Abstract
In recent years, drought due to climate change cause significant negative effects on hydrological processes and water budget in many river basins around the world. Drought indices are used to determine the spatial and temporal characteristics of drought events. They are based on single or multiple variables and applied in different countries for the assessment of drought. Drought events occur frequently in Turkey, which has semi-arid climate characteristics. Drought is one of the most damaging natural disaster affecting many regions of Turkey. In this study, the capacity of the China-Z Index (CZI) and the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) were compared to identify drought periods at different time scales in the Hirfanli Dam basin in central Turkey. For this purpose, monthly precipitation data from 1960 to 2017 collected from six meteorological stations located within the basin were used. The SPI and CZI values were calculated at 1-, 3-, 6-, 9- and 12-month time scales, and the results were compared. The relationships between the outputs of the drought indices were statistically examined. The results indicated that the SPI and CZI values have high correlation coefficients at long time scales (9 and 12 months). It was observed that as the time scale decreased, the correlation between the two drought indices gradually weakened. It was determined that both indices can be utilizied for drought forecasting studies at relatively longer time scales in the study area. It is thought that the results of the study will contribute to the regulation of the management and planning of water resources in river basins in accordance with climatic changes that has become more important in recent years.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Abbas S, Kousar S (2021) Spatial analysis of drought severity and magnitude using the standardized precipitation index and streamflow drought index over the Upper Indus Basin. Pakistan Environ Dev Sustain 23(10):15314–15340. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10668-021-01299-y
Abramowitz M, Stegun IA (1965) Handbook of mathematical formulas, graphs and mathematical tables. Dover Publications Inc, New York
Adnan S, Ullah K, Shuanglin L, Gao S, Khan AH, Mahmood R (2018) Comparison of various drought indices to monitor drought status in Pakistan. Clim Dyn 51(5–6):1885–1899. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-017-3987-0
Alami MH, Din SW, Tayfur G (2018) Meteorological drought analysis by different methods in Helmand river basin, Afghanistan. Int J Sci Eng Res 8(2):738–744
Alghazali NO, Alawadi DAH (2014) Fitting statistical distributions of monthly rainfall for some Iraqi stations. Civil and Environmental Research 6(6):40–46
Altin TB, Saris F, Altin BN (2020) Determination of drought intensity in Seyhan and Ceyhan river basins, Turkey, by hydrological drought analysis. Theor Appl Climatol 139(3–4):95–107. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00704-019-02957-y
Amin MT, Rizvan M, Alazba AA (2016) A best-fit probability distribution for the estimation of rainfall in northern regions of Pakistan. Open Life Sci 11(1):432–440. https://doi.org/10.1515/biol-2016-0057
Bacanli UG (2017) Trend analysis of precipitation and drought in the Aegean region. Turkey Meteorological Applications 24(2):239–249. https://doi.org/10.1002/met.1622
Bacanli UG, Aksan G (2019) Drought analysis in Mediterranean region. Pamukkale University Journal of Engineering Sciences 25(6):665–671. https://doi.org/10.5505/pajes.2019.64507
Bonaccorso B, Bordi I, Cancelliere A, Rossi G, Sutera A (2003) Spatial variability of drought: an analysis of the SPI in Sicily. Water Resour Manage 17(4):273–296. https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1024716530289
Bushra N, Rohli RV, Lam NSN, Zou LL, Mostafiz RB, Mihunov V (2019) The relationship between the normalized difference vegetation index and drought indices in the South Central United States. Nat Hazards 96(2):791–808. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11069-019-03569-5
Byun HR, Wilhite DA (1999) Objective quantification of drought severity and duration. J Clim 12(9):2747–2756. https://doi.org/10.1175/1520-0442(1999)012%3c2747:OQODSA%3e2.0.CO;2
Cochran WG (1952) The χ2 test of goodness of fit. Ann Math Stat 23:315–345. https://doi.org/10.1214/aoms/1177729380
Deo RC, Sahin M (2015) Application of the extreme learning machine algorithm for the prediction of monthly effective drought index in eastern Australia. Atmos Res 153:512–525. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosres.2014.10.016
