HR: 1330h
AN: H12B-0992    [PDF]
TI: Effect of Rainfall Aggregation on Hydrologic Predictions
AU: * Sharif, H
EM: sharif@ucar.edu
AF: National Center for Atmospheric Research, P.O. Box 3000, Boulder, CO 80307
AU: Brandes, E
EM: brandes@ucar.edu
AF: National Center for Atmospheric Research, P.O. Box 3000, Boulder, CO 80307
AB: Remotely sensed soil moisture data are becoming increasingly available, however the variability within the remotely sensed footprint is spatially averaged. The representation of spatial heterogeneity of soil moisture is essential for modeling processes that are nonlinearly related to soil moisture, such as the partitioning of sensible and latent heat fluxes. A number of studies have suggested that the spatial variability of soil moisture varies with wetness. At different locations, scales, and wetting and drying conditions, soil moisture patterns have been linked to topography, soil characteristics such as porosity and wilting point, and rainfall distribution. The objective of the proposed study is to examine the effects of rainfall temporal and spatial aggregation on spatial variability of soil moisture and runoff predictions on a 1000-km2 watershed. High-resolution radar-estimated rainfall from the IHOP2002 experiment will be used. These rain fields are aggregated in space and time. The hydrologic response of a distributed hydrologic model to the aggregated rain fields will be statistically compared with the response of the model to the original rainfall fields to quantify the impact of the spatial and temporal aggregation on hydrologic predictions. The proposed procedure will combine information from these simulations to determine what adjustments need to be made to the predicted fluxes.
DE: 1836 Hydrologic budget (1655)
DE: 1854 Precipitation (3354)
DE: 1860 Runoff and streamflow
DE: 1866 Soil moisture
SC: Hydrology [H]
MN: 2003 Fall Meeting