Patterns and attributions of hydrological drought in the Yangtze River basin from 1966 to 2015

As one of the possible consequences of climate change and human activities, extreme drought becomes more frequent. This study investigates how human activities altered the hydrological droughts pattern in the Yangtze River basin from 1966 to 2015 by using the I_SRI-RRV. I_SRI-RRV is calculated based on the PCR-GLOBWB 2.0 model simulated I_SR and Reliability-Resilience-Vulnerability (RRV). The results show that the model simulated I_SR can effectively reflect the hydrological drought situation of the Yangtze River basin. From 1966 to 2015, the hydrological drought in the Yangtze River basin showed an increasing trend and the human activities can reduce the proportion of the hydrological drought area in the Yangtze River basin after 1992. The I_SRI-RRV of the Yangtze River basin under the human activity scenario from 2006 to 2015 is significantly higher than that under the natural scenario. The human water intake activities dominated by reservoir regulation have the largest contribution to the increase of I_SRI-RRV of the Yangtze River basin.