Download - Rainfall Runoff
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
1/30
RAINFALL RUNOFFPROCESSES
AURELIO
BAUN
BAUTISTA
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
2/30
Runoff
Overland and subsurface flowcomponents that contribute to the quick
flow in a stream, leaving a watershedwithin a time scale of about a dayfollowing surface water input.
Runoff is also used to refer to all waterleaving a watershed, the sum of quickflow, base flow and groundwater outflow.
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
3/30
Runoff Processes
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
4/30
Precipitation may be in the form of rain orsnow.
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
5/30
Vegetation may intercept some fractionof precipitation.
Precipitation that penetrates the vegetation isreferred to as throughfall.
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
6/30
A large fraction of intercepted water iscommonly evaporated back to theatmosphere. There is also flux of water to theatmosphere through transpiration of thevegetation and evaporation from soil andwater bodies.
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
7/30
The surface water input available for the generation of
runoff consists of throughfall and snowmelt. This surface
water input may accumulate on the surface indepression storage, or flow overland towards the streams
as overland flow, or infiltrate into the soil, where it may
flow laterally towards the stream contributing to interflow.
Infiltrated water
may also
percolate
through deepersoil and rock
layers into the
groundwater.
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
8/30
The water table is the surface below whichthe soil and rock is saturated and at pressuregreater than atmospheric. This serves as theboundary between the saturated zonecontaining groundwater and unsaturatedzone.
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
9/30
Immediately above the water table is a
region of soil that is close to saturation, dueto water being held by capillary forces. Thisis referred to as the capillary fringe.
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
10/30
Subsurface water, either from interflow or fromgroundwater may flow back across the land surface
to add to overland flow. This is referred to as returnflow.
Overland flow and shallower interflow processes thattransport water to the e stream within the time scaleof approximately a day or so are classified as runoff.
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
11/30
RUNOFF GENERATION MECHANISMS
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
12/30
Infiltrated water may:
flow through the matrix of the soil in theinter-granular pores and small structuralvoids.
flow through larger voids referred to asmacropores.
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
13/30
Macropores include pipes that are open
passageways in the soil caused by decayingroots and burrowing animals.
Macropores also include larger structuralvoids within the soil matrix that serve aspreferential pathways for subsurface flow.
Schematic illustration of macropore network being activated due to rise ingroundwater resulting in rapid lateral flow.
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
14/30
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
15/30
Infiltrating water follows preferential pathways andmacropores and may result in increases in moisturecontent at depth before saturation or similarincreases in moisture content higher in the soilprofile.
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
16/30
There is a maximum limiting rate at which a soil in agiven condition can absorb surface water input.
This was referred to by Robert E. Horton (1933), oneof the founding fathers of quantitative hydrology,as the infiltration capacity of the soil, and hencethis mechanism is also called Horton overland flow.
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
17/30
Infiltration excess overland flow occurs anywhere
that surface water input exceeds the infiltrationcapaci ty of the surface. This occurs mostfrequently in areas devoid of vegetation orpossessing only a thin cover.
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
18/30
Saturation excess overland flow occurs in locations
where infiltrating water completely saturates thesoil profile until there is no space for any furtherwater to infiltrate. The complete saturation of a soil
profile resulting in the water table rising to the
surface is referred to as saturation from below.
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
19/30
In areas with high infiltration capacities, interflow, or
subsurface storm flow is usually the dominant contributor to
streamflow, especially on steeper terrain or more planarhillslopes where saturation excess is less likely to occur.
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
20/30
Hydrological Pathways involved in
different runoff generation processes
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
21/30
Physical Factors Affecting
Runoff
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
22/30
The general climatic regime controls the totalvolume of runoff in any region through its effect
on the water balance. In a broad sense, over atime scale long enough that storage changesaverage out (are negligible), and over a regionlarg e enough or with boundary defined so thatinflows (surface and subsurface) are negligible,the water balance may be stated as
P = Q + E (1)
where
P=precipitation rate
Q=runoff rateE=evapotranspiration rate.
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
23/30
This equation indicates that the precipitationinput is disposed of either into runoff orevapotranspiration. In general the climaticregime controls the overallproportioning. Heregroundwater recharge supplying baseflow is
included in Q. Because the quantities inequation (1) must be positive, this equationplaces limits on the values of Q and E given anyspecific P. Both Q and E are constrained to beless than P. This may be visualized in a space
where E is plotted versus P.
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
24/30
The domain of valid solutions is below the 1:1 line E=P.There is in general an upper limit on the possible
evapotranspiration, due to the energy inputs requiredto evaporate water. This limit is related to the solarradiation inputs as well as the capacity of theatmosphere to transport evaporated water away fromthe surface(related to wind and humidity). This limithas been denoted as Ep (potential
evapotranspiration).
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
25/30
Shows data for four different areas in the U.S. In semi-arid regions like Arizona the mean annual runoffdecreases with drainage area due to channeltransmission losses. Most runoff is infiltration excess andthe opportunity for infiltration increases as waterprogresses down the channel network.
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
26/30
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
27/30
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
28/30
The variable source area concept related to theoccurrence of saturation excess indicates that saturation
overland flow originates, not over the whole watershed, butover a fraction of it due to local saturation. The mostfundamental topographic property used in hydrology iscontributing area .
Contributing area - the area upslope of any point on a
watershed or topographic surface.
Contributing area may be concentrated as in distinctriver valleys, or dispersed as on smooth surfaces such ashillslopes. In the dispersed smooth surface case the areacontributing to a point may be a line that theoreticallyhas an area of zero, in which case it is called specificcatchment area.
Contributing area has units of area [m] and specificcatchment area has units of length [m].
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
29/30
-
8/11/2019 Rainfall Runoff
30/30
END.