The purpose of this study is to demonstrate the feasibility of determining the soil-water content fields required as initial conditions for land surface components within atmospheric prediction models. This is done using a model of the hydrologic balance and conventional meteorological observations, land cover, and soils information. A discussion is presented of the subgrid-scale effects, the integration time, and the choice of vegetation type on the soil-water content patterns. Finally, comparisons are made between two The Pennsylvania State University/National Center for Atmospheric Research mesoscale model simulations, one using climatological fields and the other one using the soil-moisture fields produced by this new method.
A mesoscale meteorological model, a surface hydrology model, and a ground‐water hydrology model are linked to simulate the hydrographic response of a large river basin to a single storm. Synoptic climatology is employed to choose a representative hydro‐climatic event. The mesoscale meteorological model uses three nested domains to simulate relatively high‐resolution precipitation over a sub‐basin of the Susquehanna River Basin. The hydrology models simulate surface runoff and ground‐water baseflow using both analyzed and simulated precipitation. The hydrologic abstractions are handled using both Curve Number and Green‐Ampt routines. To support the linkage of the numerical models, special attention is given to data resampling and reprojection.
The mesoscale meteorological model simulation captures the spatial and temporal structure of the storm event, while the hydrology models represent the timing of the event well. The Curve Number method generates a realistic hydrograph with both analyzed and simulated precipitation. In contrast, the hydrographic response generated by the Green‐Ampt routine is inferior. Several interrelated factors contribute to these results, including: the nature of the precipitation event chosen for the experiment; the tendency of the mesoscale meteorological model to underpredict low intensity, widespread precipitation in this case; and the influence of the surface soil‐texture characteristics on infiltration rates.
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