Journal of Water Resource and Protection, 2020, 12, 203-222

https://www.scirp.org/journal/jwarp
ISSN Online: 1945-3108
ISSN Print: 1945-3094

Modeling Stream Flow Using SWAT Model in

the Bina River Basin, India

Fitsum T. Teshome1,2*, Haimanote K. Bayabil2, L. N. Thakural3, Fikadu G. Welidehanna2

1
Department of Plant Science, College of Agriculture and Natural Resources, Madda Walabu University, Bale-Robe, Ethiopia
2
Department of Agricultural and Biological Engineering, Tropical Research and Education Center, IFAS, University of Florida,
Homestead, FL, USA
3
Surface Water Hydrology Division, National Institute of Hydrology, Roorkee, India

How to cite this paper: Teshome, F.T., Abstract

Bayabil, H.K., Thakural, L.N. and Welide-
hanna, F.G. (2020) Modeling Stream Flow Understanding watershed runoff processes is critical for planning effective
Using SWAT Model in the Bina River soil and water management practices and efficiently utilize available water
Basin, India. Journal of Water Resource
resources. The main objective of this study was to investigate the perfor-
and Protection, 12, 203-222.
https://doi.org/10.4236/jwarp.2020.123013
mance of the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) to simulate stream-
flow from the Bina basin in the Madhya Pradesh state of India. The SWAT
Received: December 31, 2019 model was calibrated and validated on a daily and monthly basis using his-
Accepted: March 2, 2020
torical streamflow and weather data from the Bina basin. The Sequential Un-
Published: March 5, 2020
certainty Fitting (SUFI-2) technique in the SWAT Calibration and Uncer-
Copyright © 2020 by author(s) and tainty Procedures (SWAT-CUP) program was used to assess model uncer-
Scientific Research Publishing Inc. tainties. The SWAT model performed “satisfactory” and “very good” in si-
This work is licensed under the Creative
mulating streamflow at daily and monthly time steps, respectively. Model ca-
Commons Attribution International
License (CC BY 4.0). libration results showed that coefficients of determination (R2) values were
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ 0.66 and 0.96; while Nash-Sutcliffe (NSE) values were 0.65 and 0.94 for daily
Open Access and monthly simulations, respectively. The R2 values of daily and monthly
simulations during model validation were 0.65 and 0.72, respectively while
the respective NSE values were 0.58 and 0.72. This study demonstrated that
the SWAT model could be effectively used to simulate streamflow in the Bina
river basin.

Keywords
Modeling, Streamflow, SWAT, SWAT-CUP, Bina River Basin

1. Introduction
River basins are important hydrological and environmental improvements, and
if managed properly, they generate steady streamflow from baseflow and runoff.

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F. T. Teshome et al.

Runoff is the water flow that occurs when soil is saturated and excess water from
rain, snowmelt, or other sources flows over the land surface and is a major
component of the hydrologic cycle [1]. As with all characteristics of the water
cycle, the interaction between precipitation and runoff varies according to time
and location [2]. Runoff plays a crucial role in the hydrological cycle by dis-
charging excess precipitation to the oceans to control the amount of water flows
into streams [3]. The water balance equation describes the hydrological cycle by
accounting for the flow of water into and out of a system for a specific period of
time [4].
The rainfall-runoff model is extensively used in hydrology. Runoff signal
which leaves the watershed from the rainfall signal received by the basin is de-
termined by the rainfall-runoff model [5]. Rainfall-runoff model mathematically
represents rainfall-runoff relations of a catchment area, drainage basin or wa-
tershed [6]. This mathematical representation is used for simplification of the
actual process of runoff in nature.
The main purpose of hydrological modeling is to quantify the hydrologic re-
sponse of a watershed to climatic parameters, soils, land use, and management
conditions; this, in turn, plays a significant role in water resources planning,
flood forecasting, pollution control, and numerous other applications [7]. Sever-
al methods have been developed by different researchers to simulate the rain-
fall-runoff process.
The Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) is a watershed scale model de-
veloped by United States Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Ser-
vice (USDA-ARS) for predicting the impact of land management practices on
water, sediment and agricultural chemical yields, runoff, water balance of a large
basin in a complex watershed with varying soils, land use, and management
conditions over long period of time [8].
Similarly, several model calibration techniques exist for model optimization
and uncertainty analysis such as the sequential uncertainty fitting (SUFI-2) pro-
gram in the SWAT Calibration Uncertainty Procedures (SWAT-CUP). The
SWAT-CUP is a public domain computer program for the calibration of SWAT
models. SWAT-CUP contains Generalized Likelihood Uncertainty Estimation
(GLUE), Parameter Solution (Parasol), and Sequential Uncertainty Fitting
(SUFI-2) [9]. The SWAT-CUP enables sensitivity analysis, calibration, valida-
tion and uncertainty analysis of the SWAT model. SUFI-2 combines calibration
and uncertainty analysis to find parameter uncertainties while calculating the
smallest possible prediction uncertainty range. Hence, these parameters uncer-
tainty reflect all sources of uncertainty [10]. In SUFI-2, the uncertainty of input
parameters is depicted as a uniform distribution, while model output uncertain-
ty is quantified at the 95% prediction of uncertainty (95PPU).
SWAT-CUP includes parallel processing, visualization of outlet location using
Bing Map, the creation of multi-objective function, extraction, and calculation of
95PPU for all variables into output. rich, output.hru, output.sub files without

