Abstract:

The Asian Water Tower is the most important and vulnerable water tower in the world. Its most prominent feature is the glacier and snow processes. Climate change has led to a rapid reduction of solid water bodies such as glaciers and snow in the Asian Water Tower, while liquid water bodies such as lakes and rivers have significantly increased, resulting in an imbalance between solid and liquid phases. There is a spatial imbalance in the distribution of water resources, with an increase in water resources in the northern endorheic basins and a decrease in the southern exorheic basins. Glaciers are melting at an accelerated rate, with significant spatial differences between the southeast and northwest, showing severe glacial mass loss in the southeast and Tianshan regions, relatively minor losses in the northwest regions, and relative stability or advancement in the Pamir and West Kunlun regions. Snow cover and annual snow days have decreased, snowmelt is occurring earlier, and both maximum snow water equivalent and snowmelt are decreasing. In the future, research should be focused on the changes in glacier and snow processes in high-altitude areas, improving the spatiotemporal resolution of glacier and snow process models, strengthening research on future water resource changes under different scenarios, and proposing water security response strategies.

Key words: Asian Water Tower imbalance, Glacier change, Snow cover change