| Title: | Case study: Effect of climatic characterization on river discharge in an alpine-prealpine catchment of the Spanish Pyrenees using the SWAT model |
| Authors: | Palazón, L. and A. Navas |
| Year: | 2016 |
| Journal: | Water |
| Volume: | 8(10 |
| Pages: | |
| Article ID: | 471 |
| DOI: | doi:10.3390/w8100471 |
| URL (non-DOI journals): | |
| Model: | SWAT |
| Broad Application Category: | hydrologic only |
| Primary Application Category: | climate change |
| Secondary Application Category: | hydrologic assessment |
| Watershed Description: | 1,504 km^2 Barasona River drainage area, a tributary of the Ebro River located in the central Spanish Pyrenees Region in northwest Spain. |
| Calibration Summary: | |
| Validation Summary: | |
| General Comments: | |
| Abstract: | The new challenges in assessment of water resources demand new approaches and tools,
such as the use of hydrologic models, which could serve to assist managers in the prediction, planning
and management of catchment water supplies in view of increased demand of water for irrigation
and climatic change. Good characterization of the spatial patterns of climate variables is of paramount
importance in hydrological modelling. This is especially so when modelling mountain environments
which are characterized by strong altitudinal climate gradients. However, very often there is a poor
distribution of climatic stations in these areas, which in many cases, results in under representation of
high altitude areas with respect to climatic data. This results in the poor performance of the models.
In the present study, the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) model was applied to the Barasona
reservoir catchment in the Central Spanish Pyrenees in order to assess the influence of different
climatic characterizations in the monthly river discharges. Four simulations with different input
data were assessed, using only the available climate data (A1); the former plus one synthetic dataset
at a higher altitude (B1); and both plus the altitudinal climate gradient (A2 and B2). The model’s
performance was evaluated against the river discharges for the representative periods of 2003–2005
and 1994–1996 by means of commonly used statistical measures. The best results were obtained using
the altitudinal climate gradient alone (scenario A2). This study provided insight into the importance
of taking into account the sources and the spatial distribution of weather data in modelling water
resources in mountainous catchments. |
| Language: | English |
| Keywords: | water resource assessment; hydrological modelling; river discharge; Barasona reservoir;
mountainous catchment; SWAT; Spanish Pyrenees |