Integrating Geographical Information Systems (GIS) with Hydrological Modelling ? Applicability and Limitations

摘要

The evolution of Geographic information systems (GIS) facilitated the use digital terrain data for topography based hydrological modelling. The use of spatial data for hydrological modelling emerged from the great capability of GIS tools to store and handle the data associated hydro-morphology of the basin. These models utilize the spatially variable terrain data for converting rainfall into surface runoff. Manual map manipulation has always posed difficulty in analysing and designing large scale water resources projects. Water flows down the hill slope - this clears the importance of terrain modelling in watershed management. Thus the coupling of hydrological model into GIS environment has gained significant interest of scientists and engineers. Most of the commercial GIS tools are equipped with the capability to handle spatial data for producing better cartographic output. Although the capacity of these tools in analysing geo-spatial data is still limited yet the process of complex watershed analysis is far enhanced by the use of these tools. Many a times the capability of GIS software?s for solving the problem in hand is not clearly understood. This poses difficulty in formulating the watershed information system for use in water resources planning and management. This paper describes the attempts made by researchers for integration of GIS and hydraulic modeling for analysis of watersheds.