LESSON 1 – INTRODUCTION TO IMPORTANCE OF HYDROLOGIC

ENGINEERING DESIGN:
HYDROLOGY
Hydrology – the science of water, deals with the
occurrence, circulation and distribution of the earth water
and earth’s atmosphere
• A branch of earth science 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
• 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 (ex. flood)

CLASSIFICATION OF HYDROLOGY:
1. Scientific Hydrology – the study which is concerned
chiefly with academic aspects
2. Engineering or Applied Hydrology – a study
concerned with engineering applications
• Estimation of water resources
• Study of processes such as precipitation, runoff,
evapotranspiration and their interaction
• Study of floods and droughts, and strategies to
combat them
ROLE OF HYDROLOGISTS:
1. Help solve local and global problems related to the
overabundance, scarcity and quality of water
• Using their understanding of various physical,
chemical and biological processes in the water
cycle and soil-water system
2. Undertake a wide range of activities in order to monitor,
manage and protect the water environment
HYDROLOGY VS HYDRAULICS
1. Hydrology – is based on observations that are
generalized to practice
• What is the expected maximum rainfall over a 24-
hour period?
• For what return period? 1 year, 10 years, 100
years?
• What will be the streamflow resulting from a
given storm?
• Peak value, time variation, relationship to total
amount of rainfall
2. 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
Note: Often, surface water hydrology provides inputs
(max flow rate) for hydraulics

• Involves the interpretation and analysis of data,

and hydrologists frequently develop and use Water Cycle – also known ay hydrologic cycle, involves
mathematical models to mimic the physical the continuous circulation of water in the earth-
processes they examine atmosphere system

• Evaporation, transpiration, condensation,

precipitation, and runoff
TASKS OF HYDROLOGISTS:

