Spatial correlation function of the mean annual water runoff of the river of Ukraine

Abstract

SUMMARY The purpose of the study is to calculate the spatial correlation function of the average annual water runoff for the territory of Ukraine according to the data on average annual water flow for medium and large river basins. The spatial correlation function is the coefficients of paired correlation between river water runoff depending on the distances between the centers of gravity of their river basins. Mathematical statistics, statistical analysis of the relationships between hydrological variables, and GIS technologies were used to construct the spatial correlation function. It is concluded that in the range of distances between the centers of gravity of river basins (from 88.6 to 1040 kilometers) there is a positive correlation between the runoff of the studied rivers (from −0.05 to 0.88). Correlation coefficients with increasing distance between river basin centers are killing. A satisfactory correlation (at = 0.60–0.70) between the average annual river water runoff for the plain territories of Ukraine has observed at a distance between the centers of the basins 180–300 km, for the mountain areas - at a distance of 20–80 km.