Tracking Seasonal Fluctuations in Land Water Storage Using Global Models and GRACE Satellites
Journal
Geophysical Research Letters
Journal Volume
46
Journal Issue
10
Pages
5254-5264
Date Issued
2019
Author(s)
Scanlon, B.R.
Zhang, Z.
Rateb, A.
Sun, A.
Wiese, D.
Save, H.
Beaudoing, H.
Lo, M.H.
Müller-Schmied, H.
Döll, P.
van Beek, R.
Swenson, S.
Lawrence, D.
Croteau, M.
Abstract
Seasonal water storage fluctuations are critical for evaluating water scarcity linked to climate forcing and human intervention. Here we compare seasonal changes in land total water storage anomalies using seven global hydrologic and land surface models (WGHM, PCR-GLOBWB, and five GLDAS models) to GRACE satellite data in 183 river basins globally. This work builds on previous analysis that focused on total water storage anomaly trends. Results show that most models underestimate seasonal water storage amplitudes in tropical and (semi)arid basins and land surface models generally overestimate amplitudes in northern basins. Some models (CLM-5.0 and PCR-GLOBWB) agree better with GRACE than others. Causes of model-GRACE discrepancies are attributed to missing storage compartments (e.g., surface water and/or groundwater) and underestimation of modeled storage capacities in tropical basins and to variations in modeled fluxes in northern basins. This study underscores the importance of considering water storage, in addition to water fluxes, to improve global models. ©2019. American Geophysical Union. All Rights Reserved.
Other Subjects
Geodetic satellites; Groundwater; Surface measurement; Surface waters; Tracking (position); Tropics; Global models; Grace satellites; Hydrologic models; Land surface models; Water storage; Digital storage; anomaly; climate forcing; global perspective; GRACE; hydrological modeling; land surface; satellite data; seasonality; water storage
Type
journal article