• Design and operation of hydraulic structures

• Water supply HYDROLOGIC CYCLE
• Wastewater treatment and disposal
• A convenient starting point to describe the cycle
• Irrigation
is in the oceans. Water in the oceans evaporates
• Drainage due to the heat energy provided by solar radiation.
• Hydropower generation • The water vapor moves upward and forms clouds.
• Flood control While much of the clouds condense and fall back
• Navigation to the oceans as rain, a part of the clouds is driven
• Erosion and sediment control to dry land areas by winds.
• Salinity control • There they condense and precipitate onto the land
• Pollution abatement mass as rain, snow, hail, sleet etc. A part of the
• Recreation use of water precipitation may evaporate back to the
• Fish and wildlife protection atmosphere or move down to the ground surface.
Cebeda, Princess Danica A.
CE 405 – Hydrology
 • 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.
Each path of the hydrologic cycle involves one or more
of the following aspects:
1. Transportation of water
2. Temporary storage
3. Change of state
WATER BUDGET EQUATION
1. Evaporation – occurs when the physical state of water
is changed from a liquid state to a gaseous state
• 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
• Can occur on raindrops, and on free water
surfaces such as seas and lakes
• Can even occur from water settled on vegetation,
soil, rocks and snow
2. Condensation – is the process by which water vapor
changes its physical state from a vapor to a liquid
• Water vapor condenses onto small airborne
particles to form a dew, fog or clouds
• Brought about by cooling of the air or by
increasing the amount of vapor in the air to its
saturation point
3. Precipitation – is the process that occurs when any and
all forms of water particles fall from the atmosphere and
reach the ground
4. Interception – is the process of interrupting the
movement of water in the chain of transportation events
leading to streams
• Can take place by vegetal cover or depression
storage in puddles and in land formations such as
rills and furrows
5. 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
6. Percolation – is the movement of water through the
soil, and its layers, by gravity and capillary forces
7. Transpiration – is the biological process that occurs
mostly in the day
Cebeda, Princess Danica A.
CE 405 – Hydrology
• 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
8. 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 – flows over then land
surface and through channels
- Subsurface runoff – infiltrates the surface
soils and moves laterally towards the stream
- Groundwater runoff – from deep
percolation through the soil horizons
9. Storage – locations of water storage that occur in
planetary water cycle:
• Atmosphere
• Surface of the earth
• Ground
WEATHER BASICS: ATMOSPHERIC WATERS
Meteorology – science that deals with the study of the
atmosphere and its phenomena especially with weather
Weather – mix of events that happen each day in our
atmosphere
• Most weathers happen in the troposphere, the part
of earth’s atmosphere that is closest to the ground
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
Climate – an average portrait of weather conditions in a
specific place over a long period
• 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:
• Tropical and maritime
• It is characterized by relatively high temperature,
high humidity and abundant rainfall
Temperature:
• Mean annual temperature – 26.6°C (excluding
Baguio)
• Coolest month – January (25.5°C)
• Warmest month – May (28.3°C)
• Mean annual temperature of Baguio with an
elevation of 1500 meters – 18.3°C
Humidity – refers to the moisture content of the
atmosphere
• The Philippines has a high relative humidity
• The average monthly relative humidity varies
between 71 percent in March and 85 percent in
September
• It is especially uncomfortable during March to
May, when temperature and humidity attain their
maximum levels
Rainfall – is the most important climatic element in the
Philippines
• 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
Seasons:
• Wet or rainy season – June to November
• Dry season – December to May
- Cool dry – December to February
- Hot dry – March to May
Climate Types:
1. Type I – two pronounced seasons: dry from November
to April and wet during the rest of the year
• Maximum rain period is from June to September
2. 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
3. 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
Cebeda, Princess Danica A.
CE 405 – Hydrology
• Resembles Type I since it has short dry season
4. Type IV – rainfall is more or less evenly distributed
throughout the year
• Resembles type 2 since it has no dry season
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
• Movements follow a northwesterly direction,
sparing Mindanao from being directly hit by
majority of the typhoons that cross the country,
making the southern Philippines very desirable
for agriculture and industrial development.
LESSON 3 – THE ATMOSPHERE
Atmosphere – is a layer of gases surrounding a planet or
other material body of sufficient mass that is held in place
by the gravity of the body
• It is the smallest of the Earth’s geological
reservoirs
• Is more likely to be retained if the gravity is high