Dogan S, Berktay A, Singh VP (2012) Comparison of multi-monthly rainfall-based drought severity indices, with application to semi-arid Konya closed basin, Turkey. J Hydrol 470–471:255–268. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2012.09.003
Garcia-Leon D, Contreras S, Hunink J (2019) Comparison of meteorological and satellite-based drought indices as yield predictors of Spanish cereals. Agric Water Manag 213:388–396. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.agwat.2018.10.030
Gibbs WJ, Maher JV (1967) Rainfall deciles as drought indicators. Bureau of Meteorology, 48, Melbourne
Gumus V, Algin HM (2017) Meteorological and hydrological drought analysis of the Seyhan−Ceyhan River basins. Turkey Meteorological Applications 24(1):62–73. https://doi.org/10.1002/met.1605
Guttman NB (1991) Sensitivity of the palmer hydrologic drought index. Water Resour Bull 27:797–807. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1752-1688.1991.tb01478.x
Haan CT (1977) Statistical method in hydrology. Iowa State University Press, Iowa
Habibi B, Meddi M (2021) Meteorological drought hazard analysis of wheat production in the semi-arid basin of Cheliff-Zahrez Nord, Algeria. Arab J Geosci 14:1–19. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12517-021-07401-y
Ionita M, Scholz P, Chelcea S (2016) Assessment of droughts in Romania using the standardized precipitation index. Nat Hazards 81(3):1483–1498. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11069-015-2141-8
Jain VK, Pandey RP, Jain MK, Byun HR (2015) Comparison of drought ındices for appraisal of drought characteristics in the Ken River Basin. Weather and Climate Extremes 8:1–11. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.wace.2015.05.002
Karl TR (1983) Some spatial characteristics of drought duration in the United States. J Clim Appl Meteorol 22:1356–1366. https://doi.org/10.1175/1520-0450(1983)022%3c1356:SSCODD%3e2.0.CO;2
Katipoglu OM, Acar R, Sengul S (2020) Comparison of meteorological indices for drought monitoring and evaluating: a case study from Euphrates basin, Turkey. Journal of Water and Climate Change 11(S1):29–43. https://doi.org/10.2166/wcc.2020.171
Kendall MG, Stuart A (1977) The advanced theory of statistics. Charles Griffin & Company, London
Khan MI, Liu D, Fu Q, Faiz MA (2018) Detecting the persistence of drying trends under changing climate conditions using four meteorological drought indices. Meteorol Appl 25(2):184–194. https://doi.org/10.1002/met.1680
Khan AA, Zhao Y, Khan J, Rahman G, Rafi M, Moazzam MFUI (2021) Spatial and temporal analysis of rainfall and drought condition in southwest Xinjiang in Northwest China, using various climate indices. Earth Syst Environ 5(2):201–216. https://doi.org/10.1007/s41748-021-00226-5
Khudri MM, Sadia F (2013) Determination of the best fit probability distribution for annual extreme precipitation in Bangladesh. Eur J Sci Res 103(3):391–404
Kumanlioglu AA (2020) Characterizing meteorological and hydrological droughts: a case study of the Gediz River Basin. Turkey Meteorological Applications 27(1):1–17. https://doi.org/10.1002/met.1857
Kumar U, Singh S, Bisht JK, Kant L (2021) Use of meteorological data for identification of agricultural drought in Kumaon region of Uttarakhand. J Earth Syst Sci 130(3):1–13. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12040-021-01622-1
Kutiel H, Maheras P, Guika S (1996) Circulation and extreme rainfall condition in the Eastern Mediterranean during the last century. Int J Climatol 16(1):73–92. https://doi.org/10.1002/(SICI)1097-0088(199601)16:1%3c73::AID-JOC997%3e3.0.CO;2-G
Liu Q, Zhang S, Zhang H, Bai Y, Zhang J (2020) Monitoring drought using composite drought indices based on remote sensing. Sci Total Environ. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2019.134585
Lloyd-Hughes B, Saunders MA (2002) A drought climatology for Europe. Int J Climatol 22(13):1571–1592. https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.846
Mckee TB, Doesken NJ, Kleist J (1993) The relationship of drought frequency and duration of time scales. Paper presented at 8th Conference on Applied Climatology, American Meteorological Society, Anaheim CA, 179–186
McKee TB, Doesken NJ, Kleist J (1995) Drought monitoring with multiple time scales. Proceedings of the 9th Conference on Applied Climatology, Dallas. Texas
Mohammed Y, Yimam A (2021) Analysis of meteorological droughts in the Lake’s region of Ethiopian Rift Valley using reconnaissance drought index (RDI). Geoenviron Disasters 8:1–16. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40677-021-00183-1
