The Indus River Basin (IRB) is a large river basin supporting 237 million people, but a limited gauge network means that there are relatively few measurements upon which to base water management decisions. With new globally available data products like the Multi-Error-Removed Improved Terrain (MERIT) DEM and the FAO’s Harmonized World Soil Database (HWSD) and modern computing capabilities, we can now apply land surface models to estimate the water balance over large river basins at relatively high resolution (1/16°). We used UCLA’s Hoffman2 computing cluster to calibrate the  Variable Infiltration Capacity Model (VIC) based on gage measurements of river discharge at a few locations within the IRB. Thus we are able to reproduce past Indus River flows and fill in data gaps in space and time.

Author: Jacob Schaperow