Increased evapotranspiration from land cover changes intensified water crisis in an arid river basin in northwest China

Evapotranspiration (ET) plays an important role in determining the available water resources of a basin. In past decades, the Heihe River basin (HRB) in Northwest China has suffered severe water crisis and ecological problems due to large land cover changes (LCCs), especially oases expansion for irrigation agriculture. This study quantifies the ET variations due to LCCs in the HRB from 2000 to 2015 using the Ecological Assimilation of Land and …