DEVELOPMENT OF A GEOMORPHOLOGY-BASED HYDROLOGICAL MODEL FOR LARGE CATCHMENTS

The grid-based distributed hydrological models are powerful tools for hydrological modeling due to the representation of the spatial varibility and the physically-based process descriptions. However, because of the large computational demands this kind of models are not suitable for long term simulations in large catchments. Here, an alternative distributed hydrological model is proposed, which is based on the catchment geomorphology area function and width function. In this model, the catchment is discretized into a number of flow intervals along the flow direction. Each flow interval is represented as a series of hillslope elements. A hillslope response model and the kinematic wave model are used to simulate the runoff generation and river routing. The applicability of the model for the simulation of multiple catchments is discussed in the paper.