Global assessment

6 important questions on Global assessment

How do numerical Water Balance models partition water surplus? Name two fluxes. Note that Water Balance models consider surface hydrological processes, but they are a numerical model of VZ recharge.

Recharge and surface water runoff.

Name 3 characteristics of the Vadose Zone Recharge models (eg Hydrus and SWAP). Note that these are numerical

  • Physical processes in the VZ
  • Driven by meteorological input (P, T)
  • Needs a representation of subsurface parameters (K-q, f, depth to water table)

What are typical data requirements for numerical Water Balance models?


• Climate (P-E)
• Land-use
• Soil type
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Global assessment modeling - when is it good?

I think the point here is that they struggle to find good & many reliable data points to test numericals models with. And possibly that many things are still uncertain, making it hard to assess the model result outcome. Also, the obvio grid size issue comes along as well.

Interestingly: Future recharge predictions at a global scale are highly uncertain, and even more so at a local scale. Can you think why (check lec)?

Lecture watch necessary

Name 4 benefits/downsides of VZ models used to estimate GW recharge rates in the vadose zone.


• Provide a physical-process based estimate of VZ recharge
fluxes.


• Computational demands usually prohibit regional scale
assessments using such models (meta-models, i.e. simplified
representations), although there is examples in the literature of
this (e.g. coupling Hydrus and MODFLOW).


• Data demands are high compared to surface water balance
methods.


• Hydraulic properties of VZ are uncertain, as well potential
existence of preferential flow paths (e.g., loess recharge
study).

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