Hydrological Modeling of Mountain Catchments in Central Asia— Approaches for Data Sparse Catchments
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Hydrological modeling of mountain catchments in Central Asia— approaches for data sparse catchments Doris Düthmann Dissertation submitted for the degree of Doctor of Natural Sciences (Dr. rer. nat.) in Hydrology to the Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences at the University of Potsdam, Germany Referees Prof. Dr. Bruno Merz, University of Potsdam Prof. Dr. Axel Bronstert, University of Potsdam Prof. Dr. Jan Seibert, University of Zurich Submitted January 2015 Defended June 2015 Published August 2015 Published online at the Institutional Repository of the University of Potsdam: URN urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-80071 http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-80071 CONTENTS V Contents Contents ................................................................................................................................................................. V List of figures ..................................................................................................................................................... VII List of tables ......................................................................................................................................................... XI Abstract ............................................................................................................................................................. XIII Zusammenfassung .............................................................................................................................................. XV 1 Introduction...................................................................................................................................................... 1 1.1 Motivation ................................................................................................................................................. 1 1.2 Water in Central Asia—a scarce resource ................................................................................................. 1 1.3 Additional data sources and approaches for hydrological modeling in data sparse mountain regions ...... 2 1.4 Understanding past hydrologic changes .................................................................................................... 3 1.5 Objectives and research questions ............................................................................................................. 3 1.6 Study areas ................................................................................................................................................ 5 1.7 Overview ................................................................................................................................................... 6 2 Evaluation of areal precipitation estimates based on downscaled reanalysis and station data by hydrological modeling ..................................................................................................................................... 7 2.1 Introduction ............................................................................................................................................... 8 2.2 Study area .................................................................................................................................................. 9 2.3 Data and methods .................................................................................................................................... 10 2.3.1 Precipitation data and interpolation approaches ........................................................................... 10 2.3.2 Point based evaluation of the precipitation data ........................................................................... 12 2.3.3 Evaluation of areal precipitation estimates based on simulated discharge ................................... 13 2.4 Results and discussion ............................................................................................................................. 16 2.4.1 Characteristics of the precipitation data sets ................................................................................ 16 2.4.2 Evaluation of the precipitation data based on simulated discharge .............................................. 19 2.5 Conclusions ............................................................................................................................................. 23 3 The value of satellite-derived snow cover images for calibrating a hydrological model in snow- dominated catchments in Central Asia ........................................................................................................ 27 3.1 Introduction ............................................................................................................................................. 28 3.2 Study area ................................................................................................................................................ 29 3.3 Data and methods .................................................................................................................................... 30 3.3.1 Extraction of snow cover from AVHRR satellite imagery........................................................... 30 3.3.2 Hydrological model ...................................................................................................................... 31 3.3.3 Model calibration ......................................................................................................................... 32 3.4 Results and discussion ............................................................................................................................. 35 3.4.1 Characterization of the trade-offs between good performance for discharge and snow cover area ............................................................................................................................................... 35 VI CONTENTS 3.4.2 Model performance in terms of discharge and snow cover area .................................................. 37 3.4.3 Influence of the two objective functions on constraining model parameters ............................... 39 3.4.4 Value of increasing the number of snow cover observations during the calibration period ......... 42 3.5 Conclusions ............................................................................................................................................. 43 4 Attribution of streamflow trends in snow- and glacier melt dominated catchments of the Tarim River, Central Asia ........................................................................................................................................ 47 4.1 Introduction ............................................................................................................................................. 48 4.2 Study area and observed hydrometeorological changes .......................................................................... 49 4.3 Data and methods .................................................................................................................................... 51 4.3.1 Streamflow and meteorological data ............................................................................................ 51 4.3.2 Trend analysis .............................................................................................................................. 52 4.3.3 Data-based analysis ...................................................................................................................... 52 4.3.4 Simulation-based analysis ............................................................................................................ 53 4.4 Results ..................................................................................................................................................... 56 4.4.1 Data-based analysis ...................................................................................................................... 56 4.4.2 Simulation-based analysis ............................................................................................................ 59 4.5 Discussion ................................................................................................................................................ 67 4.5.1 Glacier melt contribution and trend attribution for two headwater catchments of the Aksu River ............................................................................................................................................. 67 4.5.2 Data-based versus simulation-based trend attribution .................................................................. 67 4.5.3 Multiobjective model calibration ................................................................................................. 68 4.5.4 Limitations ................................................................................................................................... 68 4.6 Conclusions ............................................................................................................................................. 69 5 Discussion and conclusions ............................................................................................................................ 71 5.1 Main results ............................................................................................................................................. 71 5.2 Discussion and future research