Hydrologic Modelling of Mahanadi River Basin in India Using Rainfall-Runoff Model

The present study highlights on the application of an Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) tool, Water Evaluation and Planning (WEAP) system model for hydrologic simulation of Mahanadi river basin in India. A monthly time step hydrologic model was developed using rainfall-runoff method incorporated in WEAP with an aim to address the challenge of water resources estimation in Mahanadi basin. The model was set-up without taking into account effects of development and it was calibrated against measured flow data available at six gauging stations. A good agreement was observed between simulated and measured flow after calibration. Crop coefficient (Kc) and effective precipitation are the parameters changed during calibration. The range of calibrated parameters was found as ± 5 % and ± 1 % for Kc and effective precipitation respectively for different catchments. The simulation of stream flow using calibrated values revealed that, in most cases, the variation between measured and simulated stream flow values is less than 10%. This shows the good agreement with measured data by using calibrated parameters. The calibrated and validated model can be applied for runoff simulations in other basins with similar hydro-meteorological conditions. The results of the study demonstrate the potential of using WEAP model for water resource management and assessment of future resource development in the basin.