Premium
A GIS for hydrological modelling in the semi‐arid, HAPEX‐Sahel experiment area of Niger, Africa
Author(s) -
DESCONNETS J C,
VIEUX B E,
CAPPELAERE B,
DELCLAUX F
Publication year - 1996
Publication title -
transactions in gis
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.721
H-Index - 63
eISSN - 1467-9671
pISSN - 1361-1682
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-9671.1996.tb00036.x
Subject(s) - groundwater recharge , hydrology (agriculture) , surface runoff , water balance , aquifer , thematic map , environmental science , arid , rainwater harvesting , infiltration (hvac) , groundwater , geology , geography , cartography , meteorology , ecology , paleontology , geotechnical engineering , biology
During the HAPEX‐Sahel experiment (1991–94), water redistribution processes were studied at the meso‐scale (10 000 km 2 ) near Niamey, Niger. A project now under way at ORSTOM aims at modelling the regional water balance through a spatial approach combining GIS data organization and distributed hydrological modelling. The main objective is to extend the surface water balance, by now available only on a few, small (around 1 km 2 ) unconnected endoreic catchments, to a more significant part of the HAPEX‐Sahel square degree, a 1500 km 2 region called SSZ that includes most of the environmental and hydrology measurement sites. GIS architecture and model design consistently consider data and processes at the local, catchment scale, and at the regional scale. The GIS includes spatial and temporal hydrological data (rainfall, surface runoff, ground water), thematic maps (topography, soil, geomorphology, vegetation) and multi‐temporal remote sensing data (SPOT, aerial pictures). The GIS supports the simulation of the composite effect at the regional scale of highly variable and discontinuous component hydrologic processes operating at the catchment scale, in order to simulate inter‐annual aquifer recharge and response to climatic scenarios at the regional scale.