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Assessing Crop Water Demand by Remote Sensing and GIS for the Pontina Plain, Central Italy

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Abstract

An estimation of the crop water requirements for the Pontina Plain, Central Italy, was carried out through the use of remote sensing land classification and application of a simple water balance scheme in a GIS environment. The overall crop water demand for the 700 km2 area was estimated at about 70 Mm3 year − 1, i.e. 100 Mm3 year − 1 irrigation requirements when considering an average irrigation application efficiency of 70%. The simplest and least demanding available methodology, in terms of data and resources, was chosen. The methodology, based on remote sensing and GIS, employed only 4 Landsat ETM+ images and a few meteorological and geographical vectorial layers. The procedure allowed the elaboration of monthly maps of crop evapotranspiration. The application of a spatially distributed simple water balance model, lead to the estimation of temporal and spatial variation of crop water requirements in the study area. This study contributes to fill a gap in the knowledge on agricultural use of water resources in the area, which is essential for the implementation of a sustainable and sound water policy as required in the region for the application of the EU Water Framework Directive.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Dipartimento di Produzione Vegetale, Università degli Studi della Tuscia, Via San Camillo de Lellis, 01100, Viterbo, Italy

    Raffaele Casa

  2. Dipartimento Idraulica Trasporti e Strade, Università degli Studi di Roma “La Sapienza”, Via Eudossiana 18, Rome, Italy

    Matteo Rossi, Giuseppe Sappa & Antonio Trotta

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  1. Raffaele Casa
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  2. Matteo Rossi
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  4. Antonio Trotta
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Correspondence to Raffaele Casa.

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Casa, R., Rossi, M., Sappa, G. et al. Assessing Crop Water Demand by Remote Sensing and GIS for the Pontina Plain, Central Italy. Water Resour Manage 23, 1685–1712 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11269-008-9347-4

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