and the atmosphere's temperature is low
VERTICAL STRUCTURE OF THE ATMOSPHERE:
1. Troposphere – closest to the ground, the temperature
is highest near the surface of the earth and decreases with
altitude
• On average, the temperature gradient of the
troposphere is 6.5°C per 1,000 m (3.6°F per 1,000
ft.) of altitude
• Earth’s surface is a major source of heat for the
troposphere. Rock, soil, and water on Earth
absorb the Sun’s light and radiate it back into the
atmosphere as heat
• The temperature is also higher near the surface
because of the greater density of gases. The
higher gravity causes the temperature to rise
• Sometimes there is a temperature inversion, air
temperature in the troposphere increases with
altitude and warm air sits over cold air. Inversions
are very stable and may last for several days or
even weeks. Inversions form:
- Over land at night or in winter when the
ground is cold. The cold ground cools the air
 that sits above it, making this low layer of air
denser than the air above it
- Near the coast where cold seawater cools the
air above it. When that denser air moves
inland, it slides beneath the warmer air over
the land
2. Stratosphere – the layer above troposphere
• Where ash and gas from large volcanic eruption
may burst and be remains suspended for many
years due to little mixing between the two layers
• Temperature increases with altitude
• Direct heat source is the sun
• Air is stable because warmer, less dense air sits
over cooler, denser air. As a result, there is little
mixing of air within the layer.
• The ozone layer is found within the stratosphere
between 15 to 30 km (9 to 19 miles) altitude
- Extremely important because ozone gas in
the stratosphere absorbs most of the Sun’s
harmful ultraviolet (UV) radiation
- High-energy UV light penetrates cells and
damages DNA, leading to cell death (bad
sunburn)
3. Mesosphere – the layer above stratosphere
• Temperatures decrease with altitude
• Because there are few gas molecules to absorb the
Sun’s radiation, the heat source is the stratosphere
• Is extremely cold, especially at its top, about -
90°C (-130°F)
• The air has extremely low density: 99.9% of the
mass of the atmosphere is below the mesosphere.
As a result, air pressure is very low
• A person traveling through the mesosphere would
experience severe burns from ultraviolet light
since the ozone layer which provides UV
protection is in the stratosphere below
• There would be almost no oxygen for breathing
• An unprotected traveler’s blood would boil at
normal body temperature because the pressure is
so low
4. Thermosphere – the layer above mesosphere
• The International Space Station (ISS) orbits
within the upper part of the thermosphere, at
about 320 to 380 km above the Earth
• The density of molecules is so low that one gas
molecule can go about 1 km before it collides
with another molecule. Since so little energy is
transferred, the air feels very cold.
• Within the thermosphere is the ionosphere – gets
its name from the solar radiation that ionizes gas
molecules to create a positively charged ion and
one or more negatively charged electrons
- At night, radio waves bounce off the
ionosphere and back to Earth. This is why
you can often pick up an AM radio station far
from its source at night
Cebeda, Princess Danica A.
CE 405 – Hydrology
- The Van Allen radiation belts are two
doughnut-shaped zones of highly charged
particles that are located beyond the
atmosphere in the magnetosphere
- When massive solar storms cause the Van
Allen belts to become overloaded with
particles, the result is the most spectacular
feature of the ionosphere: the nighttime
aurora
5. Exosphere – outermost layer of the atmosphere
• No real outer limit
• The gas molecules finally become so scarce that
at some point there are no more
• Beyond the atmosphere is the solar wind – made
of high-speed particles, mostly protons and
electrons, traveling rapidly outward from the Sun.
COMPOSITION OF THE ATMOSPHERE:
• Nitrogen – 78%
• Oxygen – 21%
• Argon – 0.9%
• Gases like carbon dioxide, nitrous oxides,
methane, and ozone are trace gases that account
for about a tenth of one percent of the atmosphere
• Water vapor is unique in that its concentration
varies from 0-4% of the atmosphere depending
on where you are and what time of the day it is
Atmospheric Stability – a measure of the atmosphere's
tendency to encourage or deter vertical motion, and
vertical motion is directly correlated to different types of
weather systems and their severity
• Absolutely Unstable – if the environmental lapse
rate is greater than 9.8 C per kilometer, then any
rising parcel, saturated or not, will be warmer
than its environment
- The parcel will be buoyant in this case, and
so the atmosphere is characterized as
absolutely unstable
• Conditionally Unstable – if the environmental
lapse rate lies in the range between 4 C per
kilometer and 9.8 C per kilometer
- A rising parcel could become buoyant if at
some point it becomes saturated. Whether it
becomes saturated depends on the surface
temperature and humidity
• Absolutely Stable – if the environmental lapse
rate is less than 4 C per kilometer, then any rising
air parcel will be colder than the environment,
and will sink back down
- The atmosphere is characterized as
