Investigating the impacts of cascade hydropower development on the natural flow regime in the Yangtze River, China

Abstract The Yangtze River is one of the largest and most important rivers in the world. Over the past several decades, the flow regime of the Yangtze River has been altered by human activities, particularly dam construction. Hydrological regimes will be further influenced due to more dams that have been planned and are being built in the upper reach of the Yangtze River (URYR). In this context, to assess the impacts of cascade dam development on the natural flows, four different scenarios of the reservoirs' combination are simulated with a hydrological model (the Soil and Water Assessment Tool) in the URYR. Flow regime changes were investigated using the eco-flow metrics and minimum/optimal ecological flow with the simulated daily river flows. The results indicate that eco-surplus in low flows and eco-deficit in high flows greatly increases due to reservoir operations when more reservoirs are put into service. The minimum ecological flow and the optimal ecological flow cannot be guaranteed from September to November, which is a crucial time for fish spawning. To maintain the natural regime while meeting the requirements for the river ecosystem, we propose that the lower and satisfactory operation limits are 11,680 m 3 /s and 7235 m 3 /s and 16,300 m 3 /s and 9130 m 3 /s, respectively. Optimizing cascade reservoir operational rules is needed to achieve a better balance between ecological and socio-economic demands in the Yangtze River Basin.