An assessment of terrestrial water storage, rainfall and river discharge over Northern India from satellite data


Autoria(s): Prakash, Satya; Gairola, RM; Papa, F; Mitra, AK
Data(s)

2014

Resumo

Terrestrial water storage (TWS) plays a key role in the global water cycle and is highly influenced by climate variability and human activities. In this study, monthly TWS, rainfall and Ganga-Brahmaputra river discharge (GBRD) are analysed over India for the period of 2003-12 using remote sensing satellite data. The spatial pattern of mean TWS shows a decrease over a large and populous region of Northern India comprising the foothills of the Himalayas, the Indo-Gangetic Plains and North East India. Over this region, the mean monthly TWS exhibits a pronounced seasonal cycle and a large interannual variability, highly correlated with rainfall and GBRD variations (r > 0.8) with a lag time of 2 months and 1 month respectively. The time series of monthly TWS shows a consistent and statistically significant decrease of about 1 cm year(-1) over Northern India, which is not associated with changes in rainfall and GBRD. This recent change in TWS suggests a possible impact of rapid industrialization, urbanization and increase in population on land water resources. Our analysis highlights the potential of the Earth-observation satellite data for hydrological applications.

Formato

application/pdf

Identificador

http://eprints.iisc.ernet.in/50525/1/cur_sci_107-9_1582_2014.pdf

Prakash, Satya and Gairola, RM and Papa, F and Mitra, AK (2014) An assessment of terrestrial water storage, rainfall and river discharge over Northern India from satellite data. In: CURRENT SCIENCE, 107 (9). pp. 1582-1586.

Publicador

INDIAN ACAD SCIENCES

Relação

http://www.ncmrwf.gov.in/Re_Abstracts%202014/pra_2014_13.pdf

http://eprints.iisc.ernet.in/50525/

Palavras-Chave #Others
Tipo

Journal Article

PeerReviewed