#terrestrial_water_storage
#GRACE

In 2019, Bin He from Beijing Normal University and co-authors analyzed the response time of terrestrial water storage (TWS) to precipitation (P) over 168 global river basins.

The study period was 2003-2014. The trend metric was Mann-Kendall. The trends were all calculated at the basin level for the 168 global basins.

Key findings

(1) In low- and mid-latitude basins, TWS is correlated with P with a shorter lag (1-2 months) than in high-latitude basins (6-9 months).

(2) Three of the individual components of TWS - surface, ground, soil - have the same correlation lags pattern with P as TWS. The other two components - canopy and snow - have different correlation lags, i.e. 0 months and 3-8 months.

(3) Groundwater and soil moisture contributions are generally the largest. In high-latitude basins, snow contribution is greater, which can explain the longer lag in high latitude basins. Interestingly, snow contribution is also large in northern India. Soil moisture contribution is not negligible in very wet regions (e.g. Mackenzie in Canada, Amazon region, Yangtze, Yellow River, Yenisei & Lena in Russia) and a few arid basins (Niger and Nile).

https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/hydr/20/9/jhm-d-18-0253_1.xml