Real-Time Water Resources Analysis and Assessment for Supporting Beijing Water Sustainability

Abstract

Water is critical to sustainability. Beijing is located in a semiarid region and has been suffering from water resources shortage in recent decades.The per capita water resources is less than 300 m3,which is about 1/8 of the national average and 1/30 of the world average. Meanwhile,the precipitation in the Beijing region shows its trend of decreasing since 1980s.Thus,to understand the situation of real-time water resources timely and correctly is of vital importance to achieve sustainable water resources utilization and management in Beijing.The paper introduces the current situation of water resources in Beijing and describes a technical framework of approaches of real-time water resources assessment and the analysis method of water resources amount generated by real-time rainfall events based on the theory of water balance and the distributed rainfall-runoff model with 1km x 1km grid.The advanced operational water resources analysis platform with interactive function is developed based on WebGIS and B/S structure and the applica-intertion effect on the sustainability of society, economy and environment in Beijing is indicated. This technique development provided a functionalized tool for Beijing municipal decision-makers to effectively dispatch water resources and fully use the resources of urban rainfall and flood water.