Hydrological Modeling of Mahi Basin Using SWAT

Hydrological modeling of river basins is a valuable tool for basin management and assessment of extreme event impacts. However, challenges with this type of modeling still remain, including issues with data acquisition, accuracy of meteorological data, model uncertainty, and operational patterns of dams/large water structure. This paper evaluates the performance and suitability of a Soil Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) model in predicting stream flow discharge, identifying sensitive parameters, and analyzing uncertainty in the Mahi river basin. This kind of assessment is useful for the hydrological community, water resources engineers involved in agricultural management and climate change concerns, as well as the government’s efforts in mitigating extreme natural hazards such as droughts and floods. Since any model uncertainty becomes replicated in management practices, this paper addresses the concerns of uncertainity in hydrological modelling of Water Resources in the Mahi River Basin. A GIS environment was used to delineate the basin and its watersheds, and SWAT-CUP was used to perform the uncertainty and sensitivity analyses. The model’s results were compared against five observation points spread across the basin. Statistical analysis showed that four of them resulted in good Nash–Sutcliffe model efficiency and correlation.