Flow Simulation and Storage Assessment in an Ungauged Irrigation Tank Cascade System Using the SWAT Model

Koppuravuri Ramabrahmam,Venkata Reddy Keesara,Raghavan Srinivasan,Venkataramana Sridhar,Deva Pratap

doi:10.3390/su132313158

Koppuravuri Ramabrahmam, Venkata Reddy Keesara + Show 3 more

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https://doi.org/10.3390/su132313158

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Abstract

In the semi-arid regions of South Asia, tank systems are the major source of irrigation. In India, the Telangana state government has initiated the Mission Kakatiya program to rejuvenate irrigation tank systems. Understanding the hydrological processes that supply water to these systems is critical to the success of these types of programs in India. The current study attempted to comprehend the hydrological processes and flow routing in the Salivagu watershed tank cascade system in Telangana. There are a lot of ungauged tank cascade systems in this region. Soil Water Assessment Tool (SWAT), a physically-based model, was used to simulate flow patterns in the Salivagu watershed with and without tank systems. The geospatially extracted area and volume were used for this study provided by WBIS-Bhuvan-NRSC. Additionally, the Katakshapur Tank Cascade System (KTCS) was chosen to analyze the water availability in each tank using the water balance approach. The Salivagu watershed flow simulation without tanks overestimated streamflow. The volume difference in flow between with and without tank was 606 Mm3, 615.9 Mm3, and 1011 Mm3 in 2017, 2018, and 2019, respectively. The SWAT simulated volumes of the Ramchandrapur and Dharmaraopalle tanks in KTCS were merely satisfied because the tank size was less than 0.7 km2 and the storage capacity was up to 1 Mm3. Due to tank sizes more than 0.8 km2 and capacities greater than 2 Mm3, the Mallampalli and Katakshapur tank simulation findings were in good agreement with WBIS-Bhuvan-NRSC. This research advances our understanding of the hydrological processes in ungauged cascading tank systems in tropical semi-arid regions.

Highlights

Semi-arid areas in tropical zones face significant water resource management and food security challenges
The 1879square-kilometer watershed is divided into 139 sub-basins, each with a 7-square-kilometer threshold, and the sub-basins are further classified into HRUs based on topography and soil characteristics
The Soil Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) model was applied to the study area with dense tank systems to simulate the flow difference in the watershed with and without tanks to analyze the water balance components in one of the Tank Cascade System (TCS)

Summary

Introduction

Semi-arid areas in tropical zones face significant water resource management and food security challenges. Tanks and cascade tanks are the primary source of water for agricultural needs in the semi-arid region of Southern India. Tank systems account for more than one-third of the irrigated land area in southern India [1]. A tank is built by erecting earthen embankments across sloping terrain to collect rainwater during the monsoon and store it for use during the remaining dry seasons. These tanks are connected in a series over a single watercourse in south India, and this is known as the Tank Cascade System (TCS) [2].

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