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 F. T. Teshome et al.

measurements and one-at-a-time sensitivity analysis [9]. The main objective of

this study was to investigate the performance of the SWAT model in simulating
streamflow from the Bina basin in the Madhya Pradesh state of India.

2. Materials and Methods

2.1. Description of the Study Area
This study was conducted in the Bina river basin, which has a total catchment
area of 2822 km2 (Figure 1). Bina river, the main river in Bina basin, is among
important tributaries of the Betwa River system (Figure 1) which drains part of
the Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh which originates from the Begumganj
block of Raisen district and enters Sagar district at Rahatgarh block and traverses
through Kura and Bina tehsil before the confluence with river Betwa near Baso-
da town in Vidisha district [11]. Bina basin falls between 23˚3' to 24˚3'N and
78˚1' to 78˚6'E. The catchment area is highly undulated and covered by forests,
barren lands, and localized rain-fed agriculture. The stream density is more in
the upper catchment as compared to the lower part of the river basin, the later
mostly gentle sloping to plain topography mostly covered with agricultural
fields, the streams are dry after the monsoon months (June to September).

2.2. Input Data

Input data for SWAT include spatial maps of Digital Elevation Model (DEM),
soil information, and land use land cover. In addition, daily weather data (preci-
pitation, and minimum and maximum air temperature, relative humidity, aver-
age wind speed, and solar radiation) were used for simulating the streamflow.
River discharge was also used for model calibration and validation purposes.

2.2.1. Spatial Data

1) Land use and land cover and Soil Map
Landsat 8 ETM+ with a 30 m resolution for Path/Row: 145/043 and 145/044

Figure 1. Madhya Pradesh River Basins (source [12]).

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F. T. Teshome et al.

retrieved on 6 March 2015 was used. The images were retrieved from the USGS’
EarthExplorer site (https://earthexplorer.usgs.gov/). Landsat 8 ETM+ satellite
images with optical bands with the standard false-color combinations were used
to prepare the land use and land cover map of the basin, for which subsequent
ground truth verification was carried out through extensive field visits. For the
land use land cover, supervised classification using maximum likelihood clas-
sifier was applied. Land use and land cover spatial data were reclassified into
SWAT land cover/crop types.
Soil toposheets with sheet numbers of 1, 2, 4, and 5 prepared by the Indian
Council of Agricultural Research-National Bureau of Soil Survey & Land Use
Planning (ICAR-NBSS & LUP) on a scale of 1:250,000 and printed on a scale of
1:500,000 were used to prepare soil map of the watershed. The soil map was
linked with the user soil database. A user lookup table was created that identifies
the SWAT code for the different categories of soil and land use a land cover on
the map as per the required format.
2) Aster Global Digital Elevation Model Version 002 (ASTER GDEM v2)
The digital elevation model of 30 m spatial resolution was downloaded from
the EarthExplorer website (https://earthexplorer.usgs.gov/) and used to delineate
the watershed and to analyze the drainage patterns of the land surface terrain.

2.2.2. Weather and Hydrological Data

Daily streamflow, precipitation, air temperature (maximum and minimum), rel-
ative humidity, average wind speed and solar radiation from the Bina basin were
used for the period 1989-1996. These data were collected from Madhya Pradesh
State Data Center (MPSDC), Bhopal. The daily weather data and weather gene-
rator location (wgnloc) were prepared into a separate excel sheet and converted
into .dbf format using Microsoft access before imported into the model setup.
The model was set up with a two-year warmup period. Model calibration was
conducted using data from 1991 to 1993 while data from 1994 to 1996 was used
for validation.

