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Effects of Spatial Accumulation of Runoff on Watershed Response
Author(s) -
Garbrecht Jurgen
Publication year - 1991
Publication title -
journal of environmental quality
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.888
H-Index - 171
eISSN - 1537-2537
pISSN - 0047-2425
DOI - 10.2134/jeq1991.00472425002000010007x
Subject(s) - surface runoff , watershed , hydrology (agriculture) , runoff model , environmental science , runoff curve number , storm , upstream (networking) , upstream and downstream (dna) , spatial variability , soil science , geology , ecology , mathematics , statistics , geotechnical engineering , biology , computer network , oceanography , machine learning , computer science
The drainage network accumulates upstream subwatershed runoff into a single downstream response, with runoff accumulating at network junctions. The effects of this accumulation on the magnitude and spatial variability of the downstream response are reviewed for simplified boundary conditions. Runoff parameters are runoff depth and corresponding unit area peak runoff rate. At the subwatershed level these parameters are referred to as d and q , respectively, and they vary from one subwatershed to another. At a downstream location, after accumulation by the drainage network, corresponding parameters are referred to as D and Q . Equations expressing the effects of runoff accumulation are formulated and discussed for uniform rainfall conditions. The review shows that the effects of runoff accumulation gain in importance as the number of upstream subwatersheds and the size of the watershed increase in the downstream direction. The accumulation process cancels extreme values of d and q to yield a representative D and Q value for the entire upstream drainage area. The impact of individual d and q values on the downstream D and Q values in the channel diminishes as the number of upstream subwatersheds increases. This results in a decrease in the spatial variability of D and Q in the downstream direction. The review suggests that the role of spatial variability of upstream d and q in the determination of downstream D and Q diminishes as watershed size increases. However, nonuniform rainfall distributions and storm movement may overshadow the effects of runoff accumulation when watershed size increases beyond the size of the storm.