EVALUATION OF CLIMATE FORECAST AND SYSTEM REANALYSIS SATELLITE WEATHER DATA FOR THE PREDICTION IN THE UNGAUGED BASIN: CASE STUDY OF OMO-GIBE RIVER BASIN, ETHIOPIA

Hydrological data inadequacy at ungauged watersheds has been a problem for
modeling the water resources of Omo-Gibe Basin, Ethiopia. Climate Forecast and
System Reanalysis (CFSR) Satellite climate products can be utilized as an alternative
source of climate data in such regions where the usual ground observed climate data
are insufficient. Therefore, the aim of this study was to evaluate the hydrological
performance of CFSR weather data as an input to the HBV-Light hydrological model
over the Omo-Gibe River Basin, Ethiopia. The evaluation was executed in three
different steps. Initially, the CFSR data was compared to ground climate data using
efficiency descriptors (ENS, 𝑅2 , PBIAS) and categorical statistics (Probability of
Detection and False Alarm Ratio) for the same time window of 1987 to 2010. Secondly,
the runoff predictive performance of the CFSR driven HBV -Light model was
calibrated and validated at gauged catchments. Finally, streamflow was generated at
ungauged catchments through the method of regionalization. The soil descriptors (Soil
permeability, Soil available water content, Soil bulk density), vegetation descriptors
(NDVI) and topographical descriptors were some of the data used in this study