2.2.3. Model Setup

All spatial data inputs (DEM, land use the land cover map, and soil map) were
projected to Universal Transverse Mercator (UTM) 43 North and World Geo-
detic System (WGS) 84 datum and were resampled to a 30-pixel size using Bili-
nearresampling technique in ArcGIS 10.5.1. The Soil and Water Assessment
Tool (Arc SWAT 2012.10.4.21) interfaced with Arc GIS 10.5.1. The software was
used to derive catchment characteristics (e.g., watershed boundary, drainage
area, slope, flow path, etc.) solely based on the spatial data inputs [13]. Wa-
tershed delineation and spatial arrangement of basin elements (e.g. sub-basin,
reach segments and point sources) were defined [14]. The stream drainage lines
were created using threshold stream cells of 348,395. The most popular setup
was the sub-basin configuration, where the basin is divided into sub-basin and
further sub-divided into hydrologic response units (HRUs) [15]. The minimum

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 F. T. Teshome et al.

threshold area of 5/5/5 [%] for land use/soil class/slope over the sub-basin area
was used. The land use, soil and slopes percentage areas covering below the
minimum threshold area were excluded, and then the remaining area was rede-
fined so that 100% of the sub-basin area could be used in the simulation.
HRUs represent the smallest unit areas within the watershed with similar soil,
topography, and land-use class [16]. In this study, HRUs definition was done
based on eight classes of soil and eight classes of land use and land cover catego-
ries, and multiple slope discretization with three slope classes [<15%, 15% - 30%
and >30%].
Land use and land cover map were reclassified into SWAT land cover/plant
types [17]. Land use and land cover (LULC) of the basin was classified into eight
classes and the final land use classes were decided to be assigned as, agriculture
land-generic, barren land, current fallow, forest-deciduous, forest-evergreen,
sandy area, urban area, and water body (Figure 2). Similarly, the basin’s soil was
categorized into eight classes (Figure 3).
The Soil Conservation Service Curve Numbers (SCS-CN) were determined
based on the USDA National Engineering Handbook [18] [19] [20]. The
SCS-CN is a function of the soil permeability, land use, and antecedent soil wa-
ter conditions. The SCS-CN method is an approach that is used in rain-
fall-runoff modeling to compute direct runoff. This method assumes an initial
abstraction (Ia) before ponding, which is related to the SCS-CN. SCS-CN defines
three antecedent moisture conditions: I—dry (wilting point), II—average mois-
ture and III—wet (field capacity) [21]. The SCS-CN method, in SWAT, relates
runoff to soil type, land use, and management. The SCS-CN method is based on
the principle of water balance and two fundamental assumptions [22].
The first assumption is that the ratio of direct runoff to potential maximum
runoff is equal to the ratio of infiltration to potential maximum retention. The
second assumption states that the initial abstraction is proportional to the

Figure 2. Land use and land cover map (LULC) of Bina River
Basin.

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F. T. Teshome et al.

Figure 3. Soil map of the Bina River Basin [CS is Clay Soil, D is Deep,
ED is Extremely Drained, LS is Loam Soil, MD is Moderately Deep,
MWD is Moderately Well Drained, S is Shallow, SD is Shallow Deep,
VS is Very Shallow and WD is Well Drained].

potential maximum retention. The water balance equation and the two assump-
tions are expressed mathematically [23]:
P = Ia + F + Q (1)

Q
− Ia =
F S (2)
P
Ia = λ S (3)

where P is the total precipitation (mm), Ia is the initial abstraction before runoff
(mm), F is the cumulative infiltration after runoff begins (mm), Q is direct ru-
noff (mm), S is the potential maximum retention (mm), and λ is the initial ab-
straction coefficient. The combination of Equations (1) and (2) leads to the pop-
ular form of the original SCS-CN method [24]:

( P − Ia )
2

=Q when P > Ia
( P − Ia ) + S (4)
=Q 0, when P ≤ Ia

25400
=S − 254 (5)
CN
where the CN is a dimensionless variable, ranging from 0 to 100 and it depends
on land use, hydrological soil group, hydrologic conditions, and antecedent
moisture conditions [25]. This increases accuracy and gives a much better phys-
ical description of the water balance. The hydrologic cycle as simulated by
SWAT is based on the water balance equation [26]:

SWt= SWo + ( Rday − Qsurf − Ea − Wseep − Qgw ) (6)

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 F. T. Teshome et al.

where SWt is soil H2O content (mm) at time t in days, SWo is the initial soil
H2O content (mm), Rday is amount of rainfall on day i (mm), Qsurf is the amount
of surface runoff on day i (mm), Ea is the amount of evapotranspiration on day i
(mm), Wseep is the amount of percolation and bypass exiting the soil profile bot-
tom on day i (mm), Qgw is the amount of return flow on day i (mm).

