Leveraging River Network Topology and Regionalization to Expand SWOT-Derived River Discharge Time Series in the Mississippi River Basin

The upcoming Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) mission will measure rivers wider than 50–100 m using a 21-day orbit, providing river reach derived discharges that can inform applications like flood forecasting and large-scale hydrologic modelling. However, these discharges will not be unifor...

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Main Authors: Cassandra Nickles, Edward Beighley
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2021-04-01
Series:Remote Sensing
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.mdpi.com/2072-4292/13/8/1590
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author Cassandra Nickles
Edward Beighley
author_facet Cassandra Nickles
Edward Beighley
author_sort Cassandra Nickles
collection DOAJ
description The upcoming Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) mission will measure rivers wider than 50–100 m using a 21-day orbit, providing river reach derived discharges that can inform applications like flood forecasting and large-scale hydrologic modelling. However, these discharges will not be uniform in time or coincident with those of neighboring reaches. It is often assumed discharge upstream and downstream of a river location are highly correlated in natural conditions and can be transferred using a scaling factor like the drainage area ratio between locations. Here, the applicability of the drainage area ratio method to integrate, in space and time, SWOT-derived discharges throughout the observable river network of the Mississippi River basin is assessed. In some cases, area ratios ranging from 0.01 to 100 can be used, but cumulative urban area and/or the number of dams/reservoirs between locations decrease the method’s applicability. Though the mean number of SWOT observations for a given reach increases by 83% and the number of peak events captured increases by 100%, expanded SWOT sampled time series distributions often underperform compared to the original SWOT sampled time series for significance tests and quantile results. Alternate expansion methods may be more viable for future work.
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spelling doaj.art-7261d08192734d26a952a0a592d6258e2023-11-21T16:17:55ZengMDPI AGRemote Sensing2072-42922021-04-01138159010.3390/rs13081590Leveraging River Network Topology and Regionalization to Expand SWOT-Derived River Discharge Time Series in the Mississippi River BasinCassandra Nickles0Edward Beighley1Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Northeastern University, Boston, MA 02115, USADepartment of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Northeastern University, Boston, MA 02115, USAThe upcoming Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) mission will measure rivers wider than 50–100 m using a 21-day orbit, providing river reach derived discharges that can inform applications like flood forecasting and large-scale hydrologic modelling. However, these discharges will not be uniform in time or coincident with those of neighboring reaches. It is often assumed discharge upstream and downstream of a river location are highly correlated in natural conditions and can be transferred using a scaling factor like the drainage area ratio between locations. Here, the applicability of the drainage area ratio method to integrate, in space and time, SWOT-derived discharges throughout the observable river network of the Mississippi River basin is assessed. In some cases, area ratios ranging from 0.01 to 100 can be used, but cumulative urban area and/or the number of dams/reservoirs between locations decrease the method’s applicability. Though the mean number of SWOT observations for a given reach increases by 83% and the number of peak events captured increases by 100%, expanded SWOT sampled time series distributions often underperform compared to the original SWOT sampled time series for significance tests and quantile results. Alternate expansion methods may be more viable for future work.https://www.mdpi.com/2072-4292/13/8/1590dischargedrainage area ratioregionalizationurbanizationhydrologyremote sensing
spellingShingle Cassandra Nickles
Edward Beighley
Leveraging River Network Topology and Regionalization to Expand SWOT-Derived River Discharge Time Series in the Mississippi River Basin
Remote Sensing
discharge
drainage area ratio
regionalization
urbanization
hydrology
remote sensing
title Leveraging River Network Topology and Regionalization to Expand SWOT-Derived River Discharge Time Series in the Mississippi River Basin
title_full Leveraging River Network Topology and Regionalization to Expand SWOT-Derived River Discharge Time Series in the Mississippi River Basin
title_fullStr Leveraging River Network Topology and Regionalization to Expand SWOT-Derived River Discharge Time Series in the Mississippi River Basin
title_full_unstemmed Leveraging River Network Topology and Regionalization to Expand SWOT-Derived River Discharge Time Series in the Mississippi River Basin
title_short Leveraging River Network Topology and Regionalization to Expand SWOT-Derived River Discharge Time Series in the Mississippi River Basin
title_sort leveraging river network topology and regionalization to expand swot derived river discharge time series in the mississippi river basin
topic discharge
drainage area ratio
regionalization
urbanization
hydrology
remote sensing
url https://www.mdpi.com/2072-4292/13/8/1590
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AT edwardbeighley leveragingrivernetworktopologyandregionalizationtoexpandswotderivedriverdischargetimeseriesinthemississippiriverbasin