HYDROLOGY

DEM’s, Watershed and Stream Network

Delineation

• DEM Data Sources

• Study Area in Nawalparasi 30m DEM from
a 1:25,000 scale map
• Eight direction pour point model (flow
direction and flow accumulation grids)
• Stream network definition
• Watershed delineation

Methodology

What is a DEM?

A DEM is a raster representation of a continuous surface,

usually referring to the surface of the earth.

The accuracy of this data is determined primarily by the resolution

(the distance between sample points).

Other factors which influence accuracy are the data type

(integer or floating point) and the actual sampling of the surface
when creating the original DEM.

1
 DEM

100 98 99 98

101 97 95 97

99 98 94 93

100 101 96 92

2
 DEM Data Sources
• Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM)
• 30m DEMs from 1:24,000 scale map
(USA), 1” National Elevation Dataset
• 3" (100m) DEMs from 1:250,000 scale
maps
• 30" DEM of the earth (GTOPO30)
• Data in Nepal
• 1:25000 topo sheets
• 30" DEM of the earth (GTOPO30)
• 3" (100m) DEMs from 1:250,000 scale maps

Santa Barbara, California

http://srtm.usgs.gov/srtmimagegallery/index.html

3
 San Andreas Fault, California

http://srtm.usgs.gov/srtmimagegallery/index.html

Salt Lake City, Utah

http://srtm.usgs.gov/srtmimagegallery/index.html

4
 Mt Kilimanjaro, Tanzania

http://srtm.usgs.gov/srtmimagegallery/index.html

Shuttle Radar Topography

Mission (SRTM)
• 1 arc-second elevation
data for the United
States, 3 arc-second data
for the globe
• Produced by radar
measurements from a
Shuttle mission, Feb 11-
22, 2000
• http://srtm.usgs.gov/data
/obtainingdata.html

5
 Interferometry used by SRTM
In interferometry, two
images are taken
from different vantage
points of the same
area. The slight
difference in the two
images allows
scientists to
determine the height
of the surface.

6
 SRTM Coverage 56°S to 60°N

30m DEMs

• Aster Data for whole world

including Nepal
• Downloaded from
http://www.gdem.aster.ersdac.or.jp/
login.jsp

7
 3” DEMs
• Derived by US Defence Mapping Agency,
available from USGS for the whole
WORLD
• Data in geographic coordinates by
1;250,000 map sheet names (1ºx 1º) cells in
(1ºx 2º) maps
• Needs to be projected to planar coordinates
• Link http://edcwww.cr.usgs.gov/doc/edchome/ndcdb/ndcdb.html

30m Cell Size 100m

8
 30" DEM GTOPO30
• Produced by USGS from 30" grids and
Digital Chart of the World topography
• Coverage complete for the earth
• Projected cell size is 1km
• Data must be projected before use
• Link http://edcwww.cr.usgs.gov/landdaac/gtopo30/gtopo30.html

GTOPO30

Source: http://edcwww.cr.usgs.gov/landdaac/gtopo30/gtopo30.html

9
 Drainage in North America

Source: http://edcwww.cr.usgs.gov/landdaac/gtopo30/hydro/namerica.html

Drainage Basins of Narayani River

10
 DEM’s, Watershed and Stream Network
Delineation

• DEM Data Sources

• Small catchment area (created from contour
lines)
• Eight direction pour point model (flow
direction and flow accumulation grids)
• Stream network definition
• Watershed delineation

Study area

Catchment area

4 km

4 km

11
 Topographic Map
1:24,000 Scale
http://www.tnrcc.state.tx.us/gis/raster.html

20 ft contour

100 ft contour

Stream Center Line

Flow in Direction of Steepest Descent

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 Watershed Delineation by Hand Digitizing

Watershed divide

Drainage direction Outlet

200 Meter Mesh

(Universal Transverse Mercator Coordinates)

1km

1km

13
 100 Meter Mesh
(UTM Coordinates)

100m
1km
100m

1km

30 Meter Mesh
Standard for 1:24,000 Scale Maps

14
 30 Meter DEM
Elevations in meters
ftp://ftp.tnris.state.tx.us/tnris/demA.html

