1.

Introduction to Hydrology

1.1. Topic Outcomes

By the end of this chapter, students will be able to:

1. Describe, at an introductory level, the concepts of water cycle

2. A true understanding of the importance of hydrology.

1.2. Introduction

Hydrology means the science of water. It is the science that deals with the occurrence,
circulation and distribution of the earth water and earth’s atmosphere. As a branch of earth
science, it is concerned with the water in streams and lakes, rainfall and snowfall, snow and
ice on the land and water occurring below the earth’s surface in the pores of the soil and
rocks.

Hydrology is basically an applied science. To further emphasis the degree of

applicability, the subject is sometimes classified as

1. Scientific Hydrology – the study which is concerned chiefly with academic aspects.

2. Engineering or Applied Hydrology – a study concerned with engineering applications

In general sense engineering hydrology deals with (i) estimation of water resources, (ii) the
study of processes such as precipitation, runoff, evapotranspiration and their interaction, (iii)
the study such as floods and droughts, and strategies to combat them.

Role of Hydrologists

• help solve local and global problems related to the overabundance, scarcity, or quality
of water. They do so using their understanding of various physical, chemical, and
biological processes in the water cycle and soil-water system.
• undertake a wide range of activities in order to monitor, manage and protect the
water environment. Many activities and studies would be impossible without
hydrometric data measurement, collection and archiving. Much of hydrology involves
 the interpretation and analysis of such data, and hydrologists frequently develop and
use Mathematical models to mimic the physical processes they examine.\
• tasks include:
o Design and operation of hydraulic structures
o Water supply
o Wastewater treatment and disposal
o Irrigation
o Drainage
o Hydropower generation
o Flood control
o Navigation
o Erosion and sediment control
o Salinity control
o Pollution abatement
o Recreation use of water
o Fish and wildlife protection

Importance of Hydrologic Engineering Design

• Hydrologic design provides a service

• Level of service must be defined and acceptable risk of failure must be determined
(local drainage ordinances)
• Cost and site characteristics are typical constraints
• Occurrence, timing, and amount are the key aspects of hydrology from an engineering
perspective…
• Problems are created by lack of water or too much water in a location at a moment in
time (e.g., flood)

HYDROLOGY VS HYDRAULICS:

• Much of hydrology is based on observations that are generalized to practice

- What is the expected maximum rainfall over a 24 hour period?

o For what return period? 1 year, 10 year, 100 year?

- What will be the streamflow resulting from a given storm?

 o Peak value, time variation, relationship to total amount of rainfall
• Hydraulics tends to start from basic physical principles, then make approximations for
practice

- What will be the flow depth in a given channel for a given discharge?

- Hydraulics tends to work with manmade systems

• Often, surface water hydrology provides inputs (max flow rate) for hydraulics
(oversimplified explanation)

1.3. Hydrologic cycle

Water cycle, also called hydrologic cycle, cycle that involves the continuous circulation
of water in the Earth-atmosphere system. Of the many processes involved in the water cycle,
the most important are evaporation, transpiration, condensation, precipitation, and runoff.
Although the total amount of water within the cycle remains essentially constant, its
distribution among the various processes is continually changing.
 The figure above shows the schematic representation of the hydrologic cycle. A
convenient starting point to describe the cycle is in the oceans. Water in the oceans
evaporates due to the heat energy provided by solar radiation. The water vapour moves
upwards and forms clouds. While much of the clouds condense and fall back to the oceans as
rain, a part of the clouds is driven to dry land areas by winds. There they condense and
precipitate onto the land mass as rain, snow, hail, sleet etc. A part of the precipitation may
evaporate back to the atmosphere or move down to the ground surface.

A portion of the water that reaches the ground enters the earth’s surface through

Infiltration, enhance the moisture content of the soil and reach the groundwater body.