2.2.4. Model Calibration and Validation

The SWAT model was run both on a daily and monthly timesteps. A two-year
model warm-up period (1989 and 1990) was used. Model sensitivity analysis,
model calibration and validation were done using the SWAT-CUP tool. Eigh-
teen parameters were considered and tested for the model parameterization and
sensitivity analysis. The model uncertainties have been tested and analyzed using
the SUFI-2 uncertainty analysis procedure in SWAT-CUP [27] [28].
The parameters were related to stream-flow assessment and include viz.
r_CN2.mgt (curve number), v__ALPHA_BF.gw (base flow alfa factor),
v__GW_DELAY.gw (groundwater delay time), v__GWQMN.gw (threshold
depth of water in shallow aquifer required for return flow), v__GW_REVAP.gw
(groundwater ‘revap’ coefficient), v__ESCO.hru (soil evaporation compensation
factor), v__CH_N2.rte (manning roughness for the main channel),
v__CH_K2.rte (effective hydraulic conductivity in main conductivity), r__SOL_
AWC.sol (soil available water capacity), r__SOL_K.sol (soil hydraulic conduc-
tivity) v_RCHRG_DP.gw (Deep aquifer percolation fraction), r_SOL_BD.sol
(Moist bulk density), r_SOL_Z.sol (Depth from the soil surface to bottom of the
layer), r_SLSUBBSN.hru (Average slope length), r_OV_N.hru (Manning's "n"
value for overland flow), CANMX.hru (Maximum canopy storage), v_EPCO.hru
(Plant uptake compensation factor), v_SURLAG.bsn (Surface runoff lag time)
have been considered for model parameterization and calibration and validation
process.

2.2.5. Model Evaluation Criteria

A variety of verification criteria that could be used for the evaluation of models
were proposed by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and other
investigators [29]. Model evaluation was conducted using selected statistical
evaluation metrics. The following model evaluation techniques were chosen to
check the performance of the SWAT model. Moriasi et al. [30] recommended
the use of the coefficient of determination (R2) together with the Nash-Sutcliffe
model efficiency coefficient (NSE) to evaluate the performance of the SWAT
model. The R2 (Equation (7)) value is a measure of the strength of the linear
correlation between the predicted and observed values. The NSE (Equation (8))
is a measure of the predictive power of the model and is the most frequently
used method for hydrological applications [31].

∑i =1 (Oi − O ) ( Pi − P )
n

R2 = (7)
(Oi − O ) ∑in 1 ( Pi − P )
∑i 1=
n 2 2
=

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F. T. Teshome et al.

∑ (Oi − Pi )
n 2

NSE = 1 − in=1 (8)

∑i =1 (Oi − O )
2

where Oi is ith observed streamflow; O is mean observed streamflow; Pi is ith

predicted streamflow and; P is mean predicted streamflow values and, n is the
total number of observations.
An NSE value of 1 indicates a perfect match between simulated and observed
data. A value of 1 for the R2 also indicates a perfect linear correlation between
simulated and observed data. In addition, Percent bias (PBIAS, Equation (9)),
which measures the average tendency of the simulated data to be larger or
smaller than their observed counterparts, was used in this study. The optimal
value of PBIAS is 0.0, which indicates accurate model simulation. Positive PBIAS
values indicate model underestimation bias, and negative values indicate model
overestimation bias [30].

∑ (Oi − Pi ) ∗ (100 )
n

PBIAS = i =1 (9)
∑i =1Oi
n

2.2.6. Sensitivity Analysis

The global sensitivity of streamflow parameters has been estimated by calculat-
ing multiple regression system, which regresses the Latin hypercube generated
parameters against the objective function values. The t-stat and p-value are two
factors commonly used to evaluate the sensitivity of model parameters in
SWAT-CUP. The t-stat provides a measure of sensitivity as its absolute values go
larger while the p-values determine the significance of the sensitivity magnitudes
with close to zero value as more significant [32].

