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ARS Home » Plains Area » Fort Collins, Colorado » Center for Agricultural Resources Research » Water Management and Systems Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #350717
Research Project: Response of Ecosystem Services in Agricultural Watersheds to Changes in Water Availability, Land Use, Management, and Climate

Location: Water Management and Systems Research

Title: A watershed delineation tool for interconnected Hydrological Response Units (HRUs) to support distributed modeling

Author
item KIPKA, HOLM - Colorado State University
item LIGHTHART, NATHAN - Colorado State University
item DAVID, OLAF - Colorado State University
item KIM, JAE - Colorado State University
item Green, Timothy
item ARABI, MAZDAK - Colorado State University

Submitted to: Meeting Proceedings
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: 3/25/2018
Publication Date: 6/24/2018
Citation: Kipka, H., Lighthart, N.P., David, O.R., Kim, J.S., Green, T.R., Arabi, M. 2018. A watershed delineation tool for interconnected Hydrological Response Units (HRUs) to support distributed modeling. 9th International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software.

Interpretive Summary: N/A

Technical Abstract: Delineating a watershed area into discrete areas (e.g. Hydrological Response Units HRUs) with parameter attribute tables is essential to generate input parameter sets for distributed hydrological models. This presentation will introduce a generic methodology of such a delineation process and services workflow for the Agricultural Ecosystems Services (AgES) watershed model. Here, Digital Elevation Model raster data are processed for the topology of flow paths, then combined with raster layer of land use, soils, and hydrogeology to generate HRU patterns for a watershed area. Based on the pattern of HRUs, the web service analyzes a topological routing scheme that allows multiple-flow directions and interactions between neighboring HRUs. The resulting HRU information is used to automatically generate input files for the AgES distributed watershed model. The tool is open source, available to the scientific community, and implemented using Catena, an emerging platform based on the eRAMS and CSIP frameworks providing scalable geospatial analyses, collaboration, and model service capabilities. Seamless integration of (1) generating spatial model parameters, (2) connecting input data, (3) executing the model, and (4) model result analyses will be presented with a strong focus on the workflow aspect of Catena. The HRU delineation tool can be adapted to other models such as the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT+).