The Hashemite University1, Jordan University of Science and Technology2, Mideast Aviation Academy3
Climate change in Jordan is real, in particular in relation to temperature increases and precipitation decreases. This will add additional stresses on the available limited and stressed water resource in Jordan. However, there is still a high degree of uncertainty when it comes to knowledge about specific changes and impacts, as well as the relative weight of global warming compared to other changes in the physical environment with potential implications for local climate. This work aims at assessing the direct impacts of climate change on water availability Zarqa River Basin North Jordan. Therefore, SWAT along with General Circulation Models (GCM) were used to assess the future impacts of climate change on water resources in the study area. Based on the analysis of different GCM GCM models, HadCM3 runs A2 and B2 were found to be the best fits the climate conditions of Jordan. Using SWAT hydrological model, a decrease in the available monthly steam flow was noticed in the next 80 years in Jordan. The main rainy months in Jordan (Jan, Feb and Mar) will show a decrease in surface runoff amounts that reaches 40% as result of increasing temperature and decreasing precipitation. The results revealed from this study indicate that the current water strategy plans that managed by Ministry of Water and Irrigation (MWI) should be revised to handle that additional stresses that resulted from the impacts of climate change.