drought.

This places a little confusion as they could both bring about flooding and drought as well as prevent it depending on how the structure is managed.

 Basu said: "The takeaway is that (management) could be a good or a bad thing, depending on how you do it. Across the country, there are watersheds in which it is done to buffer the climate effect, and in other regions or at other times, it's done in a way to exacerbate," according to i24 News.

In some western sheds, there is an increased drought which could easily be referred to as the worst drought in 1,200 years. According to Nitin Singh, a Waterloo postdoctoral fellow and study lead author, the dams and watershed could be the reason behind the increase in the drought.

These dams were primarily built for flood, but due to the seasonal changes, the reservoir might be storing so much water causing the drought.

Increase in Flood Conditions Due to Human Activities

In the Upper Midwest and Great Lakes region, numerous watersheds experience changes in the flow due to the water management, according to research.

These changes are affected not only by poor management but the climate change in seasons like the decrease in water flow on springtime but increase in other seasons in the the Northeast and portions of the Southeast and in the US central plane.

There is also a decrease in waterflow in the western mountains but from the analysis done on these effects. About 1 out of every 10 watersheds affected by climate changes was still associated to human activities. 

Although these effects are still under investigation, researchers advise the government to improve the watershed management strategies in order to reduce these effects and avert these natural disasters.

Related Article: Human Activity Hastens Climate-driven Weather Catastrophes Like Drought, Flood, and Thunderstorms

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