Sensitivity analysis to evaluate the effect of land use change on discharge rate

Potential effects of land use change on total discharge are assessed by evaluating the spatial trends of sensitivity indices. Given the uncertainty about future land use scenarios, a statistical approach was considered. I I land use types were randomly combined into 264 scenarios, a distributed rainfall-runoff model was applied in Central Bolivia, and the outputs generated were used to estimate sensitivity indices by applying Monte Carlo based Sobol' method. Our results showed that variances observed during peak and recession flows are more likely to be influenced by land use units close to the outlet; land use units located far from the main channel were observed to be influential on the variance of time steps previous to event occurrence.