Estimation of crop water requirement based on principal component analysis and geographically weighted regression

Abstract

In this study the principal component analysis (PCA) and geographically weighted regression (GWR) are combined to estimate the spatial distribution of water requirement of the winter wheat in North China while the effect of the macro- and micro-topographic as well as the meteorological factors on the crop water requirement is taking into account. The spatial distribution characteristic of the water requirement of the winter wheat in North China and its formation are analyzed based on the spatial variation of the main affecting factors and the regression coefficients. The findings reveal that the collinearity can be effectively removed when PCA is applied to process all of the affecting factors. The regression coefficients of GWR displayed a strong variability in space, which can better explain the spatial differences of the effect of the affecting factors on the crop water requirement. The evaluation index of the proposed method in this study is more efficient than the widely used Kriging method. Besides, it could clearly show the effect of those affecting factors in different spatial locations on the crop water requirement and provide more detailed information on the region where those factors suddenly change. To sum up, it is of great reference significance for the estimation of the regional crop water requirement.