Morid S, Smakhtin V, Moghaddasi M (2006) Comparison of seven meteorological indices for drought monitoring in Iran. Int J Climatol 26(7):971–985. https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.1264
Myronidis D, Fotakis D, Ioannou K, Sgouropoulou K (2018) Comparison of ten notable meteorological drought indices on tracking the effect of drought on streamflow. Hydrol Sci J 63(15–16):2005–2019. https://doi.org/10.1080/02626667.2018.1554285
Nalbantis I (2008) Evaluation of hydrological drought index. European Water 23(24):67–77
Nedham US, Hassan AS (2019) Comparison of some drought indices in Iraq. Al-Mustansiriyah Journal of Science 30(4):1–9
Ortega-Gómez T, Pérez-Martín MA, Estrela T (2018) Improvement of the drought indicators system in the Júcar River basin, Spain. Sci Total Environ 610–611:276–290. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2017.07.250
Palmer WC (1945) U.S. Meteorological drought. Research Paper No. 45. US Weather Bureau, Washington DC
Pandey RP, Dash BB, Mishra SK, Singh R (2008) Study of indices for drought characterization in KBK districts in Orissa (India). Hydrol Process 22(21):1895–1907. https://doi.org/10.1002/hyp.6774
Pathak A, Dodamani BM (2019) Comparison of meteorological drought indices for different climatic regions of an Indian river basin. Asia-Pacific J Atmos Sci 56(4):563–576. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13143-019-00162-5
Payab H, Turker U (2019) Comparison of standardized meteorological indices for drought monitoring at northern part of Cyprus. Environ Earth Sci 78(10):309–327. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12665-019-8309-x
Poonia V, Jha S, Goyal MK (2021a) Copula based analysis of meteorological, hydrological and agricultural drought characteristics across Indian river basins. Int J Climatol 41(9):4637–4652. https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.7091
Poonia V, Goyal MK, Gupta BB, Gupta AK, Jha S, Das J (2021b) Drought occurrence in different river basins of India and blockchain technology based framework for disaster management. J Clean Prod 312:127737. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2021.127737
Ramkar P, Yadav SM (2018) Spatiotemporal drought assessment of a semi-arid part of middle Tapi River Basin, India. International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction 28:414–426. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijdrr.2018.03.025
Sener E, Sener S (2021) GIS based spatiotemporal comparation between SPI and CZI drought index: a case study of Burdur lake basin. Journal of Natural Hazards and Environment 7(1):41–58. https://doi.org/10.21324/dacd.800036
Sharma MA, Singh JB (2010) Use of probability distribution in rainfall analysis. New York Science Journal 3(9):40–49
Shin JY, Chen S, Lee JH, Kim TW (2018) Investigation of drought propagation in South Korea using drought index and conditional probability. Terrestrial, Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences 29(2):231–241. https://doi.org/10.3319/TAO.2017.08.23.01
Sobhani B, Zengir VS (2020) Modeling, monitoring and forecasting of drought in south and southwestern Iran. Iran Model Earth Syst Environ 6(1):63–71. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40808-019-00655-2
Sonmez FK, Komuscu AU, Erkan A, Turgu E (2005) An analysis of spatial and temporal dimension of drought vulnerability in Turkey using the standardized precipitation index. Nat Hazards 35(2):243–264. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11069-004-5704-7
Sukrutha A, Dyuthi SR, Desai S (2018) Multimodel response assessment for monthly rainfall distribution in some selected Indian cities using best-fit probability as a tool. Appl Water Sci 8(5):145–154. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13201-018-0789-4
Thom HCS (1958) A note on the gamma distribution. Mon Weather Rev 86(4):117–122. https://doi.org/10.1175/1520-0493(1958)086%3c0117:ANOTGD%3e2.0.CO;2
Tsakiris G, Vangelis H (2005) Establishing a drought index incorporating evapo-transpiration. European Water Journal 9:3–11
Tsakiris G, Pangalou D, Vangelis H (2007) Regional drought assessment based on the Reconnaissance drought index (RDI). Water Resour Manage 21(5):821–833. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11269-006-9105-4
Van Rooy MP (1965) A rainfall anomaly index (RAI), Independent of the Time and Space. Notos 14:43–48
Vergni L, Todisco F, Di Lena B (2021) Evaluation of the similarity between drought indices by correlation analysis and Cohen’s Kappa test in a Mediterranean area. Nat Hazards 108(2):2187–2209. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11069-021-04775-w
