Validation of TRMM Data in the Black Volta Basin of Ghana
Publication: Journal of Hydrologic Engineering
Volume 17, Issue 5
Abstract
This study was conducted in the Black Volta basin, Ghana, to determine how Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) satellite-derived rainfall compares with ground-measured values and the possibility of using it to complement ground-measured rainfall. Bilinear interpolation was used to resample TRMM 3B42V6 monthly rainfall grids to determine site-specific rainfall of the basin based on rain gauge locations and analyzed statistically. The study showed that the correlation between the monthly datasets ranged from 0.73 to 0.88. A plot of the average monthly data of all the stations gave a correlation coefficient () of 0.94. The overall catchment rainfall was well represented by TRMM data. However, the annual station rainfalls were either underestimated or overestimated. The underestimations and overestimations were mostly below 20% and 10%, respectively, of the raingauge measurements. Although the TRMM rainfall data did not perfectly match with the ground measurements, it can still be used to supplement ground measurements and for estimating rainfalls in ungauged basins.
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Acknowledgments
This work was supported by the Innovative Research Team Project under Grant No. 2009585412 by Basic Research Funds for National University at State Key Laboratory of Hydrology-Water Resources and Hydraulic Engineering and also by the Ministry of Education and State Administration of Foreign Experts Affairs, P. R. China through the 111 Project under Grant No. B08048.
The images and data used in this study were acquired using the GES-DISC Interactive On-line Visualization and Analysis Infrastructure (Giovanni) as part of the NASA’s Goddard Earth Sciences (GES) Data and Information Services Center (DISC). We are also grateful to the Ghana Meteorological Agency for providing us with the rainfall data and the European Space Agency TIGER II Capacity Building Facility for Africa for supporting this project through training and data facilitation.
We are also very grateful to the anonymous reviewers for their useful comments and suggestions that went a long way to improve this paper.
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Information
Published In
Journal of Hydrologic Engineering
Volume 17 • Issue 5 • May 2012
Pages: 647 - 654
Copyright
© 2012. American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Mar 3, 2011
Accepted: Aug 4, 2011
Published online: Aug 6, 2011
Published in print: May 1, 2012
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