3. Results and Discussion

3.1. Catchment Characteristics
3.1.1. Hydrological Response Units (HRUs)
The elevation of the basin ranges from 380 - 710 m. Among the land use and soil
type classes, Forest-Deciduous and Clay Soil-Moderately Well Drained-Deep
(CS-MWD-D) were dominant in the catchment, respectively (Table 1). Most
(98%) of the catchment area has a flat to the moderate slope (0% - 15%). The
catchment was divided into four sub-basins and classified into 68 HRUs (Table
2). The HRUs of this basin have been classified into different classes mainly
based on land use land cover, soil type, and slope.
The catchment has an average CN of 83.3 (Table 3). Higher CN indicates
greater run-off potential. Curve number is governed by land use, hydrological
soil group, hydrologic conditions, and antecedent moisture conditions which
depend on the average slope of the basin.

3.1.2. The Sensitivity of Model Parameters

The SWAT model has over 30 parameters. Arnold et al. [33] categorized SWAT
model parameters by the process such as surface runoff, baseflow, sediment and

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 F. T. Teshome et al.

Table 1. Detail of LULC, soil, and slope.

LULC Category LULC Class Area [ha] Watershed area (%)

Sandy Area SND 124.74 0.05

Forest-Evergreen FRSE 489.24 0.18

Current fallow in District Sagar E137 33197.85 12.01

Forest-Deciduous FRSD 72464.22 26.21

Water body WATR 48421.8 17.52

Urban Area SETL 37851.3 13.69

Barren Land BARN 34492.23 12.48

Agricultural Land-Generic AGRL 49388.94 17.87

Soil Category Soil class Area [ha] Watershed area (%)

Clay soil-Moderately Well

CS-MWD-D 199204.1 72.06
Drained-Deep

Clay Soil-Well Drained-Drained CS-WD-D 12556.62 4.54

Clay Soil-Well Drained-Moderately

CS-WD-MD 20497.05 7.41
Deep

Loam Soil-Extremely
LS-ED-S 4614.57 1.67
Drained-Shallow

Loam Soil-Extremely Drained-Very

LS-ED-VS 5021.19 1.82
Shallow

Loam Soil-Well Drained-Deep LS-WD-D 32758.02 11.85

Loam Soil-Well Drained-Shallow LS-WD-S 1718.82 0.62

Loam Soil-Well Drained-Shallow

LS-WD-SD 59.94 0.02
Deep

Slope Category Slope class (%) Area [ha] Watershed area (%)

1 0 - 15 271009.8 98.04

2 15 - 30 5158.89 1.87

3 30 - 99.99 261.63 0.09

Table 2. Hydrological response units (HRUs) classification.

Sub basin Input Summary

Sub HRUs
Latitude Elevation(m)

1 24.07 411 6

2 23.79 449 20

3 23.8 483 19

4 23.52 543 23

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F. T. Teshome et al.

Table 3. Bina River Basin hydrological components value.

8 Hydrological parameters Value (mm)

1 Precipitation 1210.2

2 Surface runoff 225.8

3 Lateral flow 0.62

4 Groundwater 12.51

5 Evaporation from shallow aquifer 0.82

6 Recharge to deep aquifer 0.7

7 Total aquifer recharge 14.04

8 Total water yield 237.92

9 Percolation to shallow aquifer 13.13

10 Actual evapotranspiration 978.9

11 Potential evapotranspiration 2256.1

12 Transmission Losses 1

13 Average curve number 83.3

nutrient and pesticide using the report of input parameters in SWAT model ca-
libration for 64 selected watershed studies.
In this study, following a comprehensive literature review, 18 parameters were
selected for model simulation on daily and monthly timesteps. The parameters
primarily represented the channel, runoff and soil processes. The initial value
ranges used for these selected parameters are shown in Table 4. It was observed
that using the fitted parameters and their appropriate initial range had a signifi-
cant effect on the streamflow simulation process.
There are mainly two approaches to analyze the sensitivity of model parame-
ters: local sensitivity analysis and global sensitivity analysis. The local sensitivity
analysis is a one-at-a-time (OAT) technique that analyses the impact of a single
parameter at a time, keeping the other parameters fixed [9]. The global sensitiv-
ity of model parameters has been estimated by calculating the multiple regres-
sion system, which regresses the Latin hypercube generated parameters against
the objective function values [32]. In the present study, the most sensitive para-
meters observed after global sensitivity analysis for daily and monthly calibra-
tion in SUFI-2 are shown in Table 5 and Table 6, respectively. Results showed
that r_SOL_BD.sol (moist bulk density), v__ALPHA_BF.gw (base flow alfa fac-
tor) and v__CH_N2.rte (Manning roughness for the main channel) for a daily
basis and r__SOL_AWC.sol (soil available water capacity), r_SOL_Z.sol (Depth
from the soil surface to bottom of the layer) and r_CN2.mgt (curve number) for
monthly simulations were found the most sensitive model parameters. It was
experienced that the streamflow simulations process was not affected by para-
meters that are relatively insensitive compared to sensitive parameters and
changes in their range had not caused significant changes in the model result.

