Meso-Scale Hydrological Modeling: Application to Mekong and Chao Phraya Basins

Abstract

In this paper, an attempt has been made to predict river flow in meso-scale basins using the general circulation model generated atmospheric forcings by coupling a land surface model and a river routing model. Several versions of the variable infiltration capacity model were used as the land surface model, including one that incorporates a double parabolic curve to describe the infiltration capacity of the soil. In the runoff routing model, which uses a much finer grid, backward distribution of observed river discharges to upstream cells as well as flood plain inundation are introduced. The proposed models and the procedures are applied to two major river basins in the Southeast Asian Region—the Mekong and the Chao Phraya. The Mekong is an international river that runs through China, Myanmar, Lao, Thailand, Cambodia, and Vietnam, and the Chao Phraya River is contained within Thailand. Despite the limitations in the data availability, the results of daily river discharge predictions seem to be reasonable in the scale concerned.