Using glacier area ratio to quantify effects of melt water on runoff

•Effects of melt water on runoff were analyzed for twenty-four catchments.•Power functions of GAR describe the effects very well across catchments.•The effects are very sensitive to change in GAR when GAR is less than 10%.

SummaryTwenty-four headwater catchments with varying glacier area ratios (GARs) in the Eastern and Central Tian Shan Mountains were simulated by the glacier-enhanced Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) model from 1961 to 2007. The mean catchment GAR ranges between 0.7% and 44.8% with a mean of 8.6%. Through synthetic analysis of the glacio-hydrological processes simulation results of the catchments, it was found that the GAR is an effective index that can be used to interpret quantitatively the varying influences of glaciers on runoff across catchments. Among the twenty-four catchments, the ratio of glacier melt contribution (RGMC) to runoff varies between 3.5% and 67.5% with a mean of 24.0%; the ratio of ice melt contribution (RIMC) between 1.4% and 35.8% with a mean of 10.5%; the ratio of ice melt in glacier melt between 33.4% and 59.1% with a mean of 43.4%; the runoff coefficient (RC) between 0.24 and 0.90 with a mean of 0.52; and the coefficient of variation (CV) of runoff between 0.10 and 0.29 with a mean of 0.18. Based on synthetic analysis, it was found that (1) power functions fit the relations between RGMC, RIMC, RC, and CV and GAR with high certainty; (2) the CV decreases with increasing GAR while others increase; and (3) these power functions change sensitively with GAR when GAR is less than 10%, implicating that a small change in GAR may cause remarkable changes in RGMC, RIMC, RC, and CV in the less glacierized catchments.