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 F. T. Teshome et al.

Table 4. Selected parameters and their initial range.

Sr.no Parameter_Name Description of parameters Min_value Max_value

1 R__CN2.mgt Curve number −0.2 0.2
2 V__ALPHA_BF.gw Baseflow alfa factor 0 1
3 V__GW_DELAY.gw Groundwater delay time 30 450
4 R__SOL_K (..).sol Soil hydraulic conductivity −25 25
5 V__EPCO.hru Plant uptake compensation factor 0.01 1
6 R__SOL_BD (..).sol Moist bulk density −25 25
7 V__OV_N.hru Manning’s “n” value for overland flow 0.01 30
8 V__SURLAG.bsn Surface runoff lag time 1 24
9 V__CANMX.hru Maximum canopy storage 0 10
10 R__SOL_Z (..).sol Depth from soil surfaces to bottom of the layer −25 25
11 V__CH_K2.rte Effective hydraulic conductivity 0 150
12 V__CH_N2.rte Manning roughness for main channel 0 0.3
13 R__SLSUBBSN.hru Average slope length 10 150
14 V__GW_REVAP.gw Groundwater “revap” coefficient 0.02 0.2
15 R__SOL_AWC (..).sol Soil available water capacity −25 25
16 V__RCHRG_DP.gw Deep aquifer percolation fraction 0 1
17 V__ESCO.hru Soil evaporation compensation factor 0.01 1
18 A__GWQMN.gw Threshold depth of water in the shallow aquifer. 0 200

V = Replaced by value, R = (1 + multiply by value (%)) and A = added on value.

Table 5. Ranking the sensitivity of streamflow parameters in Bina watershed for daily timescale (the ranking is based on the abso-
lute value of the t-statistics).

Rank Parameters t-stat p-value

1 r_SOL_BD.sol 14.76 0.00
2 v__ALPHA_BF.gw 3.97 0.00
3 v__CH_N2.rte −3.93 0.00
4 r_SOL_Z.sol −3.42 0.00
5 v_SURLAG.bsn 1.78 0.08
6 v__CH_K2.rte 1.76 0.08
7 r__SOL_K.sol 1.29 0.20
8 v__GW_DELAY.gw 1.20 0.23
9 r_SLSUBBSN.hru 1.05 0.30
10 r__SOL_ AWC.sol −0.73 0.47
11 v_CANMX.hru 0.66 0.51
12 v_RCHRG_DP.gw 0.62 0.54
13 r_CN2.mgt 0.27 0.79
14 v_EPCO.hru −0.22 0.83
15 v__GWQMN.gw 0.15 0.88
16 r_OV_N.hru 0.12 0.90
17 v__ESCO.hru −0.03 0.98

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F. T. Teshome et al.

Table 6. Ranking the sensitivity of flow parameters in Bina Watershed for monthly time-
scale (the ranking is based on the absolute value of the t-statistics).

