Hydrology and Water

Resources

Heba Hamad
RAINFALL-RUNOFF MODELS
The Unit Hydrograph
The Unit Hydrograph is a simplified model of the
response of a catchment.
It was introduced by Sherman in the 1930's and defines
a characteristic hydrograph shape for a given amount
and duration of rainfall.
Once the Unit Hydrograph shape is known it can be
used to model the effects of other rainfall events.
It is a powerful way of predicting how a catchment will
respond to larger rain storms with complex rainfall
patterns.
The unit hydrograph: Definition
A Unit Hydrograph is the excess runoff caused by one
unit of effective rainfall falling over a given period of
time.
The effective rainfall amount used is usually 1cm (1mm
is too small to have a real effect on many catchments).
The rainfall duration can be any number of hours but
is typically 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 12, or 24 hours.
The unit hydrograph: Definition
We have to define a Unit Hydrograph in terms of the
effective rainfall amount and duration
e.g. a 1 hour 1cm Unit Hydrograph is the result of 1cm
of effective rain falling in 1 hour,
 a 3 hour 1cm hydrograph would be the result of the
same effective rainfall falling in 3 hours.
The volume of water in a Unit hydrograph is equal to
1cm depth of rainfall over the catchment area.
The Unit Hydrograph is based ONLY on the
Effective Rainfall and the Direct Runoff
The Unit Hydrograph is the DIRECT RUNOFF created by
1cm of EFFECTIVE RAINFALL

If this is 1cm of rain

then the direct runoff
 is the UNIT
HYDROGRAPH
The Unit Hydrograph is the DIRECT RUNOFF created by
1cm of EFFECTIVE RAINFALL

1cm


123 TIME BASE OF RAIN is 3
hours here

THIS IS THEREFORE THE

3 hour UNIT HYDROGRAPH
Assumed properties of the Unit Hydrograph
1.The amount of runoff is directly proportional to
the amount of effective rainfall.

2.Flow from successive rainfall events can be

modelled as the sum of two Unit Hydrographs.

3.The Unit Hydrograph is fixed and does not change

seasonally.
1.The amount of runoff is directly proportional to the amount of
effective rainfall.
2.Flow from successive rainfall events can be modelled
as the sum of two Unit Hydrographs.
UH assumptions
 Assumption 1 means that the hydrograph resulting from 2cm of rain

falling in 1 hour will produce a hydrograph with ordinates exactly twice

as large as the 1 hour 1cm Unit Hydrograph.

 Assumption 2 means that if 1cm of rain falling in the first hour is

followed by 1cm in the next hour than the resultant hydrograph will be

sum of the ordinates of the individual 1hour 1cm Unit Hydrographs.

 Assumption 3 means that we decide that a winter UH is the same as a

summer UH. This is not always true, because the land use changes

between winter and summer

Advantages of the Unit Hydrograph
approach
 i) Hydrographs for different rainfall amounts of the same
duration can be predicted by scaling the ordinates of the Unit
Hydrograph.

 ii) Runoff resulting from storms where the intensity varies can be
modelled by dividing the storm into short (1 hour) periods.

 Unit hydrographs can then be scaled by the amount of rain in

each hour.
 These separate hydrographs can then be summed to obtain
the resultant hydrograph from the whole storm.

 iii) The method is relatively simple and has been proven to be

effective around the world.
Complex rainfall event used to generate 4 scaled unit
hydrographs
Complex rainfall event used to
generate 4 scaled unit hydrographs

These are added together to get a

predicted catchment runoff
hydrograph
Disadvantages
i) No account is taken of the condition of the
catchment before the rainfall. A dry catchment will
have a large initial abstraction compared with one that
is already saturated.

ii) Seasonal variations in vegetation/land use are

ignored.
Disadvantages
iii) It is assumed that the rainfall is evenly distributed

across the catchment and the intensity is constant for

the time period in question. This is a problem in large
catchments where rain storms are smaller than the
catchment, but can be avoided by sub-dividing the
catchment into smaller sub-catchments and
analysing each separately.
Disadvantages
iv) A unit hydrograph has to be derived from an

existing series of hydrographs where the effective

rainfall is known. Difficulties in separating base flow
from excess runoff can occur.

v) A Unit Hydrograph is for a given rainfall duration. It

may be necessary to change this time base.

Example Calculation
Flow from a catchment was recorded and baseflow was
separated, leaving the direct runoff hydrograph. The
catchment area was 500 km2 and the rainfall duration
was 6 hrs. Calculate the depth of effective rainfall that
caused this runoff. Next scale the hydrograph to
derive 6 hr 1 cm unit hydrograph
Example Calculation
From definition, a unit hydrograph is produced by 1
cm effective rain. Hence, total volume of effective rain
in m3 = total volume of direct runoff in m3
 Direct runoff
300

250

200
Flow

150

100

50

0
0 6 12 18 24 30 36 42 48 54 60 66 72 78

TIME hrs
time hr flow m3/s flow m3/h flow m3
0 0 0 0
6 100 360000 2160000
12 250 900000 5400000
18 200 720000 4320000
24 150 540000 3240000
30 100 360000 2160000
36 70 252000 1512000
42 50 180000 1080000
48 35 126000 756000
54 25 90000 540000
60 15 54000 324000
66 5 18000 108000
72 0 0 0
Example Calculation
Estimate total volume of runoff as: 2,160,000 +
5,400,000 + 4,320,000 + 3,240,000 + 2,160,000 +
1,512,000 + 1,080,000 + 756,000 + 540,000 + 324,000 +
108,000 = 21600000 m3 = 2.16 * 106 m3

Now volume = Depth * Area

= 2.16 * 106 m3 = depth * 500 * 1000 * 1000
Depth = 0.0432 m = 4.32 cm
 time hr 1cm UH
Example Calculation 0
6
0.00
23.15
Hence, the given hydrograph 12 57.87
is the result of 4.32 cm 18 46.30
effective rainfall. The unit 24 34.72
hydrograph is the result of 1 30 23.15
cm rain. Hence we must scale 36 16.20
the ordinates of the given 42 11.57
hydrograph by ¼.32 to get the 48 8.10
1cm 6 hrs unit hydrograph 54 5.79
60 3.47
66 1.16
72 0.00
 1cm 6hrs UH
70.00

60.00

50.00

40.00

30.00

20.00

10.00

0.00
0 6 12 18 24 30 36 42 48 54 60 66 72 78
Example 2
We have a river that has some records and we want to
predict the hydrograph caused by the following
prediction of rainfall:
Rainfall in next hour 20 mm
Rainfall in second hour 12 mm
Rainfall in third hour 17 mm
Example 2
Data available: The graph shows the measured flow
caused by 40 mm of rain falling in 1 hour. The river
basin is crossland with a coefficient of runoff of 0.33