Vegetation sends a portion of the water from under the ground surface back to the
atmosphere through the process of transpiration. The precipitation reaching the ground
surface after meeting the needs of filtration and evaporation moves down the natural slope
over the surface and through a network of gullies, streams and rivers to reach the ocean. The
ground water may conic to the surface through springs and other outlets after spending a
considerably longer time than the surface. The portion of the precipitation which by a variety
of paths above and below the surface of the earth reaches the stream channel is called
runoff. Once it enters a stream channel, runoff becomes stream flow.

Each path of the hydrologic cycle involves one or more of the following aspects: (1)
transportation of water, (ii) temporary storage and (iii) change of state.

The quantities of water going through various individual paths of the hydrological cycle
in a given system can be described by the continuity principle known as water budget
equation or hydrologic equation.

a. EVAPORATION

• Evaporation occurs when the physical state of water is changed from a

liquid state to a gaseous state.

• Typically, solar radiation and other factors such as air temperature, vapor
pressure, wind, and atmospheric pressure affect the amount of natural
evaporation that takes place in any geographic area.

• Evaporation can occur on raindrops, and on free water surfaces such as seas
and lakes.

• It can even occur from water settled on vegetation, soil, rocks and snow.
b. CONDENSATION

• Condensation is the process by which water vapor changes it's physical state
from a vapor, most commonly, to a liquid.

• Water vapor condenses onto small airborne particles to form dew, fog, or
clouds.

• Condensation is brought about by cooling of the air or by increasing the

amount of vapor in the air to its saturation point.

c. PRECIPITATION

• Precipitation is the process that occurs when any and all forms of water
particles fall from the atmosphere and reach the ground.

d. INTERCEPTION

• Interception is the process of interrupting the movement of water in the

chain of transportation events leading to streams. The interception can
take place by vegetal cover or depression storage in puddles and in land
formations such as rills and furrows.

e. INFILTRATION

• Infiltration is the physical process involving movement of water through the

boundary area where the atmosphere interfaces with the soil.

• The surface phenomenon is governed by soil surface conditions. Water

transfer is related to the porosity of the soil and the permeability of the
soil profile.

f. PERCOLATION

• Percolation is the movement of water through the soil, and it's layers, by
gravity and capillary forces

g. TRANSPIRATION

• Transpiration is the biological process that occurs mostly in the day.

 • Water inside of plants is transferred from the plant to the atmosphere as
water vapor through numerous individual leave openings. Plants transpire
to move nutrients to the upper portion of the plants and to cool the leaves
exposed to the sun. Leaves undergoing rapid transpiration can be
significantly cooler than the surrounding air

h. RUNOFF

• Runoff is flow from a drainage basin or watershed that appears in surface

streams.

• It generally consists of the flow that is unaffected by artificial diversions,

storages or other works that society might have on or in a stream channel

• The flow is made up partly of precipitation that falls directly on the stream
, surface runoff that flows over the land surface and through channels,
subsurface runoff that infiltrates the surface soils and moves laterally
towards the stream, and groundwater runoff from deep percolation through
the soil horizons.

i. STORAGE

• There are three basic locations of water storage that occur in the planetary
water cycle. Water is stored in the atmosphere; water is stored on the
surface of the earth, and water stored in the ground.

WEATHER BASICS (METEOROLOGY): ATMOSPHERIC WATERS

Meteorology
o Science that deals with the study of the atmosphere and its phenomena especially
with weather

Weather
o Mix of events that happen each day in our atmosphere. Weather is different in
different parts of the world and changes over minutes, hours, days and weeks.
 Most weather happens in the troposphere, the part of Earth’s atmosphere that is
closest to the ground.

o Condition of the atmosphere at a particular place over a short period of time in

terms of:
✓ Wind
✓ Precipitation (rain,
snow)
✓ Temperature
✓ Sunshine
✓ Humidity
✓ Pressure
✓ Cloud
✓ Visibility

1st Set of Weather Elements

The sun causes all our weather because it heats the
Earth unevenly. The contrast between Earth’s hot
parts and cold parts turns the atmosphere into a
powerful engine. This engine keeps the cold and
warm air moving, thus makes changes in air pressure.
Those air pressure changes cause wind
o Sunshine
o Air Pressure
o Wind

