Spatial and temporal dynamics of soil moisture in ungauged basins (HOE PUB 1st year)

17.08.2004 - 30.09.2009
Research funding project
Soil moisture is important in processes that partition rainfall into runoff and infiltration. Extreme hydrological events are very sensitive to the soil water content prior to the forcing. Soil moisture is also the major source of water associated with the latent heat flux from land to the atmosphere and hence is important in partitioning incoming energy into latent, sensible, and other heat and radiative fluxes at the ground. This project is devoted to research into understanding the spatial and temporal dynamics of soil moisture, with an emphasis on Austrian conditions. The research plan consists of four work packages. In the first work package, spaceborne scatterometer data are used to derive a soil moisture index with a focus on Austrian conditions. In the second work package, a soil moisture accounting scheme is made compatible with the scatterometer data, and a procedure is developed to assimilate the scatterometer data into the scheme. This is done for a large number of gauged catchments in Austria. In the third work package, the model parameters estimated from both sources of information are transposed to ungauged catchments, and in the fourth work package the uncertainty of the spatio-temporal soil moisture estimates of the ungauged catchments is assessed.

People

Project leader

Sub project leader

Project personnel

Institute

Grant funds

  • Österr. Akademie der Wissenschaften (National) Austrian Academy of Sciences

Research focus

  • Environmental Monitoring and Climate Adaptation: 50%
  • Modeling and Simulation: 50%

Keywords

GermanEnglish
Bodenfeuchtesoil moisture
ScatterometerScatterometer

External partner

  • Institut für Photogrammetrie und Fernerkundung
  • Slovak Universty of Technology

Publications