Rank Parameters t-stat p-value

1 r__SOL_AWC.sol 12.75 0.00

2 r_SOL_Z.sol 8.30 0.00

3 r_CN2.mgt −3.37 0.00

4 v__ESCO.hru 2.16 0.03

5 v__ALPHA_BF.gw 2.12 0.03

6 v_EPCO.hru −2.07 0.04

7 v_CANMX.hru 1.81 0.07

8 v_RCHRG_DP.gw 1.72 0.09

9 r__SOL_K.sol −1.72 0.09

10 v__CH_K2.rte −1.34 0.18

11 v__GW_DELAY.gw 0.75 0.46

12 r_SOL_BD.sol 0.66 0.51

13 r_SLSUBBSN.hru 0.66 0.51

14 v__GW_REVAP.gw 0.65 0.52

15 v__CH_N2.rte −0.22 0.82

16 v__GWQMN.gw −0.16 0.87

17 r_OV_N.hru −0.08 0.93

18 v_SURLAG.bsn −0.06 0.96

These results were supported by various authors i.e. Singh et al. [34] calibrated
SWAT model for Tungabhadra River and found CH_K2, SOL_K, CN2,
ALPHA_BF, ALPHA_BNK as most sensitive parameters. Setegn et al. [35] si-
mulated streamflow using the SWAT model in the Lake Tana Basin, in their
study, they have evaluated the relative sensitivity of the Nineteen parameters and
found that soil evaporation compensation factor (ESCO), initial SCS Curve
Number II value (CN2) and base flow alpha-factor (Alpha_Bf) [days] were the
most sensitive parameters. Himanshu et al. [36] indicated that a total of 27 sen-
sitive parameters were considered collectively for runoff and sediment, and their
rank was determined according to sensitivity to the output. Sensitivity analysis
shows that curve number (CN2) and effective hydraulic conductivity (Ch_K2)
are the most sensitive model parameters for both runoff and sediment yield
computations. Soil evaporation compensation factor (Esco), an available water
capacity of soil layer (Sol_Awc), depth from the soil surface to bottom of (Sol_Z)
are relatively more sensitive to runoff but less to sediment. Hosseini et al. [10]
applied the SWAT model for the runoff estimation in a Taleghan basin and
found that the Baseflow alpha factors (ALPHA_BF) followed by Snowfall tem-
perature (SFTMP) and Groundwater delay time (GW_DELAY) are more sensi-
tive parameters.

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 F. T. Teshome et al.

3.1.3. Streamflow Simulation

Overall, the SWAT model performed “satisfactorily” during daily simulations
while during the monthly simulation the model performed “very good”. The
PBIAS for both daily and monthly time periods was in the acceptable range; with
2.2% and 18% for calibration and 4.5% and 3.9% for validation, respectively [30].
The coefficients of determination (R2) of calibration for the daily and monthly
data were 0.66 and 0.96, respectively. The R2 value of both daily and monthly
timescales shows there is a good correlation between the observed and simulated
flows [30]. However, it was clear that the model’s performance significantly im-
proved with monthly simulations. Similarly, NSE values for monthly simulations
both during calibration and validation showed significant improvements com-
pared to respective daily simulations. These are related studies that could sup-
port our results: Jain and Sharma. [37] found that the SWAT model could be
employed for simulation of runoff and sediment yield behavior of the Vamsad-
hara river basin. Srinivas G and Naik [38] reported that the SWAT model gave
good correlation during daily simulation results and a very good correlation for
monthly time series at the Musi river basin. Jain et al. [39] reported that the
SWAT model was calibrated and validated with daily streamflow data and the
results were indicated a good simulation of streamflow of the Himalayan moun-
tain basin.
The R2 and NS coefficient are two important statistical analyses for the evalua-
tion of the results. According to Santhi et al. [40], when R2 equals 1, the regres-
sion equation model considered as a perfect fit model, while an R2 value less
than 0.5 (near to zero), suggests that the model is not suitable. The strength of
the model calibration and uncertainty procedure was also analyzed using the
R-factor. The R-factor values were estimated as 0.22 and 0.52 for the daily and
monthly simulations, respectively (Table 7). The best model parameters and
their value ranges for both daily and monthly model simulations are presented
in Table 8 and Table 9. In addition, observed and simulated time series daily
and monthly streamflow were plotted for visual comparison to explore how the
model performs during peak and low flows (Figures 4-11).

Table 7. Model evaluation objective functions daily and monthly results.

Daily Monthly
No
Objective Variables Calibration Validation Calibration Validation

1 P-factor 0.49 0.42 0.44 0.25

2 R-factor 0.22 0.35 0.52 0.27

3 R2 0.66 0.65 0.96 0.72

4 NS 0.65 0.58 0.94 0.72

5 bR2 0.39 0.35 0.80 0.52

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F. T. Teshome et al.

Table 8. Daily best parameters with calibrated values.

Sr.No Parameter_Name Fitted_Value Min_value Max_value

1 R__CN2.mgt −0.2419 −0.3160 −0.1754

2 V__ALPHA_BF.gw 0.9076 0.7660 1.2156

3 V__GW_DELAY.gw 339.4813 282.1209 402.8797

4 V__OV_N.hru 29.4613 25.9809 33.5634

5 V__CH_N2.rte 0.0160 −0.0014 0.0415

6 V__CH_K2.rte 101.2698 73.3829 129.7200

7 A__GWQMN.gw 20.3172 16.3810 96.7126

8 V__RCHRG_DP.gw 0.3463 0.0560 0.4220

9 R__SLSUBBSN.hru −36.8985 −44.8489 −30.5237

10 V__EPCO.hru 0.5186 0.5173 0.9265

11 V__ESCO.hru 0.3483 0.2250 0.4228

12 V__SURLAG.bsn 14.8983 14.3081 19.3521

13 R__SOL_K(..).sol 30.8894 15.0737 39.4429

14 R__SOL_BD(..).sol 11.1450 −7.1659 20.9614
15 R__SOL_Z(..).sol 22.6821 5.6266 27.2432
16 R__SOL_AWC(..).sol 16.8007 15.4220 33.8054
17 V__CANMX.hru 1.6540 1.5581 3.1297

Table 9. Monthly best parameters with calibrated values.

