A monthly distributed agro-hydrological model for irrigation district in arid region with shallow groundwater table

Agro-hydrological processes in arid irrigation districts mainly include precipitation, water diversion, irrigation, drainage, evapotranspiration (ET), and soil water and groundwater flow, which interact with each other and are controlled by complex natural and anthropogenic drivers. To better understand the agro-hydrological processes in arid irrigation districts with shallow groundwater table, we developed a novel monthly distributed agro-hydrological model for irrigation districts (DAHMID) based on the concepts of canal command area (CCA) and sub-drainage command area (SDCA). The DAHMID model is driven by meteorology, irrigation, and evapotranspiration (ET) estimated by remote sensing-based ET model, and considers soil water and groundwater balances in both irrigated and non-irrigated lands and interior drainage between them. The model was applied to Hetao Irrigation District (HID), the largest irrigation district in arid region of China with a total irrigated area of 0.68 million ha. The DAHMID model was calibrated with groundwater table depth measurements in 13 CCAs of HID from 2008 to 2010, and validated from 2012 to 2013. Results depicted that the root mean square errors (RMSEs), normalized RMSEs (NRMSEs), Nash-Sutcliffe efficiency coefficients (NSEs), and coefficients of determination (r2) of groundwater table depth in both irrigated and non-irrigated lands for all CCAs were in the ranges of 0.19–0.34 m, 0.10–0.25, 0.30–0.82, and 0.68–0.91, respectively. The simulation results from 2008 to 2014 indicated that interior drainage from irrigated land to non-irrigated land is an important approach of drainage in HID, which is about 14.3% of total irrigation water diversion and 34.9% more than the drainage through ditches. The interior drainage process is basically similar to irrigation and ditch drainage processes, all reaching their peaks in May and October. ET is the major water consumption in HID, which is about 95% of total irrigation water diversion and precipitation in average. The net capillary rise of irrigated land is significantly less than that of non-irrigated land due to the impact of irrigation infiltration. The DAHMID model has less parameters and requires less inputs, and can be better applied to continuous simulation of agro-hydrological processes in irrigation districts in medium and long periods with satisfactory simulation accuracy.