absolutely stable because no matter if the
parcel is saturated or not, it cannot become
buoyant
Condensation – process by which water vapor in the air
is changed into liquid water
• Crucial to the water cycle because it is
responsible for the formation of clouds
• These clouds may produce precipitation, which is
the primary route for water to return to the Earth's
surface within the water cycle
• Condensation nuclei – dust, carbon particle,
pollen particle
Clouds – mass of small water droplets or tiny ice crystals
that float in the air
• Formed when temperature of the air is below dew
point
• White in color because droplets and crystals
scatters sunlight, appeared gray when blocking
sunlight
TYPES OF CLOUDS:
1. HIGH CLOUDS – made of ice crystals due to the cold
air in the upper sky (6,000-18,000m in tropics to 3,000-
8,000m in polar regions)
a. Cirrus – are the most common high cloud (5,000-
13,000m)
• Composed entirely of ice and consist of long,
thin, wispy, streamers
• Commonly known as “Mare’s Tails” because of
their appearance
• Usually white and predict fair weather
b. Cirrostratus – sheet thin like clouds that usually cover
the entire sky (5,000-13,000m)
• The sun or moon can shine through and
sometimes may appear to have halo around it
when in the presence of cirrostratus
• Usually come 12-24 hours before a rain or snow
storm, and especially true if middle clouds are
associated with it
c. Cirrocumulus – small rounded puffs that usually
appear in long rows
• Usually white but sometimes appear gray
• The same size or smaller than the width of your
littlest finger when you hold up your hand at
arm's length
• If these clouds cover up a lot of sky, they are
called “Mackerel Sky” because it resembles the
scales of a fish
• Usually seen in the winter time and indicate fair,
but cold weather
2. MIDDLE CLOUDS – consists of altostratus and
altocumulus, are made up of ice crystals and water
droplets (2,000-8,000m in tropics to 2,000-4,000m in
polar regions)
Cebeda, Princess Danica A.
CE 405 – Hydrology
a. Altostratus – usually covers the whole sky and has a
gray or blue-gray appearance
• The sun or moon may shine through it but will
appear watery or fuzzy
• Usually forms ahead of storms with continuous
rain or snow
• Occasionally, rain will fall from an altostratus
cloud. If the rain hits the ground, then the cloud
becomes classified as nimbostratus cloud
b. Altocumulus – are grayish-white with one part of the
cloud darker than the other
• Usually form in groups and are about 1km
thick
• Are about as wide as your thumb when you
hold up your hand at arm's length to look at
the cloud
• If you see this on a warm humid morning,
expect thunderstorms by late afternoon
3. LOW CLOUDS – consist of water droplets (from the
ground surface to 2,000m)
a. Stratus – uniform in gray color and can cover most or
all of the sky
• Looks like a fog that does not reach the ground
• Light or mist drizzle is sometimes associated with
it
b. Stratocumulus – low, lumpy and gray
• Can look like cells under a microscope,
sometimes line up in rows or spread out
• Only light precipitation generally in form of
drizzle are associated with it
• To distinguish between a stratocumulus and an
altocumulus cloud, point your hand toward the
cloud. If the cloud is about the size of your fist,
then it is stratocumulus.
c. Nimbostratus – dark gray with a ragged base
• Associated with continuous rain or snow
• Sometimes cover up and sky and the edges of the
cloud can’t be seen
4. CLOUDS WITH VERTICAL GROWTH – grow
high up into the atmosphere rather than spreading across
the sky
• Can span all levels of troposphere and even rise
up to stratosphere
• Develop by warm air rising from the surface
a. Cumulus – puffy white or light gray clouds that look
like floating cotton balls
• Have sharp outlines and flat base
• Height: 1,000m and width: 1km
• Can be associated with good or bad weather
 - Cumulus Humilis – fair weather
- Cumulus Congestus – bad weather, tops can
look like cauliflower heads and mean that
light to heavy shower can occur
• Cumulus cloud cells (the individual puffs of
clouds) are about the size of your fist or larger
when you hold up your hand at arm's length
b. Cumulonimbus – known as thunderstorm clouds
• Can grow up to 10km high
• At this height, high winds will flatten the top of
the cloud out into an anvil-like shape
• Associated with heavy rain, snow, hail, lightning
and tornadoes
5. UNUSUAL CLOUDS
a. Lenticular – form on the downside of the mountains
• Wind blows most types of clouds across the sky,
but lenticular clouds seem to stay in one place
• Air moves up and over a mountain, and at the
point where the air goes past the mountaintop the
lenticular cloud forms, and then the air evaporates
on the side farther away from the mountains
b. Kelvin-Helmholtz – looks like breaking waves in the
ocean
• After wind blows up and over a barrier, like a
mountain, the air continues flowing through the
atmosphere in a pattern that looks like a wave
• Form when there is a difference in the wind speed
or direction between two wind currents in the
atmosphere
c. Mammatus – are pouches of clouds that hang
underneath the base of a cloud
• Usually seen with cumulonimbus that produce
very strong storms
• Sometimes described looking like a field of