Sr.No Parameter_Name Fitted_Value Min_value Max_value

1 R__CN2.mgt −0.1229 −0.1558 0.0814

2 V__ALPHA_BF.gw 1.2160 0.4104 1.2316
3 V__GW_DELAY.gw 326.1514 210.7675 572.4725
4 R__SOL_K(..).sol −13.1914 −43.7799 2.0799
5 V__EPCO.hru 0.8876 0.4905 1.4520
6 R__SOL_BD(..).sol 16.6925 −1.1801 46.4801
7 V__OV_N.hru 3.6721 1.9713 20.6612
8 V__SURLAG.bsn 7.5954 7.4032 20.2188
9 V__CANMX.hru 5.0864 3.2640 9.7960
10 R__SOL_Z(..).sol 40.2362 −3.1300 40.6300
11 V__CH_K2.rte 12.9645 −60.8398 79.7398
12 V__CH_N2.rte 0.1474 0.1036 0.3110
13 R__SLSUBBSN.hru 112.8324 75.1561 205.5238
14 V__GW_REVAP.gw 0.1150 −0.0211 0.1263
15 R__SOL_AWC(..).sol 10.1709 −5.5300 33.4300
16 V__RCHRG_DP.gw 0.5795 0.1554 0.7186

17 V__ESCO.hru 1.0107 0.4500 1.3303

18 A__GWQMN.gw 56.5522 54.4804 163.5196

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 F. T. Teshome et al.

Figure 4. Observed and simulated hydrographs of daily streamflow at the Bina River Basin
from 1991 to 1993 (calibration period). The green shaded part is the 95% prediction uncer-
tainty.

Figure 5. Scatter plot of observed and simulated daily streamflow of the Bina River Basin
from 1991 to 1993 (calibration period).

Figure 6. Observed and simulated hydrographs of daily streamflow at the Bina River Basin
from 1994 to 1996 (validation period). The green shaded part is the 95% prediction uncer-
tainty.

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F. T. Teshome et al.

Figure 7. Scatter plot of observed and simulated daily streamflow of the Bina River Basin
from 1994 to 1996 (validation period).

Figure 8. Observed and simulated hydrographs of monthly streamflow at the Bina River Basin from
1991 to 1993 (calibration period). The green shaded part is the 95% prediction uncertainty.

Figure 9. Scatter plot of observed and simulated monthly streamflow of the Bina River Basin from
1991 to 1993 (calibration period).

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 F. T. Teshome et al.

Figure 10. Observed and simulated hydrographs of monthly streamflow at the Bina River Basin
from 1994 to 1996 (validation period). The green shaded part is the 95% prediction uncertainty.

Figure 11. Scatter plot of observed and simulated monthly streamflow of the Bina River Basin from
1994 to 1996 (validation periods).

4. Conclusions
Hydrological modeling could be a useful tool for several purposes including wa-
ter resources planning, development, and management. In this study, the per-
formance of the SWAT model was evaluated in simulating streamflow from the
Bina basin. The SWAT-CUP advance calibration and uncertainty analysis tool
was used for automatic calibration/uncertainty analysis, validation, and sensitiv-
ity analysis of stream-flow measurements on a daily and monthly basis for the
period 1989-1996. Results showed that the R2 values for the daily and monthly
time steps were 0.66 and 0.96, respectively during model calibration, while R2
values during the validation period were 0.65 and 0.72, respectively.
Overall, the SWAT model performed “satisfactory” and “very good” in simu-
lating streamflow at daily and monthly time steps, respectively. The model re-

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F. T. Teshome et al.

produced the observed flow well both during peak and low flow periods. How-
ever, the model results showed that prediction uncertainties exist especially with
the daily simulations. These uncertainties could be due to the quality of the
streamflow records.
This study demonstrated that the SWAT model performed satisfactorily and
could be effectively used to simulate streamflow in the Bina river basin, and re-
sults could be used to inform decisions towards planning soil and water man-
agement practices in the basin.

Acknowledgements
We thank the National Institute of Hydrology (NIH), Roorkee for providing the
facilities to carry out this work. We also thank the staff of NIH for their encou-
ragement and support.

Conflicts of Interest
The authors declare no conflicts of interest regarding the publication of this pa-
per.

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