Hydrologic Modeling

This book contains seven parts. The first part deals with some aspects of rainfall analysis, including rainfall probability distribution, local rainfall interception, and analysis for reservoir release. Part 2 is on evapotranspiration and discusses development of neural network models, errors, and sensitivity. Part 3 focuses on various aspects of urban runoff, including hydrologic impacts, storm water management, and drainage systems. Part 4 deals with soil erosion and sediment, covering mineralogical composition, geostatistical analysis, land use impacts, and land use mapping. Part 5 treats remote sensing and geographic information system (GIS) applications to different hydrologic problems. Watershed runoff and floods are discussed in Part 6, encompassing hydraulic, experimental, and theoretical aspects. Water modeling constitutes the concluding Part 7. Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT), Xinanjiang, and Soil Conservation Service-Curve Number (SCS-CN) models are discussed. The book is of interest to researchers and practitioners in the field of water resources, hydrology, environmental resources, agricultural engineering, watershed management, earth sciences, as well as those engaged in natural resources planning and management. Graduate students and those wishing to conduct further research in water and environment and their development and management find the book to be of value.

During ten years serving with the USDA Soil Conservation Service (SCS), now known as the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), I became amazed at how millions of dollars in contract monies were spent based on simplistic hydrologic models. As project engineer in western Kansas, I was responsible for building flood control dams (authorized under Public Law 566) in the Wet Walnut River watershed. This watershed is within the Arkansas-Red River basin, as is the Illinois River basin referred to extensively in this book. After building nearly 18 of these structures, I became Assistant State Engineer in Michigan and, for a short time, State Engineer for NRCS. Again, we based our entire design and construction program on simplified relationships variously referred to as the SCS method. I recall announcing that I was going to pursue a doctoral degree and develop a new hydrologic model. One of my agency's chief engineers remarked, "Oh no, not another model!" Since then, I hope that I have not built just another model but have significantly advanced the state of hydrologic modeling for both researchers and practitioners. Using distributed hydrologic techniques described in this book, I also hope one day to forecast the response of the dams I built.

This book comprehensively accounts the advances in data-based approaches for hydrologic modeling and forecasting. Eight major and most popular approaches are selected, with a chapter for each stochastic methods, parameter estimation techniques, scaling and fractal methods, remote sensing, artificial neural networks, evolutionary computing, wavelets, and nonlinear dynamics and chaos methods. These approaches are chosen to address a wide range of hydrologic system characteristics, processes, and the associated problems. Each of these eight approaches includes a comprehensive review of the fundamental concepts, their applications in hydrology, and a discussion on potential future directions.

Floods continue to cause significant damage in the United States and elsewhere, and questions about the causes of flooding continue to be debated. A significant amount of research has been conducted on the relationship between forest management activities and water yield, peak flows, and flooding; somewhat less research has been conducted on the modeling of these activities as related to flooding. This bibliography and online bibliographic database provide a searchable listing of more than 600 publications related to the interrelationships of forest and forest management on watershed and flood hydrology. Also included are publications related to the capability and limitations of currently available hydrologic models and modeling approaches, with particular emphasis on their utility for evaluating forest management effects.