USGS 30 Meter DEM for This Area

15
30 Meter DEM Cell Boundaries

DEM Lattice Points

16
DEM Cell Stores Elevation at Lattice Point

DEM Elevations
720 720
Contours
740
720

700

680

740 720 700 680

17
 DEM Elevations Contours

700

680

DEM’s, Watershed and Stream Network

Delineation

• DEM Data Sources

• Nawalparashi area (created from contour
lines)
• Eight direction pour point model (flow
direction and flow accumulation grids)
• Stream network definition
• Watershed delineation

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Digital Elevation Model
67 56 49 46 50
53 44 37 38 48
58 55 22 31 24
61 47 21 16 19
53 34 12 11 12

Cell Definition
cell size

67 56 49 46 50
53 44 37 38 48
58 55 22 31 24 50
(cell value)
61 47 21 16 19
53 34 12 11 12

cell

19
 Eight Direction Pour Point Model

32 64 128

16 1

8 4 2

Direction of Steepest Descent

1 1

67 56 49 67 56 49

53 44 37 53 44 37

58 55 22 58 55 22

Slope:

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 Flow Direction Grid

2 2 4 4 8
1 2 4 8 4
128 1 2 4 8
2 1 4 4 4
1 1 1 2 16

30 Meter DEM
Elevations in meters
ftp://ftp.tnris.state.tx.us/tnris/demA.html

21
 Flow Direction Grid

32 64 128

16 1

8 4 2

Grid Network

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 DEM’s, Watershed and Stream Network
Delineation

• DEM Data Sources

• Nawalparashi area (created from contour
lines)
• Eight direction pour point model (flow
direction and flow accumulation grids)
• Stream network definition
• Watershed delineation

Flow Accumulation Grid

0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

0 3 2 2 0 0 3 2 2 0
0 0 0 11 0 1
0 0 1
11
0 1 0 0 0 1 15 0
0 15
0 2 5 0 2 5 24 1
1
24

Link to Grid calculator

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Flow Accumulation > 5 Cell Threshold

0 0 0 0 0

0 3 2 2 0

0 0 11 0 1

0 0 1 15 0

0 2 5 24 1

Stream Network for 5 cell

Threshold Drainage Area
0 0 0 0 0

0 3 2 2 0

0
0 0 1
11
0 1 0
0
15
0 2 5
1
24

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Streams with 200 cell Threshold
(>18 hectares or 13.5 acres drainage area)

“Burning In” the Streams

 Take a mapped stream network and a DEM

 Make a grid of the streams
 Raise the off-stream DEM cells by an arbitrary elevation
increment
 Produces "burned in" DEM streams = mapped streams

+ =

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 Filling in the Pits
• DEM creation results in artificial pits in the
landscape
• A pit is a set of one or more cells which has
no downstream cells around it
• Unless these pits are filled they become
sinks and isolate portions of the watershed
• Pit filling is first thing done with a DEM

26
 Strahler ordering

Shreve ordering

DEM’s, Watershed and Stream Network

Delineation

• DEM Data Sources

• Eight direction pour point model (flow

direction and flow accumulation grids)
• Stream network definition
• Watershed delineation

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 Watershed Outlet

Watershed Draining to This Outlet

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 Watershed and Drainage Paths
Delineated from 30m DEM

Automated method is more consistent than hand delineation

Stream Segments
0 0 0 0 0

0 3 2 2 0

0
0 0 1
11
0 1 0
0
15
0 2 5
1
24

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Stream Segments in a Cell Network

1
1 2
1 2
5
3 5
3 5
4 4 4 3 5
4 4
6 6
6

1000 Cell Threshold Exceeded at Stream Junction

510 989
1504 (>1000)

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 Subwatersheds for Stream Segments

Same Cell Value

Vectorized Streams Linked Using

Grid Code to Cell Equivalents

Vector
Streams
Grid
Streams

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 Delineated Subwatersheds and Stream Networks

Summary Concepts
• Topographic maps are the traditional way of
representing land surface terrain and
streams
• Watersheds can be hand-delineated from
these maps
• DEM’s of equivalent accuracy are now
available for most map series in the US

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 Summary Concepts (2)
• DEM cell elevation is at the cell center
• eight direction pour point model leads to
flow direction and flow accumulation grids
• stream network is defined as cells whose
flow accumulation exceeds a threshold
• watershed outlet is the cell with highest
flow accumulation

Summary Concepts (3)

• Streams can be divided into links and
subwatersheds defined for them
• Resulting grids can be vectorized
• Standardized DEM data sources: 30m, 1”
3”, 30”
• Coverage from local scale to the whole
earth

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