Evaluation of the impact of water conservancy projects on the ecosystem of Poyang Lake

Abstract

Energy engineering, such as hydroelectric stations, greatly affects the environment. Under the effect of the Three Gorges Dam, the water level of Poyang Lake has decreased. The dry season of Poyang Lake has become longer, leading to many consequences. The government proposed that a sluice be built in Poyang Lake to regulate the water level. We established AQUATOX model of Poyang Lake with different water flow in and out to simulate the ecosystem with changing water volume (water level). The data used in this paper are the output of the AQUATOX model. This paper proposes and uses a framework for ecosystem assessment of the body of Poyang Lake. The results show that the ecosystem quality of the body of Poyang Lake will become increasingly worse if no action is taken. If the necessary connectivity (for migratory creatures) is ensured, building a sluice can improve the ecosystem quality of the body of Poyang Lake. We also discusses the possibility of using ecosystem stability and regime shift indexes in ecosystem assessments.