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Modeling water discharge and nitrate leaching using drainmod-gis technology at small catchment scale

Abstract:

The purpose of the study was to examine the possibility of modeling nitrate leaching to surface waters using a field-scale quasi-two-dimensional mechanistic flow model (DRAINMOD) in combination with a GIS. The GIS was used to describe the spatial distribution within the area of interest of soil type and land use, and to integrate the simulated nitrate leaching at field scale at the scale of the catchment. This study summarizes the method used to model the nitrate leaching at field scale and how the GIS was applied to present the spatial distribution of nitrogen loss by natural and artificial drainage. The modeling framework was applied to the Witte Nete, the Molenbeek and the Mark, three agricultural catchments in Belgium having total areas of 40.70, 57.44 and 93.62 km2, respectively to assess the vulnerability for nitrate leaching of a pilot study region in Belgium. The study illustrates that a GIS in combination with a mechanistic field scale model is a powerful and suitable tool for modeling nitrate leaching at catchment scale. The resulting vulnerability maps depict the nitrogen leaching as a function of soil type and land use and give the decision maker the opportunity to make nitrogen leaching standards site specific. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.