3 LOW-FLOW

Low-flow statisticsare essentialin water supply planning to determine allowable

watertransfersand withdrawals. Other applications of low-flows include water
qualitymanagementapplications, determination of minimum downstream release
requirementsfrom water resourcesprojects etc.
A method for assessinglow-flow characteristicsfor l-day,7-day,30-day,
and monthly duration was developed by the Department of Hydrology and
Meteorology and Water and Energy Commission Secretariate in 1980s
(WECS/DHM, 1990) published in 1990 as a report titled 'Methodologies for
EstimatingHydrologic Characteristicsof UngaugedLocations in Nepal.' This wes
thefirst attempt in Nepal for assessinglow-flows of different recurrence intervals.
Thestudyused data for 44 stations with a period covering the period from 1963 to
1985.The presentstudy is an update of the 1990 study to include: additional data
up to 1995,additional stations, and improved physiographic and hlpsometric data
derivedfrom GIS tools. The study used data from 309 precipitation-gauglng
stations (Figure 1.3) and 51 hydrometric stations(Figure 1.4).

3.1 Low-FlowCharacferisfics
Significantdecrease in low-flow on a stream leads to drought, reduction in
reservoirlevels, depletion in soil moisture, &d depletion of groundwater levels.
Suchconditions lead to scarcity in drinking water, ffid decline in agriculture
productionwittr high consequences on economy and social developments
includinghuman miseries. Estimation of low-flow status on a river is important
for designinga single purpose or multipurpose water resourcesproject considering
extemeconditionsregarding the availability of adequatewater supply.
Rivers ure mainly recharged by groundwater during minimum flow
periods.Hence,the flow pattern is highly influenced by the hydrology of a river
basin.Becauseof the drawdown of upper aquifers, a river is recharged from deep
aquiferswith less water storageduring extremely dry years. A potential frequency
distributionof low-flow series must, hence, be able to take such deviation into
acc0unt.
In a region affected by continental monsoons, winter and spring seasons
ue usuallydry causing the minimum flow occurring generally in spring season.
The period is also highly dependent on the ice and snowmelt situation in the
headwaterareas. Due to snowmelt in snow-fed rivers, lowest flow condition
generallyoccurs earlier than in the rivers lacking snowmelt contribution to the
riverflows(Figure 1.7).
As in the case of flood flow estimates, the assessmentof low-flow
dischargeson a river at any location primarily dependson three cases: adequate
data"inadequatedata and missing data. The well-known method of hydrological
analogyis an appropriate tool in the case of inadequate hydrometric data. The
scopeof this method may be wider in respect of the estimation of low flows.
29
 3.2 LiteratureReview Iow-flow se
Compared to flood-flow studies,literature on low-flow studiesis limited. One of minimum.
the earlier studieson low flows by Riggs (1972) discussesthe natureof low-flow Liter
frequency curves presentinga multiple regressionapproachin regionalization.A literature sh
few regional studieson low flows found in recent literatureinclude the Low-Flow' T)p. III c
Studies in the UK (IH, 1980), in Russia (Artemieva, 1997) and in South Africa distrihurion r
(Smakhtin and Hughes, L997). Multivariate relationship of low flows to ciimatic probability c
and basin characteristicsare the basic approachapplied in most of thesestudiesro Fouloula-Ge
developmethodologiesfor ungaugedbasins.A method deveiopedin 1982by Sir Distr i:rrtion
MacDonald and Partners titled 'Medium lrrigation Project Design Manual' is tn tnrs stud
basedon the data of a single streamflow measurementduring a dry period to ger boundedat tl
long-termcharacteristics of minimum flows (MacDonald1990).
The ,
A catchmentarea acts as a reservoir for precipitation. Hence a catchment program LOJ
area is usually consideredas a universal parameterwhile computing low flows. Canada. The
Besides the catchment area, other parametershave also been considered in the Extreme Valt
regressionanalysis for arriving at the best equation for predicting low-fiow. The presentedin l
pattern of equationconsideredin this study has the following iorm:
t

Q,= axix{ x1'--......, (J.I]

i where Qr : T- year minimum flow
il
Xr, X:, X: : lndependentvariablesinfluencing low flows
&d,p,T....: regressioncoefficients

3.3 Low-FIow Derivation

Daily dischargedata available at DHM were the sourceof data for the derivation
of low-flow values for different durations. An EXCEL based macro was
developed to extract l-day minimum, 7-day minimum, 30-day minimum and
monthly minimum flows. The macro produced output in a format, which could
directly be used as input for the low-flow frequencyanalysis.
One-day low-flow computed by the macro is the lowest value obtained
from eachyear'sdaily streamflow data. Seven-daylow-flow is the minimum value
obtained from the consecutive seven-day averages. The procedure used to
calculation 30-day low-flow was similar to the procedureused in 7-day low-flow
computation. Monthly minimum flow is the minimum value obtained from the
seriesof twelve monthly values.One-day,7-day,30-day, and monthly minimum
valueswere obtained for eachyear developinga seriesfor eachduration..

