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Global gridded products efficiency in closing water balance models: various modeling scenarios for behavioral assessments

  • Research Article - Hydrology
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Abstract

Nowadays, large-scale and remotely sensed products have been widely used, and this study aims to investigate the effect of precipitation and evapotranspiration (ET) products on the performance of hydrological models, especially the water balance in Gheshlagh and Baghmalek basins in Iran with two different climates and model structures. For this purpose, five large-scale precipitation products, including CHIRPS, ERA, IMERG, TRMM, Terra and ET named GLEAM, SSEbop, MODIS, Terra, and Era, were implemented in five designed scenarios. These scenarios depend on how this information is applied and used in the model calibration process. Moreover, to evaluate the parametric behavior of these models, the uncertainties of their parameters were evaluated by the GLUE method. The parameters of the developed scenarios model with uncertain behavior were also measured in the main model. The results showed that in the absence of ground observations of precipitation or ET, the use of large-scale products in the mountainous and highland watersheds, where such measurements are not possible, is a suitable alternative for wrapping up the water balance equation. Using these products as the model input maintains model performance at the reference model level. The results also indicate that in the simultaneous calibration of ET and streamflow, the use of ET products improves the simulation of ET but reduces the accuracy of the simulated streamflow. No precipitation or ET product shows its best behavior in all conditions and all regions. This issue implies various products' functional values in different regions.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Civil Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, University of Zanjan, Zanjan, Iran

    Rahimeh Mousavi & Saeed Abbasi

  2. School of Civil Engineering, College of Engineering, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran

    Mohsen Nasseri, Mercedeh Taheri & Milad Shamsi Anboohi

  3. Department of Civil Engineering, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, ON, K1N6N5, Canada

    Mercedeh Taheri

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  1. Rahimeh Mousavi
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Mousavi, R., Nasseri, M., Abbasi, S. et al. Global gridded products efficiency in closing water balance models: various modeling scenarios for behavioral assessments. Acta Geophys. 71, 2401–2422 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11600-022-01004-1

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