Análisis del impacto del crecimiento de las megaciudades sobre el ciclo hidrológico bajo escenarios de cambio climático. Aplicación a la cuenca del río bogotá (colombia)

Abstract

Currently 54% of the world population lives in cities and it is expected that by 2050 this percentage will increase to 68% (UNDESA, 2019). An important part of this urban population is concentrated in megacities, defined as urban areas with more than 10 million inhabitants. In Latin America, the main megacities are Sao Paulo and Mexico City, with more than 20 million inhabitants. Buenos Aires, Rio de Janeiro, Lima and Bogotá are megacities still in development (Cepal, 2013). This doctoral thesis aims to identify and analyse the impacts that the dynamics of urban growth of a megacity induce on the behaviour of of the hydrological cycle components. The research carried out incorporates the effect of climate change together with the effect of urban land use change. To do this, a methodology for aggregating hydrological parameters in urban areas has been proposed. This methodology has been applied to the megacity of Bogotá, using the TETIS hydro-logical model and the LCM land use change model, under the official climate change scenarios in force in Colombia. Results obtained show that the joint analysis of land use change and climate change provides valuable tools to understand the hydrological behaviour of the basin in which the megacities are located and predict their future evolution. In the case of the megacity of Bogotá, it has been observed that the greatest effect on the components of the hydrological cycle is produced by the land use change, which is increased by the actions induced by climate change. The use of numeri-cal models that consider all these aspects is of special relevance when defining development plans, policies and programs in densely urbanized environments.