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The Vulnerability of Water Resources from Eastern Romania to Anthropic Impact and Climate Change

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Water Resources Management in Romania

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Abstract

The regional and local strategies of the past decade have attempted to introduce the principles of sustainable development, which would allow Romania to both meet economic demands and face increasingly pronounced climate change. With a surface of 20,569 km2 and a population of 2.2 million, the eastern part of the country, spread between the rivers Siret and Prut and sharing borders with the Ukraine (to the north) and the Republic of Moldova (to the east). All the region is classified as vulnerable from an economic and social point of view, but also as far as the impact of climate change upon water resources is concerned. Anthropic activities and climate change are triggering the modification of the hydrological regime (in both quantity and quality) and an increase in the severity of issues associated with water bodies shared with other countries (such as the river Prut, which acts as the border between Romania and the Republic of Moldova), thus rendering an already overexploited resource even more vulnerable. The conclusions of scientific analyses aimed at assessing the effects of climate change upon water resources allow an evaluation of their degree of vulnerability in the face of irreversible challenges. The trend toward phenomena such as global warming, evaluated for the region at 0.2–0.3 °C for the last 50 years, together with an increase in the frequency of extreme temperature values and precipitation volumes emphasize the degree of vulnerability of water resources to current climate change.

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Acknowledgements

The author acknowledges the climatic, hydrological and hydrogeological data provided Moldova Regional Meteorological Center, and Prut-Birlad Basins Branch of Romanian Waters Administration.

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  1. Department of Geography, Faculty of Geography and Geology, “Alexandru Ioan Cuza” University of Iasi, Iasi, Romania

    Ionuț Minea

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  1. Ionuț Minea
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Correspondence to Ionuț Minea .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of Engineering, Zagazig University, Zagazig, Egypt

    Abdelazim M. Negm

  2. Faculty of Geography and Geology, University "Alexandru Ioan Cuza", Iași, Romania

    Gheorghe Romanescu

  3. Technical University of Košice, Košice, Slovakia

    Martina Zeleňáková

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Minea, I. (2020). The Vulnerability of Water Resources from Eastern Romania to Anthropic Impact and Climate Change. In: Negm, A., Romanescu, G., Zeleňáková, M. (eds) Water Resources Management in Romania. Springer Water. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-22320-5_7

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