Development of drought severity - areal extent - frequency curves in the Parambikulam - Aliyar basin, Tamil Nadu, India
2013
Manikandan, Muthiah (Agricultural Engineering College and Research Institute, Coimbatore (India). Department of Soil and Water Conservation Engineering) | Tamilmani, Dhanapal (Agricultural Engineering College and Research Institute, Coimbatore (India). Department of Soil and Water Conservation Engineering)
Assessment and characterization of regional droughts provide useful information for sustainable water resources planning and management. In the present study, the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) a most widely used rainfall based drought index was applied to investigate the temporal characteristics, areal extent and frequency of meteorological drought in the Parambikulam-Aliyar basin, Tamil Nadu. For this purpose, the basin was divided into 97 grid-cells of 5 x 5 km with each grid correspondence to approximately 1.03% of total area. Gridded monthly rainfall was developed by spatial interpolation technique with the help of GIS capabilities at each grid point using monthly rainfall data for the period of 40 years (1972-2011) from 28 rain gauge stations. Regional representative of SPI values calculated from spatially averaged mean areal rainfall were used to characterize the temporal variation of drought. Drought severity-areal extent-frequency (SAF) curves were constructed using gridded SPI values to assess the drought severity and areal extent with respect to return period so as to describe and characterize the spatial and recurrence patterns of drought. The analysis of SPI suggests that the basin suffered severe droughts in the 1970s, 1980s and 2000s. The SAF curves developed in this study can be used for the development of a drought preparedness plan in the region and planning sustainable water resource management within the basin.
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