Evaluating the Atibaia river basin hydrology using the JULES land-surface model
Abstract
Community land surface models such as JULES are increasingly used for hydrological assessments such as land use and land cover changes (LUCC) , because of their state-of-the-art representation of physical processes and versatility. Unlike statistical models and AI models, the JULES model simulates the physical water flux under given meteorological conditions which permits us to understand and investigate the cause and effect of changes of environmental processes. Here we explore the possibility of this approach using a case study in the Atibaia river basin, which serves as a major water supply for metropolitan regions of Campinas and São Paulo, Brazil. The watershed is subjected to increasing hydrological risks (e.g. historical floods in 2009, 2010, and drought in 2014) which could be attributed to LUCC such as urbanization and agricultural activity. Therefore, highlights the importance to evaluate the land surface processes of the watershed systematically. We explore the use of local precipitation collection (e.g. rain gauge, radar), compliment with multiple sources of global reanalysis data, to simulate the basin hydrology. Our results show that the spatiotemporal rainfall variability in this area is extremely high, complicating the extrapolation of point-based measurements to catchment averages. Despite the shortcoming, key hydrological fluxes in the basin can be represented by the JULES model simulations. The hydrology simulation could be the first step toward a pilot flood and drought forecasting and early warning system for the Atibaia river basin.
- Publication:
-
AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2020
- Bibcode:
- 2020AGUFMH194.0010C
- Keywords:
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- 1804 Catchment;
- HYDROLOGY;
- 1843 Land/atmosphere interactions;
- HYDROLOGY;
- 1846 Model calibration;
- HYDROLOGY;
- 1847 Modeling;
- HYDROLOGY