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Use of oxygen-18 isotope to quantify flows in the upriver and middle reaches of the Heihe River, Northwestern China

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Environmental Geology

Abstract

In recharge areas, the Heihe River flow was separated into components of ice-snowmelt and precipitation according to 14 gauging stations and to monthly hydrograph using oxygen-18. As shown by the result of the two-component mixing model, on average, 19.8% of the runoff comes from ice-snowmelt. At three stations which are closer to glaciers and with headstream of ice-snow melted water, the ice-snowmelt runoff is larger than 28% of stream water. In addition, because most of the ice-snowmelt infiltrates the groundwater, which later discharges into the river at mountain outlets, the ice-snowmelt percentage in runoff is lower than average at these stations with the elevation higher than 3,600 m. According to monthly hydrograph, the lowest percentage of ice-snowmelt in runoff is in July (6.46%), whereas during November it is the largest (26.1%). In the middle basin, the fraction of groundwater in runoff had a marked increase from 23.57% near Zhangye City to 60.28% near Gaotai City, and then a dramatic drop to 13.61% near Zhengyixia Station because of agricultural flood irrigation in Zhangye Basin.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by a grant from the Innovation Project of CAS (O7V70020SZ) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (40671034). We would like to appreciate Jan Schwarzbauer for his helpful discussions, valuable advice and review. We also wish to thank Kobi Anker and the anonymous reviewers for their reading of the manuscript, and for their suggestions and critical comments.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key Laboratory of Water Cycle and Related Land Surface Processes, Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, CAS, 100101, Beijing, China

    Y. H. Zhang & X. F. Song

  2. School of Environmental Science and Engineering, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, 200240, Shanghai, China

    Y. Q. Wu

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  1. Y. H. Zhang
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  2. X. F. Song
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  3. Y. Q. Wu
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Correspondence to Y. H. Zhang.

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Zhang, Y.H., Song, X.F. & Wu, Y.Q. Use of oxygen-18 isotope to quantify flows in the upriver and middle reaches of the Heihe River, Northwestern China. Environ Geol 58, 645–653 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00254-008-1539-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00254-008-1539-y

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