CE421- Engineering

Hydrology
 Introduction

 Water is vital for all living organisms on Earth.

 For centuries, people have been investigating
where water comes from and where it goes, why
some of it is salty and some is fresh, why
sometimes there is not enough and sometimes too
much. All questions and answers related to water
have been grouped together into a discipline.
 The name of the discipline is hydrology and is
formed by two Greek words: "hydro" and "logos"
meaning "water" and "science".
 What is the difference between Hydrology
and Hydraulics?
 Hydrology
– is the study of the Earth's water; its motion and
properties. This includes the water cycle, the
distribution of water resources, water quality, and
how water flows on top of the land and underneath.
The water cycle is at the heart of hydrology, and is
the way water moves around the Earth: how it
evaporates, forms clouds, rains onto the ground,
follows rivers to lakes and seas, and evaporates all
over again.
– A hydrologist is a person who solves water related problems. This
includes dealing with the water supplies in a city, controlling flooding,
helping farmers develop irrigation, or working with environmental
groups to study how water flow affects wildlife.
What is the difference between
Hydrology and Hydraulics?

 Hydraulics
– is more geared towards physics , the
study of the motion of liquids in relation
to disciplines such as fluid mechanics and
fluids dynamics , etc.
 In general sense engineering
hydrology deals with
– Estimation of water resources
– The study of processes such as
precipitation, evapotranspiration, runoff
and their interaction
– The study of problems such as floods
and droughts and strategies to combat
them
 Hydrologic Cycle

 Water exists on the earth in all its three

states, viz. liquid, solid, gaseous and in
various degrees of motion.
 Hydrologic cycle….
 Evaporation from water bodies
 Water vapour moves upwards
 Cloud formation
 Condensation
 Precipitate
 Interception
 Transpiration
 Infiltration
 Runoff–stream flow
 Deep percolation
 Ground water flow
 Hydrologic cycle….
 The hydrologic cycle has important influence
in a variety of fields such as agriculture,
forestry, geography, economics, sociology,
and political science.
 Engineering application of the knowledge are
found in the design and operation of the
projects dealing with water supply,
hydropower, irrigation & drainage, flood
control, navigation, coastal work, various
hydraulic structure works, salinity control
and recreational use of water.
 Water Budget Equation
Catchment area

 The area of land draining into a stream

or a water course at a given location is
called catchment area / drainage area /
drainage basin / watershed.
 A catchment area is separated from its
neighbouring areas by a ridge called
divide / watershed.
 Water Budget Equation
Catchment area….
 A watershed is a geographical unit in which
the hydrological cycle and its components can
be analysed. The equation is applied in the
form of water-balance equation to a
geographical region, in order to establish the
basic hydrologic characteristics of the region.
Usually a watershed is defined as the area
that appears, on the basis of topography, to
contribute all the water that passes through a
given cross section of a stream.
 Watershed and watershed divide

Watershed/
catchment
Watershed/
catchment
 Catchment area….
 If a permeable soil covers an impermeable substrate,
the topographical division of watershed will not
always correspond to the line that is effectively
delimiting the groundwater.
Water Budget Equation

 For a given catchment, in an interval of

time ∆t, the continuity equation for water
in its various phases can be given as:
Mass inflow – Mass outflow = change in mass storage
 If the density of the inflow, outflow and
storage volumes are the same:
i  o  S
Vi - Inflow volume into the catchment, Vo - Outflow volume
from the catchment and ∆S - change in the water
volume
 Water Budget Equation…

 Therefore, the water budget of a catchment

for a time interval ∆t is written as:
P – R – G – E – T = ∆S
P = Precipitation, R = Surface runoff, G = net ground water flow out of the
catchment, E = Evaporation, T = Transpiration, and ∆S = change in
storage

 The above equation is called the water

budget equation for a catchment

NOTE: All the terms in the equation have the dimension of

volume and these terms can be expressed as depth
over the catchment area.
 Components of hydrologic cycle

Evapo transpiration
Precipitation

Stream flow

(Runoff)

Inter flow
Infiltration

Base flow

Groundwater flow
 World Water Budget
 Total quantity of water in the world is
estimated as 1386 M km3
– 1337.5 M km3 of water is contained in
oceans as saline water
– The rest 48.5 M km3 is land water
 13.8 M km3 is again saline
 34.7 M km3 is fresh water
– 10.6 M km3 is both liquid and fresh
– 24.1 M km3 is a frozen ice and glaciers in the
polar regions and mountain tops
Estimated World Water Quantitites
96%

2% 1% Ocean-saline
1% Land - saline
Fresh - Liquid
Fresh - Frozen
 Global annual water balance
SN Item Ocean Land
1 Area (km2) 361.3 148.8
2 Precipitation (km3/year) 458,000 119,000
(mm/year) 1270 800
3 Evaporation (km3/year) 505,000 72,000
(mm/year) 1400 484
4 Runoff to ocean
Rivers (km3/year) 44,700
Groundwater (km3/year) 2,200
Total Runoff (km3/year) 47,000
(mm/year) 316
 Water Balance of Continents
Area (M km^2)

50
45
40
30.3
30
20.7
20 17.8
8.7 9.8
10

0
Africa Asia Australia Europe N.Am erica S.Am erica

Precipitation (mm/yr)

2000
1648
1500

1000 736 734

686 726 670
500

0
Africa Asia Australia Europe N.Am erica S.Am erica
 Water Balance …….
Precipitation (mm/yr)

2000
1648
1500

1000 736 734

686 726 670
500

0
Africa Asia Australia Europe N.Am erica S.Am erica

Evaporation (mm/yr)

1200
1065
1000
800
547 510
600
400
433 415 383 Drop of water …..
200 Matter…..
0
Africa Asia Australia Europe N.Am erica S.Am erica

Total Runoff (mm/yr)

700
600 583
500
400 319
293 287
300 226
200 139
100
0
Africa Asia Australia Europe N.Am erica S.Am erica
 Water Balance of Oceans
1600 Area M km^2
1380
1400 Precp (mm/yr)
1210
1140
1200 1040 Evap. (mm/yr)
1010
1000
780
800
600
400 240
107 120 167
200 75
12
0
Atlantic Arctic Indian Pacific

Water flow in Ocean

400 350

200 230
200 130
70 60
0
Atlantic Arctic Indian Pacific
-200 -60

-400 Continental Inflow (mm/yr) -300

water exch. with ocean(mm/yr)
Application in Engineering
 Hydrology finds its greatest application
in the design and operation of water
resources engineering projects
– The capacity of storage structures such as
reservoir
– The magnitude of flood flows to enable safe
disposal of the excess flow
– The minimum flow and quantity of flow
available at various seasons
– The interaction of the flood wave and
hydraulic structures, such as levees,
reservoirs, barrages and bridges
THE END
References

 http://www.fao.org/docrep/w5183e/w
5183e04.htm