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Influence of observed and RCM-simulated precipitation on the water discharge over the Sirba basin, Burkina Faso/Niger

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Abstract

The forcing of a hydrologic model (ABC) by both observed and simulated precipitation from a regional climate model (MAR) has been performed over the Sirba watershed (39,000 km2) located in the Sahelian region. Two aspects have been more specifically examined: the spatial and temporal representations of precipitation. The comparison between simulated and observed discharges—using observed rainfall datasets as forcing of the hydrologic model—has shown that the representation of daily precipitation (which is mainly convective in the Sahelian region) was not sufficiently accurate to correctly simulate the hydrologic response of the watershed. Since this response drives the soil water budget and consequently the amount of evaporation in forthcoming coupling experiments, it is thus necessary to develop more realistic infra-daily precipitation associated with convective events. A new temporal disaggregation scheme has been then developed. Considering observed as well as simulated precipitation fields, this method has significantly improved the simulated discharge at the catchment outlet. The major role played by the temporal component compared to spatial component of the precipitation has been then underlined. In addition, the present study shows the unsuitability of the simulated precipitation from the RCM to directly force a hydrologic model at infra daily timescale even if the cumulative amount and the main features of the precipitation seasonal cycle are well simulated.

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Acknowledgments

The research is a part of the PPL3-COUMEHY project funded by the French program ACI-GRID 2001 (Ministère de la Recherche). It is also a contribution of the European project DEISA (Distributed European Infrastructure for Supercomputing Applications). All major computations were realized with the CNRS-IDRIS computing resources. Authors particularly thank the Niger-DRE (Direction des Ressources en Eau) for the access to the Sirba river discharge data. The GLC, IRD, and ECMWF institutions were helpful for providing the authors with their indispensable datasets. Authors also thank the two anonymous reviewers for their comments that help us to improve this paper.

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Messager, C., Gallée, H., Brasseur, O. et al. Influence of observed and RCM-simulated precipitation on the water discharge over the Sirba basin, Burkina Faso/Niger. Clim Dyn 27, 199–214 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-006-0131-y

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