Valuating service loss of snow cover in Irtysh River Basin

Snow cover provides essential resources and services for human well-being and socioeconomic development in arid areas. With the change in snow cover resulting from climate change that causes concerns about its consequences, there is a pressing need to analyze and understand its impact on the benefits that people has been enjoying from snow cover. These can be derived from the variation in economic value of snow services, that are demanded to meet socioeconomic activities. Based on the average decline mass of snow cover from 1979 to 2016 in Irtysh River Basin, we use the approach by applying economic evaluation to estimate the annual value loss of snow services. Considering the decreasing trend of snow cover mass at rates of -10.2 Mt per year (p < 0.05) or 0.3% per year, the annual service loss in Irtysh River Basin is currently worth up to CNY196 million. Within it, the service loss of climate regulation contributes the most, or about CNY84.7 million. The loss of freshwater service contributes only about 19%, implying that there would be a significant underestimation of service loss if only water supply would be considered. This may cause biased decision-making when we are facing the challenges of declining services as a result of climate change, impacting on the balancing of socioeconomic development and environment conservation for the sustainability over a long term.