Contributions of irrigation modeling, soil moisture and snow data
assimilation to the skill of high-resolution digital replicas of the Po
basin water budget
Abstract
High-resolution water budget estimates benefit from modeling of human
water management and satellite data assimilation (DA) in river basins
with a large human footprint. Utilizing the Noah-MP land surface model,
in combination with an irrigation module, Sentinel-1 backscatter and
snow depth observations, we produce a set of 0.7-km$^2$ digital
water budget replicas of the Po river basin (Italy) for 2015-2023. The
results demonstrate that irrigation modeling consistently improves the
seasonal soil moisture variation and summer streamflow at all gauges in
the valley after withdrawal of irrigation water from the streamflow
(12\% error reduction relative to observed low summer
streamflow), even if the basin-wide irrigation amount is underestimated.
Sentinel-1 backscatter DA for soil moisture updating strongly interacts
with irrigation modeling: when both are activated, the soil moisture
updates are limited, and the simulated irrigation amounts are reduced.
Backscatter DA systematically reduces soil moisture in the spring, which
improves downstream spring streamflow. Assimilating Sentinel-1 snow
depth retrievals over the surrounding Alps and Apennines further
improves spring streamflow in a complementary way (2\%
error reduction relative to observed high spring streamflow). Despite
the seasonal improvements, irrigation modeling and Sentinel-1
backscatter DA cannot significantly improve short-term or interannual
variations in soil moisture, irrigation results in a systematically
prolonged high vegetation productivity, and snow depth DA only impacts
the deep snowpacks. These findings help to advance the design and
production of digital water budget replicas for river basins.