Estimation of agricultural flood irrigation water consumption in the Heihe River Basin, China, using satellite based daily land surface evapotranspiration and soil moisture

IF 4.7 2区地球科学 Q1 WATER RESOURCES

Journal of Hydrology-Regional Studies Pub Date : 2025-06-16 DOI:10.1016/j.ejrh.2025.102524

Lirong Huo , Qiaoyun Xie , Liang Sun , Lisheng Song , Sinuo Tao , Shaomin Liu , Zuo Wang , Yan Li

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引用次数: 0

Abstract

Study region

The Heihe River Basin, China.

Study focus

Irrigation data are often from census surveys at coarse administrative or river basin scale, and as such, the amount of water used for agricultural irrigation difficult to quantify. We improve the Soil Moisture to Rain (SM2RAIN) method to estimate irrigation water use in the Heihe River Basin from 2003 to 2020 using thermal infrared and microwave satellite data. The results showed that this approach has satisfactory performance in estimating the annual irrigation water volume (mean volume=0.657 km3/year, R2=0.83, RMSE=0.03 km3/year) when compared with the field measurements at irrigation district administrative scale, due to its reliability in determining the infiltrated water around the root zone used by crops.

New hydrological insights for the region

Through an analysis of irrigation water use trends, the results indicate that most farmland areas exhibited a declining trend in water use per hectare (-55 m³/ha/yr). Interestingly, we observed that while water use efficiency improved significantly at the field scale, overall irrigation efficiency showed a decreasing trend. This study reveals a paradox in the Heihe River Basin, where enhanced irrigation efficiency rarely translates into reduced total water consumption at river basin scale. Our study advances agricultural irrigation volume estimation and irrigation mapping across district and river basin scales in arid and semi-arid areas, which should assist in irrigation scheduling and water resource management.

查看原文本刊更多论文

基于卫星地表日蒸散和土壤水分的黑河流域农业洪涝灌溉耗水量估算

研究区域：中国黑河流域。灌溉数据通常来自粗略的行政或流域尺度的人口普查调查，因此，农业灌溉用水量难以量化。利用热红外和微波卫星数据，改进SM2RAIN （Soil Moisture to Rain）方法估算黑河流域2003 - 2020年灌溉用水量。结果表明，在灌区行政尺度下，该方法对作物根区周围入渗水量的测定较为可靠，在估算年灌溉水量（平均值=0.657 km3/年，R2=0.83， RMSE=0.03 km3/年）方面具有较好的效果。通过对灌溉用水趋势的分析，结果表明，大多数农田的每公顷用水量呈下降趋势（-55 m³/ha/年）。有趣的是，我们观察到，虽然农田尺度上的水分利用效率显著提高，但总体灌溉效率呈下降趋势。该研究揭示了黑河流域的一个悖论，即在流域尺度上，灌溉效率的提高很少转化为总用水量的减少。本研究为干旱半干旱地区的农业灌溉估算和跨区域、跨流域尺度的灌溉制图提供了依据，为灌溉调度和水资源管理提供了依据。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

Journal of Hydrology-Regional Studies Earth and Planetary Sciences-Earth and Planetary Sciences (miscellaneous)

CiteScore

6.70

自引率

8.50%

发文量

284

审稿时长

60 days

期刊介绍： Journal of Hydrology: Regional Studies publishes original research papers enhancing the science of hydrology and aiming at region-specific problems, past and future conditions, analysis, review and solutions. The journal particularly welcomes research papers that deliver new insights into region-specific hydrological processes and responses to changing conditions, as well as contributions that incorporate interdisciplinarity and translational science.