DEVELOPING A REGIONAL DISTRIBUTED HYDROLOGICAL MODEL FOR WATER RESOURCES ASSESSMENT AND ITS APPLICATION TO THE CHAO PHRAYA RIVER BASIN

Abstract

The Thailand's Great Flood in 2011 resulted in the great calamity causing tremendous losses impacting livelihood, social and economic of the nation. A better understanding of the basin hydrological processes is necessary for studying and predicting a future flood. Consequently, this study aims to develop a regional distributed hydrological model for water resources situation prediction. The regional hydrologic model was composed of a runoff generation model with a concept of the variable infiltration capacity and a flow routing model using the kinematic wave equation. The effects of dam control were also included in the flow routing model. The model was applied to the Chao Phraya River basin to reproduce floods in 1995, 2008, 2010, and 2011. By using the model, the effect of the existing dams operations and the new dam construction on flood control is numerical evaluated.