Climate
o An average portrait of weather conditions in a specific place over a long period.
o It considers the average weather conditions and its variability to give a long-term
view of the weather being experienced by a certain area (ISDR, 2008)

Climate of the Philippines (http://bagong.pagasa.dost.gov.ph/information/climate-

philippines, accessed June 2018)
The Climate of the Philippines is tropical and maritime. It is characterized by
relatively high temperature, high humidity and abundant rainfall. It is similar in many
respects to the climate of the countries of Central America. Temperature, humidity,
and rainfall, which are discussed hereunder, are the most important elements of the
country's weather and climate.

Temperature
Based on the average of all weather stations in the Philippines, excluding
Baguio, the mean annual temperature is 26.6°C. The coolest months fall in January
with a mean temperature of 25.5°C while the warmest month occurs in May with a
mean temperature of 28.3°C. Latitude is an insignificant factor in the variation of
temperature while altitude shows greater contrast in temperature. Thus, the mean
annual temperature of Baguio with an elevation of 1,500 meters is 18.3°C. This makes
the temperature of Baguio comparable with those in the temperate climate and
because of this, it is known as the summer capital of the Philippines.
The difference between the mean annual temperature of the southernmost
station in Zamboanga and that of the northernmost station in Laoag is insignificant. In
other words, there is essentially no difference in the mean annual temperature of
places in Luzon, Visayas or Mindanao measured at or near sea level.
 Humidity
Humidity refers to the moisture content of the atmosphere. Due to high
temperature and the surrounding bodies of water, the Philippines has a high relative
humidity. The average monthly relative humidity varies between 71 percent in March
and 85 percent in September. The combination of warm temperature and high
relative and absolute humidities give rise to high sensible temperature throughout the
archipelago. It is especially uncomfortable during March to May, when temperature
and humidity attain their maximum levels.
Rainfall
Rainfall is the most important climatic element in the Philippines. Rainfall
distribution throughout the country varies from one region to another, depending
upon the direction of the moisture-bearing winds and the location of the mountain
systems.
The mean annual rainfall of the Philippines varies from 965 to 4,064
millimeters annually. Baguio City, eastern Samar, and eastern Surigao receive the
greatest amount of rainfall while the southern portion of Cotabato receives the least
amount of rain. At General Santos City in Cotabato, the average annual rainfall is only
978 millimeters.
 The Seasons
Using temperature and rainfall as bases, the climate of the country can be
divided into two major seasons: (1) the rainy season, from June to November; and (2)
the dry season, from December to May. The dry season may be subdivided further into
(a) the cool dry season, from December to February; and (b) the hot dry season, from
March to May.

Climate Types
Based on the distribution of rainfall, four climate types are recognized, which
are described as follows:
Type I: two pronounced season: dry from November to April and wet
during the rest of the year. Maximum rain period is from June to
September.
Type II: no dry season with a very pronounced maximum rain period from
December to February. There is not a single dry month. Minimum
monthly rainfall occurs during the period from March to May.
Type III: no very pronounced maximum rain period with a dry season lasting
only from one to three months, either during the period from
December to February or from March to May. This type resembles
types I since it has short dry season.
Type IV: rainfall is more or less evenly distributed throughout the year.
This type resembles type 2 since it has no dry season.

This system of climate classification was devised by Fr. J. Corona in 1920

(Lantican 2001) (1903-1918)"
 Typhoons have a great influence on the climate and weather conditions of the
Philippines. A great portion of the rainfall, humidity and cloudiness are due to the
influence of typhoons. They generally originate in the region of the Marianas and
Caroline Islands of the Pacific Ocean which have the same latitudinal location as
Mindanao. Their movements follow a northwesterly direction, sparing Mindanao from
being directly hit by majority of the typhoons that cross the country. This makes the
southern Philippines very desirable for agriculture and industrial development.