Evaluation of TRMM Precipitation Product for Meteorological Drought Monitoring in Hai Basin

Abstract

Due to spatial coverage, data availability and cost efficiency, this paper focused on studying the potential to apply the satellite rainfall product to monitor meteorological drought. Standard Precipitation Index (SPI) is widely used around the world for research and operational applications on meteorological and agricultural drought monitoring and early warning. SPI was designed to be calculated for any location that has a long-term precipitation record. Therefore, the accuracy of monthly precipitation data of TRMM (the Tropical Rainfall Measurement Mission) 3B43, was firstly investigated through comparison with rainfall data of forty ground stations in Hai Basin from 1998 to 2010. The significant correlations between the two sources were found during different durations of months, seasons and years, and the decision coefficients (R2) are separately 0.84, 0.52–0.82 and 0.60. A single parameterized correction equation was presented to calibrate the TRMM rainfall data to formulate the series rainfall dataset of 30 year from 1981 to 2010. Based on this dataset, the corrected TRMM rainfall data from 2000 to 2004 were used to calculate Standard Precipitation Index (SPI) pixel by pixel for Hai Basin. It was found that 3-month SPI was the best to depict the meteorological drought, which agreed well with the statistical drought information from 2000 to 2004.