tennis balls or melons, or like female human
breasts
• The name “mammatus” comes from the latin
word mamma or breast
d. Contrails – white streaks you see coming off high-
flying jet airplanes, in short for condensation trails
• Clouds that form when water vapor condenses
and freezes around small particles that exist in
aircraft exhaust
• Some evaporate quickly while some stay in the
sky for a long time
• Can become human-made cirrus clouds
• Last longer when there is a greater amount of
water in the air; last until the water in the clouds
evaporate
• Three types of contrails:
- Short-lived – if the air is somewhat moist, a
contrail will form right behind the airplane
Cebeda, Princess Danica A.
CE 405 – Hydrology
and make a bright white line that lasts for a
short while
- Persistent Non-spreading – if the air is very
moist, a contrail will form behind an airplane
and stay in the sky for long time, after the
airplane has flown out of sight
- Persistent Spreading – form when a
persistent contrail spreads out, grow wider
and fuzzier as time passes. Sometimes take
on characteristic of cirrus clouds and become
human-made clouds
LESSON 3 – SOLAR RADIATION AND
EARTH’S ENERGY BALANCE
Earth – climate: solar powered system
• Absorbs an average of about 240 watts of solar
power per square meter
• When the flow of incoming solar energy is
balanced by an equal flow of heat to space, earth
is in radiative equilibrium, and global
temperature is relatively stable
Climate – is the average or typical state of the weather at
a particular location and time of year
• Variables: temperature, humidity, windiness,
cloudiness, precipitation, and visibility
COMPONENTS OF CLIMATE:
1. Atmosphere – the fast-responding medium which
surrounds us and immediately affects our condition
2. Hydrosphere – including the oceans and all other
reservoirs of water in liquid form
• Main source of moisture for precipitation and
which exchange gases with the atmosphere
3. Land masses – affect the flow of atmosphere and
oceans through their morphology (topography, vegetation
cover, roughness), hydrological cycle and radiative
properties blown by the winds or ejected from earth’s
interior in volcanic eruptions
4. Cryosphere – ice component of the climate system,
whether on land or ocean’s surface
• Plays a special role in the earth radiation balance
and in determining properties of the deep ocean
5. Biota – all forms of life
• Through respiration and other chemical
interactions affects the composition and physical
properties of air and water
EARTH RADIATION BUDGET PART 1: ENERGY
FROM THE SUN
Sun – energy that drives the earth’s climate
• When the Sun's energy reaches the earth it is
partially absorbed in different parts of the climate
system
• The absorbed energy is converted back to heat,
which causes the earth to warm up and makes it
habitable
• Solar radiation absorption is uneven in both
space and time and this gives rise to the intricate
pattern and seasonal variation of our climate
THE SUN AND ITS ENERGY
Sun – is the star located at the center of planetary system
• Mainly composed of hydrogen and helium
• In its interior, a thermonuclear fusion reaction
converts the hydrogen into helium releasing huge
amounts of energy
• The energy created by the fusion reaction is
converted into thermal energy (heat) and raises
the temperature of the Sun to levels that are about
20x larger that of the Earth's surface
• The solar heat energy travels through space in the
form of electromagnetic waves enabling the
transfer of heat through a process known as
radiation
Solar radiation – occurs over a wide range of
wavelengths
• However, its energy is not divided evenly over all
wavelengths but is rather sharply centered on the
wavelength band of 0.2-2 micrometers
• Main ranges include:
- Ultraviolet radiation (UV, 0.001-0.4 μm)
- Visible radiation (light, 0.4-0.7 μm)
- Infrared radiation (IR, 0.7-100 μm)
THE PHYSICS OF RADIATIVE HEAT TRASNFER
• The radiative heat transfer process is independent
of the presence of matter. It can move heat even
through empty space
• All bodies emit radiation and the wavelength (or
frequency) and energy characteristics (or
spectrum) of that radiation are determined solely
by the body's temperature
• The energy flux drops as the square of distance
from the radiating body
• Radiation goes through a transformation when it
encounters other objects (solid, gas or liquid).
That transformation depends on the physical
properties of that object and it is through this
transformation that radiation can transfer heat
from the emitting body to the other objects.
Cebeda, Princess Danica A.
CE 405 – Hydrology
RADIATION TRANSFER FROM SUN TO EARTH
Properties of Solar Radiation
• The Sun is located at the center of our solar
system, at a distance of about 150x10^6 km from
earth
• With a surface temperature of 5780 K, the energy
flux at the surface of the sun is approximately
63x10^6 W/m^2 which is at the center of the
visible part of the spectrum
Solar Radiation on Earth
• As the sun's energy spreads through space its
spectral characteristics do not change because
space contains almost no interfering matter
• However, the energy flux drops monotonically as
the square of the distance from the sun
• When the radiation reaches the outer limit of the
