Hydrologic Networks: Information Transmission

A hydrologic data collection metwork is considered to be a component of a communication channel conveying regional hydrologic information. A measure of the information transmission by the hydrologic network, in conjunction with spatial estimators, is derived using Shannon's information theory. The resulting measure confirms that the network information transmission is dependent upon the joint entropy of the network station output but independent of the spatial estimators. Maximum information transmission is proposed as a criterion for the selection of station locations for a permanent network. A numerical example, involving the selection of station locations for various sizes of optimal information transmission hydrologic networks, is given.