Hydrology and Water Resources Development Research Grpoup

Imtroduction

The hydrologic cycle is one of the essential elements for maintaining life on the earth. The regular movement of water on earth is affected by many factors, which can lead to flooding and drought. The formation of hydrologic cycle in watersheds is a complicated process so that many of the parameters related to the precipitation as well as its time and spatial distribution have remained unknown. The Hydrology and Water Resources Development Research Department is responsible to implement applied researches in different fields of hydrology and hydro­ meteorology for achieving required engineering parameters in conservation and utilization of soil and water resources. Research projects in the field of specifications of the precipitation, runoff, permeability, snow hydrol­ ogy, and flood are among the topics of concern. Furthermore, to take more benefits from intro-duction and the new technologies, the application of remote sensing and geographic information systems are included among the research projects. The research projects are benefit from the satellite technology and facilities to supply the needed data for watersheds especially distributive data of physical and hydrologic parameters.

Objectives

The objectives of the Hydrology and Water Resources Development Research Department are to investigate the various parameters of the water cycle in the watershed and to investigate the successive processes of the water cycle to determine the factors affecting runoff generation, permeability, evaporation, flood and drought. Under­ standing the hydrological behavior of watersheds, water resources development methods, proper methods of fore­ casting floods and droughts, providing appropriate methods for estimating hydrological parameters, exploiting floods and developing scarce water resources and reducing floods in watersheds are among the goals.

Principal research topics and pivots

Explaining strategic programs, identifying research priorities in hydrological processes and water resources development, predicting needs, facilities, equipment, staff, education and extension programs and assistance to the required legislation in the field of soil and water conservation,

Collecting countrywide information in the area of hydrological elements and data such as rainfall discharge and groundwater to develop data bank needed for applied researches,

Defining and performing applied national research projects in accordance with the strategic programs and sub-programs of the department,

Reviewing proposed projects of provincial research centers in the department technical committee and constant monitoring on the implementation of approved projects,

Validating and localizing hydrological models (temporal and spatial) for flood, discharge and low-flow forecast­ ing, estimating the components and water budget balance elements,

Providing technical guidelines and instructions for sub-surface water flow, flood utilization, rainwater harvesting systems,

Identifying water resources quality and quantity changes in different scale of watersheds,

Identifying effective elements on hydrology and its impacts on water resources with emphasis on snow hydrol­ ogy in the climate change condition,

Applying RS and GIS in hydrology and water resources topics such as precipitation forecasting, evapotranspira­ tion computation and flood zonation mapping.

Some important implemented research projects

Developing 37 national research, education and extension flood water spreading stations for aquifer management , Developing   groundwater   resources   using   floodwater spreading systems ,

Pilot project of water  resource development  by under­ ground dam in seven stations,

Preparing national flooding hazard atlas (flooding zones, flood frequency, flood severity, runoff threshold, flood damage),

Preparing the national water capacity atlas,

Implementing pilot station for integrated water resources management in Vardige ,

Implementing pilot station for integrated water resources for dust control in Hendijan, Khuzestan.