Earth's atmosphere, several hundred kilometers
over the earth's surface, the radiative flux is
approx. 1360 W/m^2
EFFECT OF ORBIT’S SHAPE
Radiation at top of atmosphere – 3.5% over the year, as
the earth spins around the sun
Elliptical – shape of the orbit, where the sun is located in
one of the foci
Perihelion – a point where the earth is closer to the sun at
one time of year
• The time-of-year when the earth is at perihelion
moves continuously around the calendar year
with a period of 21,000-years
• At present perihelion occurs in the middle of the
Northern Hemisphere winter
Aphelion – a point at the “opposite” time
Solar Constant – another term for the annual average
radiative solar flux at the top of the earth's atmosphere
(1360 W/m^2)
• Because it has changed by no more than a few
percent over the recent history of the Earth
• There are however important variations in this
flux over longer, so-called "geological", time
scales, to which the Earth glaciation cycles are
attributed
EFFECT OF EARTH’S SPHERICAL SHAPE
• The earth is a sphere
• Aside from the part closest to the sun, where the
rays of sunlight are perpendicular to the ground,
its surface tilts with respect to the incoming rays
of energy with the regions furthest away aligned
in parallel to the radiation and thus receiving no
energy at all
THE TILT OF THE EARTH'S AXIS AND THE
SEASONS
• If the axis of Earth was perpendicular to the plane
of its orbit (and the direction of incoming rays of
sunlight), then the radiative energy flux would
drop as the cosine of latitude as we move from
equator to pole
• However, the Earth axis tilts at an angle of 23.5°
with respect to its plane of orbit, pointing towards
a fix point in space as it travels around the sun
Summer Solstice – on or about June 21, the north pole
points directly towards the sun and the south pole is
entirely hidden from the incoming radiation
Winter Solstice – on or about December 21, the north
pole points away from the sun and does not receive any
sunlight while the south pole receives 24hrs of continued
sunlight
During Solstice:
• Incoming radiation is perpendicular to the Earth
surface on either the latitude of Cancer or the
latitude of Capricorn, 23.5° north or south of the
equator, depending on whether it is summer or
winter in the northern hemisphere
During Spring and Fall
• On equinox days (March 21 and September 23)
• The earth’s axis tilts in parallel to the sun and both
polar regions get the same amount of light
• At that time the radiation is largest at the true
equator
EARTH RADIATION BUDGET PART 2: ENERGY
FROM EARTH AND EARTH’S TEMPERATURE
Albedo – reflectivity of the planet expressed as a fraction
• The earth’s surface reflects part of the solar
energy
• The albedo of earth depends on the geographical
location, surface properties and weather
• On average, earth’s albedo is about 0.3 (this
fraction of incoming radiation is reflected back
into space
• The other 0.7 part of the incoming solar radiation
is absorbed by our planet
EARTH’S VITAL STATISTICS
• Orbital Semi Major Axis – 1.496x10^8 km
• Orbital Period – 365.256 days
• Rotational Period – 23.9345 hours
• Inclination of Rotational Axis – 23.45°
• Eccentricity of Orbit – 0.017
Cebeda, Princess Danica A.
CE 405 – Hydrology
• Diameter (at equator) – 12,756 km
• Mass – 5.974x10^24 kg
• Mean Density (observed) – 5520 kg/m^3
GENERAL CIRCULATION: THERMAL
CIRCULATION AND EARTH’S ROTATION
Local and Seasonal Effects on Climate:
• Bodies of water and topographic features such as
mountain ranges can affect local climates
• Ocean currents can influence climate in coastal
areas
• Mountain effects rainfall greatly
Heating and Cooling of Land vs Water
• Water heats and cools off faster than land
• Differences in the heating and cooling rates of
land and water cause the breezes called the daily
monsoons
• Mountain regions also have their “daily
monsoons”, called the mountain breeze and the
valley breeze.
Sea Breeze – day time small scale circulation where
dense, cool air over the water moves toward the land and
forces warm air over the land to go up
Land Breeze – night time small scale circulation where
the land usually gets cooler than the nearby waters, the
cool air moves over the warmer and forces warm air to go
up
TEMPERATURE: GEOGRAPHIC DISTRIBUTION
TIME VARIATION AND MEASUREMENT
Temperature – is an objective comparative measure of
hot or cold
• Units: Celsius, Fahrenheit, Kelvin
Thermometer – measures temperature, may work
through the bulk behavior of a thermometric material,
detection of thermal radiation, or particle kinetic energy
Coldest Temperature:
• The coldest theoretical temperature is absolute
zero, at which the thermal motion in matter would
be zero
• However, an actual physical system or object can
never attain a temperature of absolute zero.
Absolute zero is denoted as 0 K on the Kelvin
scale, −273.15°C on the Celsius scale, and
−459.67°F on the Fahrenheit scale
EARTH GEOGRAPHICAL TEMPERATURE
• If the Earth was a homogeneous body without the
present land/ocean distribution, its temperature
distribution would be strictly latitudinal
 • However, the Earth is more complex than this
being composed of a mosaic of land and water
• This mosaic causes latitudinal zonation of
temperature to be disrupted spatially