Vicente-Serrano SM, Beguería S, López-Moreno JI (2010) A multiscalar drought index sensitive to global warming: the standardized precipitation evapotranspiration index. J Clim 23(7):1696–1718. https://doi.org/10.1175/2009JCLI2909.1
Vicente-Serrano SM, Van der Schrier G, Beguería S, Azorin-Molina C, Lopez-Moreno JI (2015) Contribution of precipitation and reference evapotranspiration to drought indices under different climates. J Hydrol 526:42–54. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2014.11.025
Wable PS, Jha MK, Shekhar A (2019) Comparison of drought indices in a semi-arid river basin of India. Water Resour Manage 33(1):75–102. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11269-018-2089-z
Wambua RM, Mutua BM, Raude JM (2018) Detection of spatial, temporal and trend of meteorological drought using standardized precipitation index (SPI) and effective drought index (EDI) in the Upper Tana river basin Kenya. Open Journal of Modern Hydrology 8(3):83–100. https://doi.org/10.4236/ojmh.2018.83007
Wang FQ, Zheng Z, Kang PP, Wang L (2017) Applicability evaluation on the indexes of typical drought in Henan province, China. Applıed ecology and envıronmental research 15(3):253–262. https://doi.org/10.15666/aeer/1503_253262
Wilhite DA, Glantz MH (1985) Understanding: the drought phenomenon: the role of definitions. Water International 10(33):111–120. https://doi.org/10.1080/02508068508686328
Willeke G, Hosking JRM, Wallis JR, Guttman NB (1994) The national drought atlas. Institute for Water Resources Report 94-NDS-4, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
Wilson EB, Hilferty MM (1931) The distribution of Chi-square. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 17(12):684–688. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.17.12.684
Wu H, Hayes MJ, Weiss A, Hu Q (2001) An evaluation of the standardized precipitation index, the China-Z index and the statistical Z-score. Int J Climatol 21(6):745–758. https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.658
Wu H, Hayes MJ, Wilhite DA, Svoboda MD (2005) The effect of the length of record on the standardized precipitation index calculation. Int J Climatol 25(4):505–520. https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.1142
Yacoub E, Tayfur G (2017) Evaluation and assessment of meteorological drought by different methods in Trarza Region. Mauritania Water Resour Manage 31(3):825–845. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11269-016-1510-8
Yacoub E, Tayfur G (2020) Spatial and temporal of variation of meteorological drought and precipitation trend analysis over whole Mauritania. J Afr Earth Sc 163:1–12. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jafrearsci.2020.103761
Yao Z, Ding Y (1990) Climate statistics. Meteorological Press, Beijing, China
Yenigun K, Ibrahim WA (2019) Investigation of drought in the northern Iraq region. Meteorol Appl 26(3):490–499. https://doi.org/10.1002/met.1778
Yıldız O (2014) Spatiotemporal analysis of historical droughts in the central anatolia. Turkey Gazi University Journal of Science 27(4):1177–1184
Yuan J, Emura K, Farnham C, Alam MA (2018) Frequency analysis of annual maximum hourly precipitation and determination of best fit probability distribution for regions in Japan. Urban Climate 24:276–286. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.uclim.2017.07.008
Yuce MI, Esit M (2021) Drought monitoring in Ceyhan basin, Turkey. Journal of Applied Water Engineering and Research. https://doi.org/10.1080/23249676.2021.1932616
Zarei A, Asadi E, Ebrahimi A, Jafary MM, Malekian A, Tahmoures M, Alizadeh EE (2017) Comparison of meteorological indices for spatio-tem-poral analysis of drought in Chahrmahal-Bakhtiyari province in Iran. Hrvatski Meteorološki Časopis 52(52):13–26
Acknowledgements
The authors thank the reviewers for their constructive criticisms which have considerably improved this manuscript.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Conflict of interest
The authors declare no competing interests.
Additional information
Responsible Editor: Broder J. Merkel
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Zeybekoğlu, U., Aktürk, G. A comparison of the China-Z Index (CZI) and the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) for drought assessment in the Hirfanli Dam basin in central Turkey. Arab J Geosci 14, 2731 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12517-021-09095-8
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12517-021-09095-8