3.4 Low-FIowFrequencyAnalysis
Estimation of low-flows from stream flow records is generally done by fitting a
probability distribution to the annuai minirnurn averagelou.,-flou''series"Tlrricai
J V
low-flowseries consideredin this study are: l-day, 7-day,30-day and monthly
minimum.
Literature on low-flow frequency analysis is relatively sparse. Available
literatureshows that the three-parameterWeibull Distribution, the Log Pearson
Type III distribution, and two-parameter and three-parameter Lognormal
distributionare the widely used distributions in severalparts of the world for the
probabilitydistribution analysis of low flows (Riggs, 1982; Stedinger, Vogel &
Foufoula-Georgiou,1992). The Extreme Value Type III distribution (Weibull
Distribution)usedin most of the regions of the world, was selectedfor application
in this study. This distribution is particularly suitable for discharge values
bounded at the lower end such as the casesof ephemeralrivers.
The low-flow frequency analysis was carried out using a computer
programLOFLOW developed by the Inland Water Directorate of Environment
Canada.The program computes low-flow values for a given duration using
ExtremeValue Type III distribution. The results of the run for all the stations are
presented
in Table 3.1 for different durations.

Jr
 7-DAY 2.YEAR LOW-FLOW

@
ca
E
3
o IV
LL

o
o
t
C)
(g
q 95% Cl
Qo 95% Pl

'100 200

SquareRoot[Area(km2)below5000m]

-Year7 -daYlow-flow'

2O-YEARLOW-FLOW

a
c)
E
3ro
o
LL
o
o
te
o
$
q 95% cl
Q0 -- 95%Pl

SquareRoot[Area(km2)below5000m]

ir 7 -daYlow-flow'
))
 3.5 Resul
The correlatic
Low-Flow
1-daY10-Year significantlY I
SimilarlY, tht
hypsometric a
areasbelow 5
by the Poor c
100
the regional a
u)
(., aprlied for th
q)
the reiationst
o)
(g and ungauge
o
U'
for these regi
l- Anall
lc)
multiPle reg
lo
elevation an
I()
improvemen
5000 m, ho
ease, onlY
recommend
10
frequencies
(m3/s)
ActualDischarge comPutatior
Present the
low flows r
Figure3.3.Plotofactualvscomputeddischarge:1-dayl0-yearylow-flow

7-daY10-YearLow'Flow

I
I f ' '--\
I
-t,
periodT

T
presente
multiPle
numbers
(3.2) fot
resPecti

Figure3.4.Plotactualvscornputeddischarge:1.dayl0.yearlowflow
r i
al+
3.5 Resulfs and Dfscussion
The correlation matrix (Annexure III) shows that the low-flow values are
significantlycorrelated with basin area, basin perimeter, and river length.
Similarly, the minimum flows are also significantly related to different
hypsometric and land-useareas.Correlation matrices also indicate that the basin
areasbelow 5000 m are the most influencing area for the low-flows. As indicated
by the poor correlation between the low-flow and the geographical coordinates,
theregionalaspectis consideredless significant so that the same equation may be
appliedfor the whole country. Caution should, however, be taken while applyng
therelationshipfor an ungaugedlocation above 1800 m in high mountain areas
andungaugedlocations on streamsoriginating in the Siwalik or Terai as no data
fortheseregionswere availablefor developingregressionequations.
Anaiysis of multiple regressionshowed that the relationship based on the
multipleregressionof areabelow 5000 m or 3000 m combined with averagebasin
elevationand averagebasin slope yielded best results avoiding co-linearities. The
improvement in goodnessof fit by including additional parametersin area below
5000m, however was marginal. Considering the applicability of equation with
ease,only the relationship of low-flow with area below 5000 m have been
recommendedfor the estimation of low-flows for different durations and
frequencies.The following equation (Equation 3.2) may be used for the
computation of low flows at an ungaugedlocation. Figure 3.1 and Figure 3.2
presentthe best-fit plot presentingthe sample of 7-day Z-year and 7-day Z}-year
low flowsrespectively.