Two Important Factors in Influencing Distribution of

Temperature on Earth’s Surface
1. Latitude of the location – determines how much solar
radiation is received

• Influences the angle of incidence and duration of

day length
2. Surface Properties
LESSON 4 – PRECIPITATION
Substance Specific Heat
Water 1.0
Air 0.24
Precipitation – is the water that falls from the atmosphere
Granite 0.19
in either liquid or solid form
Sand 0.19
Iron 0.11 • Basic input in hydrology
• Mainly because of specific heat, land surfaces • It results from condensation of moisture in the
behave quite differently from water surfaces atmosphere due to the cooling of the parcel of air
• In general, the surface of any extensive deep body • The most common cause of cooling is dynamic or
of water heats more slowly and cools more slowly adiabatic lifting of the air
than the surface of a large land body
Adiabatic Lifting – means that a given parcel of air is
caused to rise with resultant cooling and possible
Other Factors Influencing Water and Land Heating condensation into very small cloud droplets
and Cooling: • If these droplets coalesce and become of
• Solar radiation warms an extensive layer in sufficient size to overcome the air resistance,
water; on land, just the immediate surface is precipitation in some forms results
heated
• Water is easily mixed by the process of
convection FACTORS AFFECTING TYPE, PROPERTIES AND
• Evaporation of water removes energy from BEHAVIOR OF PRECIPITATION:
water's surface 1. Topography, region or space
2. Temporal or time
3. Meteorological Factors – weather elements
TEMPERATURE MEASUREMENT - Wind, temperature, humidity, pressure in the
volume region enclosing the clouds and
• Temperature measurement using thermometer
ground surface at the given place
and temperature scales goes back at least as far as
18th century For Precipitation to form…
• Gabriel Fahrenheit adapted a thermometer
1. The atmosphere must have moisture
(switching to mercury) and a scale both
2. There must be sufficient nuclei present to aid
developed by Ole Christensen Romer
condensation
• Kelvin – basic unit of temperature in the
3. Water conditions must be good for condensation
international system of units (symbol: K)
of water vapor to take place
• For everyday applications, it is often convenient
4. The products of condensation must reach the
to use the Celsius Scale in which 0°C corresponds
earth
very closely to the freezing point of water and
100°C to the boiling point
• Because liquid droplets commonly exist in clouds
FORMS OF PRECIPITATION:
at subzero temperatures, 0°C is better defined as
the melting point of ice 1. Rain – is the most common type of precipitation, is
when liquid droplets fall to the surface of the earth

• The term rainfall is used to describe

precipitations in the form of water drops
Cebeda, Princess Danica A.
CE 405 – Hydrology
 • Two different forms of rain: mass is lifted over the colder one with the
- Showers – are heavy, large drops of rain and formation of a front
usually only last a period of time
Cyclone – is a large low pressure region with circular
- Drizzles – usually last longer and are made
wind motion
up of smaller droplets of water
2. Snow – 2nd most common, consist of ice crystals
which usually combine to form flakes TYPES OF CYCLONES:
• Forms when the water vapor turns directly into 1. Tropical – is a wind system with an intensely strong
ice without ever passing through a liquid state, depression
happens as water condenses around ice crystal
• Typhoon – Southeast Asia
3. Hail – a showery precipitation in the form of irregular • Cyclone – India
pellets or lumps of ice • Hurricane – USA
• Size ranging 5 to 125 mm • Normal area extent of a cyclone is about 100-
200km in diameter
• Occurs in violent thunderstorms in which vertical
currents are very strong • The isobars are closely spaced and the winds are
anticlockwise in the northern hemisphere
• Created when moisture and wind are together
• Eye – center of the storm, may extend to about 10
• Inside the cumulonimbus clouds ice crystals
– 50 km in diameter
forms, and begin to fall towards the earth’s
surface 2. Extratropical Cyclones – formed in location outside
• Shapes of hail: the tropical zone
- Spherical
- Conical • Associated with frontal system, they possess a
- Irregular strong counter-clockwise wind circulation in the
northern hemisphere
4. Fog – is a cloud that has formed near the surface of the • The magnitude of precipitation and wind
earth velocities are relatively lower than those of a
tropical cyclone
• Really has no difference with clouds except its
position 3. Anticyclones – regions of high pressure, usually of
large extent
5. Dew – small drops of water which can be found on cool
surfaces like grass in the morning • Cause clockwise wind circulation in northern
hemisphere
• This is the result of atmospheric vapor
condensing on the surface in the colder night air • Winds are moderate speed, cloudy and
precipitation conditions exist
• Dew point – is the temperature in which
condensation starts to take place and when dew is
created
TYPES OF PRECIPITATION:
6. Mist – is a bunch of small droplets of water which are
in the air 1. Cyclonic Precipitation – lifting of air converging into
a low pressure area
• Occurs with cold air when it is above a warm
surface 2. Warm front precipitation – warm air advancing
• The difference between fog is visibility (if you upward over a colder air mass
can’t see 1km or less = fog) • Has a slow rate of ascent
• You can see visuals through mist and it is more
haze looking than a thicker substance 3. Cold Front Precipitation – warm air forced upward
by an advancing cold mass, the leading ledge of the cold
7. Glaze – ice coating, generally clear and smooth air mass is a cold front
• Formed on exposed surfaces by freezing of super • Faster rate of ascent
cooled water deposited by rain or drizzle • Rainfall is showery in nature or high precipitation
rate

