Characteristics of Snowmelt and Runoff in a Mountain Basin in Tohoku District, Japan
Yoshiko Muto,
Eiichi Kurashima
Issue:
Volume 4, Issue 1, January 2016
Pages:
1-9
Received:
25 January 2016
Accepted:
8 February 2016
Published:
25 February 2016
Abstract: Winter snow cover occurs widely in Japan at comparatively low elevation and latitude. The water stored as snow is very important for irrigation of the rice crop during its early growth. We investigated the snowpack and snowmelt quantitatively on a daily and hourly basis during the snowmelt seasons from 2001 to 2008 in the Akazawa basin, Tohoku district. We used a snowmelt model to simulate the flux of snowmelt and rainwater in the snowpack. Among the years, total snowmelt varied between 190 to 540 mm from the beginning of Mar. to the late of Apr. We characterized the snowmelt runoff by making an index from the parameters of a storage routing model. We used the optimized parameters of the storage routing model to examine the output differences between the case in which the snowmelt flux at the snow surface was input, and the case in which the snowmelt flux from the base of the snowpack was input. The results clearly indicated that a snowpack influences the characteristics of snowmelt runoff.
Abstract: Winter snow cover occurs widely in Japan at comparatively low elevation and latitude. The water stored as snow is very important for irrigation of the rice crop during its early growth. We investigated the snowpack and snowmelt quantitatively on a daily and hourly basis during the snowmelt seasons from 2001 to 2008 in the Akazawa basin, Tohoku dist...
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