Use of a Rainfall Runoff Model and Satellite Data Sets for Hydrological Studies of the Upper Contas Watershed, Brazil
Abstract
Continuous in-situ monitoring of environmental variables is expensive and difficult to maintain. This is true specifically in large watersheds and remote areas in developing countries, with little infrastructure and limited resources, as well as in semiarid areas, where the lack of water may represent an obstacle to the regional economic and sustainable development. On the other hand, over the past two decades, various satellite data sets that can be used to generate land surface hydrological variables have been made available, as well as model data sets resulting from the assimilation of remotely sensed and in-situ data in land surface models. This work focuses on using these satellite datasets and model outputs for the hydrological modeling of an ungauged basin, wherein stream flow data are absent or insufficient and little or no observations of spatially variable hydrological quantities are carried out. This work will focus on a 18200km² semiarid catchment Upper Contas watershed in Northeastern Brazil. We will examine the performance of a rainfall runoff model by calibrating the parameters using (a) observed stream flows (b) soil moisture from the GLDAS model output for the periods 1982-present. We also examine the relationship between vegetation growth using NDVI from MODIS and the model generated soil moisture.
- Publication:
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AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2015
- Bibcode:
- 2015AGUFM.H43H1634M
- Keywords:
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- 1836 Hydrological cycles and budgets;
- HYDROLOGY;
- 1847 Modeling;
- HYDROLOGY;
- 1855 Remote sensing;
- HYDROLOGY