W = Co.,* Fo.rJ
A-* , (3.2)

where,Qd,,: Discharge1m3/s;
d: duration(day)
T: Return period (year)
Co.r: Constantcoefficient for a duration d and return period T
Fa,r : Coef. of independent variable for duration d and return
periodT
A.5r: Area of the basinbelow 5000 m
The values of C and F for different return periods and duration are
presented in Table 3.2. The table also includes the statistics obtained from the
multipleregressionanalysis of the data. Figure 3.3 and Figure 3.4 comparesthe
numbers obtainedfrom actual values with the numbers computed from Equation
(3.2)for the two sample casesof l-day lO-year and 7-day Z-year low flows
respectively.Annexure I presentsan exampleof the computation.
35
Table 3.2.
.t, Table for low-fl
Laote Ior estimati equauons
tow-Ilow esLtmatton
Return Const. Goef. std.
Period Day Car Far Error f
1 0.2144 0.081t 0.0033 0.925
2
7 0.2362 0.083c 0.0033 0.929
30 0.302€ 0.0854 0.0031 0.938
[/onthly 0.339i 0.086c 0.003c 0.94C
10 1 0.085s 0.0729 0.0032 0.915
0.0920 0.0748 t.oogr 0.921
3C 0.1807 0.076€ 0.003c 0.93C
Monthly 0.2138 0.0777 0.0031 0.94C
1 0.0698 0.0703 0.0031 0.912
20
0.0662 0.0726 0.0031 0.91€
30 0.160€ 0.0742 0.003c 0.927
[/onthlv 0.194t 0.0754 0.0031 0.929

36
 5 CONCLUSIONSANIDRECOMMENDATIONS

Themethodsfor hydrologicalestimationsat ungaugedlocationsin Nepal, suggested

in this report,are the updatesof the eariiersimilar studies(WECSIDHM, 1990).The
updatesuse meteoroiogicaland hydroiogical data up 1995. Besides, the updated
database integrated in a GIS system was the source of land-use,physiographic, and
hypsometricdata used in this study.

The mathematical formulations developedfor different hydrological designs

arebasedon easily derived basin and climatic information. Designers with iimited
hydrologicalexpertise can use these methods.Drainage area of the ungaugedbasin
below3000m is the only parameterrequiredfor flood flow estimation.Similarly, low
flowsare estimatedon the basis of the drainageareabelow 5000 m. Average annual
hydrographat an ungauged location is computed using. average basin elevation,
averageannuaiprecipitation and basin areabeiow 3000 m. Flow-duration curve for an
hngauged location usesthe samevariable as in averageannualhydrographbesidesthe
b.asin
areabelow 5000 m. i

Aithough Nepal can be divided into three distinct physiographic zones,

nameiythe High Himalayas, Middle Mountains, and the Terai, attempts to derive
regionalpattern of the hydrological characteristicsover Nepal were not successful
primarilybecauseof the unavailability of representativeinformation covering the
wholeregion. The existing hydrometric network in Nepal covers only the Middle
Mountain regionwithin the eievationzonefrom 140m to 1800m abovesealevel.

Since the developed methodologies are based on limited information and

averagedconditions,they should be used only for the hydrological investigationsat
reconnaissanceor pre-feasiblylevels.Estimatedvaluesshouldbe judged properly on
thebasisof hydrological reasoningfor the best results.The following precautionsare
particulariy
importantwhile applyrngthe methods.

. Reliability of the methodswill be low in the high Himalayan region

where no regular hydrometry exists.Besides,the hydrology of the high
Himalayan region needsto addressthe complex processof snow and
glacier,which is not yet properlyassessed.
. The methodswill need specialjudgment in the Terai region where the
flows are highly influencedby surfacewater-Groundwaterinteractions
and human impacts. In addition, the nature of floods in Terai is
different fronnr/alley floods in the mountainousareas.The Terai fioods
aremore static comparedto floods in the mcuntainousrivers.
. Since the drainage areas used in this study ranged from 17 kmz to
54000 km2, precaution should be taken in applying the methods in
river basinssmallerthan 20 km2.
45
Station number: 600.1
Location: Uwa Gaon Latitude: 27 36 00
River: Arun River Longitude: 87 20 06

EXTREME DISCHARGES

MAXIMI'M INSTAI.ITA}IEOUS MINIMI,M INSTAI{TAI\TEOUS

Year Discharge Gauge heighE Date Discharge caugE height DaEe
( m 3 / s) (m) {m3/s) (m)
l-985 t420 5.60 05/oe/8s
1_986 L270 6.30 2e/06/86 69.3 L.87 L8/02/86
L987 L 5 20 6. 80 t 2 / 0 8 /8 7 67 .5 L.8s te/02/87
L988 j-370 6.50 ts / o8/88 52.9 1.67 27/OL/88
L9B9 1270 6.30 2e/05/8e 53.0 1.80 20/02/8e
r.990 LL70 6. 10 t3/08/eo 61.0 1. 60 0 7/ 0 2 / e o
r_991_ ) - 4 70 6.70 76/06/eL 55.4 r . .s 3 26/or/et
1992 L270 5.30 2 s / o B /e 2 59.4 1_.s8 27/02/92
r.993 t470 6.70 04/07/e3 53.0 1.s0 23/03/e3
L994 957 5.60 08/08/e4 5L. B 1.48 22/OL/gq
r_99s 1450 .6.50 28/08/es ,5L.3 1.48 03/Or/e5

66