Theor Appl Climatol DOI 10.1007/s00704-009-0222-x

ORIGINAL PAPER

Precipitation data in a mountainous catchment in : quality assessment and spatiotemporal characteristics

I. Westerberg & A. Walther & J-L. Guerrero & Z. Coello & S. Halldin & C-Y. Xu & D. Chen & L-C. Lundin

Received: 25 April 2008 /Accepted: 1 October 2009 # Springer-Verlag 2009

Abstract An accurate description of temporal and spatial provided the best results for gap-filling and the universal precipitation variability in is important for kriging method for spatial interpolation. In-homogeneity in local farming, water supply and flood management. Data the time series was the main quality problem, and 22% of quality problems and lack of consistent precipitation data the daily precipitation data were too poor to be used. Spatial impede hydrometeorological analysis in the 7,500 km2 autocorrelation for monthly precipitation was low during basin in central Honduras, encompassing the dry season, and correlation increased markedly when the capital . We used precipitation data from 60 data were temporally aggregated from a daily time scale to daily and 13 monthly stations in 1913–2006 from five local 4–5 days. The analysis manifested the high spatial and authorities and NOAA's Global Historical Climatology temporal variability caused by the diverse precipitation- Network. Quality control routines were developed to tackle generating mechanisms and the need for an improved the specific data quality problems. The quality-controlled monitoring network. data were characterised spatially and temporally, and compared with regional and larger-scale studies. Two gap- filling methods for daily data and three interpolation 1 Introduction methods for monthly and mean annual precipitation were compared. The coefficient-of-correlation-weighting method In Central America, large socio-economic interests, such as hydropower generation, agriculture and flood prevention are dependent on the characteristics of the precipitation regime * : : : : I. Westerberg: ( ) J.-L. Guerrero Z. Coello S. Halldin (Alfaro 2002;Magañaetal.1999). An accurate description C.-Y. Xu L.-C. Lundin of the features of this regime, specifically on a local scale, is Department of Earth Sciences, Uppsala University, dependent on the quality of the database. The creation of Uppsala, Sweden e-mail: [email protected] such a database takes many years of data collection. In addition, a thorough quality control and analysis are needed I. Westerberg before the station data records can be transformed into IVL Swedish Environmental Research Institute, estimates of areal precipitation useful for hydrometeorological Stockholm, Sweden analysis. In Central America in general, and Honduras in A. Walther : D. Chen particular, the need for properly quality controlled precipita- Department of Earth Sciences, University of Gothenburg, tion data has been stated in several previous studies (Aguilar et Gothenburg, Sweden al. 2005; Balairón Pérez et al. 2004; Flambard 2003)of J.-L. Guerrero : Z. Coello which some have been limited by poor quality data. High Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Honduras, quality precipitation data are specifically needed for water Tegucigalpa, Honduras management in the Choluteca River basin in Honduras, encompassing the capital Tegucigalpa. C.-Y. Xu Department of Geosciences, University of Oslo, Precipitation data of high quality are important not only Oslo, Norway for describing the precipitation regime; hydrological models