WEATHER SYSTEMS FOR PRECIPITATION:

Front – is the interface between two distinct air masses 4. Convective Precipitation – rising of warmer, lighter
air in colder, denser surroundings
• Under certain favorable conditions when warm
air mass and cold air mass meet, the warmer air • There is a change in temperature such as unequal
heating at the surface or unequal cooling at the
top of the air layer
Cebeda, Princess Danica A.
CE 405 – Hydrology
 • May experience a scattered rain showers and
cloud bursts
5. Orographic Precipitation – mechanical lifting of air
mass over mountain barriers
Artificially Induced Precipitation – conducted to
modify and control weather condition
Cloud Seeding/Modification – type of artificially
induced precipitation to dissipate clouds or simulate
precipitation
• Seeding agents: dry ice and silver iodide
• General approaches in cloud seeding:
- Static – 1 artificial nucleus per liter of cloud
air
- Dynamic – massive seeding
CLASSIFICATION OF MEASURING
PRECIPITATION:
1. Yield Point Data – commonly uses rain gauge since
the area of considered in measuring precipitation is about
20 cm only
• Done in small regions
2. Areal Data – uses radar where the area covered for
measurement is at around 2.5 km^2
Measurement of Precipitation
• Precipitation is expressed in terms of the depth to
which rainfall water stand in an area if all the rain
were collected on it
• 1 cm of rainfall over a catchment area of 1 sq.km
represents a volume of water equal to 10x10^4
cu.m
• The precipitation is collected and measured in
raingauge
- Pluviometer, ombrometer and hyetometer are
also sometimes used to designate a raingauge
CONSIDERATION FOR SETTING UP
RAINGAUGES:
1. The ground must be level and in the open and the
instrument must present a horizontal catch
surface
2. The gauge must be set as near the ground as
possible to reduce wind effects but it must be
sufficiently high to prevent splashing, flooding,
etc.
3. The instrument must be surrounded by an open
fenced area of at least 5.5m by 5.5m
- No object should be nearer to the instrument
than 30m or twice the height of the
obstruction
Cebeda, Princess Danica A.
CE 405 – Hydrology
CATEGORIES OF RAINGAUGES:
1. Non Recording Gauges
• Simons’ Gauge – it essentially consists of a
circular collecting area of 12.7cm (5 in) diameter
connected to a funnel
2. Recording Gauges - produce a continuous plot of
rainfall against time to provide valuable data of intensity
and duration of rainfall for hydrological analysis of
storms
TYPES OF RECORDING GAUGES:
1. Tipping Bucket – 3.5 cm size, not applicable for snow
• The catch form the funnel falls onto one of pair
of small buckets
• It measures the rainfall with at least count of 1
mm and gives out one electrical pulse for every
mm of rainfall
2. Weighing Type Gauge – records the weight of snow
or rain
• The catch from the funnel empties into a bucket
mounted on a weighing scale
• The weight of the bucket and its contents are
recorded on a clockwork-driven chart
3. Natural-Siphon Type – aka float-type gauge
• The rainfall collected by funnel-shaped collector
is led into a float chamber causing a float to rise
• As the float rises, a pen attached to the float
through a lever system records the elevation of
the float on a rotating drum driven by a clockwork
mechanism
4. DOST-PAGASA Automated Rain Gauge (ARG) –
developed to gather and record the amount of rainfall over
a set of period of time
• Automatically sends the data to a central based
station on a predetermined interval basin
• Rainfall data are sent wirelessly through the
cellular network as a text message or Short
Messaging System (SMS)
• It is designed to be rugged and standalone, the
station can be deployed even in the harshest
remote areas
• Can operate continuously, as it gets power from
the sun, backed up by the internal rechargeable
battery
PRESENTATION OF RAINFALL DATA
1. Mass Curve Rainfall – is a plot of the accumulated
precipitation against time, plotted in chronological order
2. Hyetograph – is a plot of the intensity of rainfall
against the time interval
 • Is derived from the mass curve and is usually
represented as a bar chart
• Particularly important in the development of
design storms to predict extreme flood
• The area under a hyetograph represents the total
precipitation received in the period

Point Rainfall – aka station rainfall, refers to the rainfall

data of the station

• Depending upon the need, data can be listed as

daily, weekly, monthly, seasonal or annual values
for various periods
• Graphically these data are represented as plots of
magnitude vs. chronological time in the form of a
bar diagram

Cebeda, Princess Danica A.

CE 405 – Hydrology