Geospatial Technology for Water Resource Applications

TLDR: In this article, the authors provide a summary of different research work carried out in various fields of water resources with demonstrated results and findings that could be able to use in decision making, developing policy and planning at root level.

Abstract: Increasing demands on water resources to fulfill the growing population needs have led to a great pressure on the water resources. Water resources conservation and management needs exemplary information regarding the water bodies with respect to quality, quantity and the related driving factors responsible for deterioration and depletion of water. Traditional methods existing in literature are limited to the point locations and manually gathered input dataset for analysis of the water system. However, after the development of advance geospatial technologies, now it is possible to build the digital information that can support analysis and interpretation for a large area in short span of time. The chapter introduces the various geospatial technologies, which are playing a vital and inevitable role in the acquisition of information and development of research capabilities towards water resources. These technologies are required for determining a strategic plan for execution of desired results as applicable to different regions and objectives (for e.g. determination of water-river boundaries, water quality and quantity, soil moisture, flood plains, ocean temperature etc). This chapter provides different methods/applications to demonstrate the importance of traditional and advanced concepts of geospatial technology in water resources. Thus, overall goal 1 Centre for Landscape and Climate Research, Department of Geography, University of Leicester, Leicester, UK. 2 Hydrological Sciences, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland, USA. 3 Earth System Science Interdisciplinary Center, University of Maryland, Maryland, USA. 4 Institute of Environmental and Sustainable Development, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, India. 5 Department of Remote Sensing, Banasthali University, Newai, Tonk, Rajasthan, India. 6 Water and Environmental Management Research Centre, Department of Civil Engineering, University of Bristol, Bristol, UK. * Corresponding author: prashant.just@gmail.com D ow nl oa de d by [ U ni ve rs ity o f T ok yo ] at 0 0: 59 0 4 A pr il 20 17 4 Geospatial Technology for Water Resource Applications of this chapter is to provide a summary of different research work carried out in various fields of water resources with demonstrated results and findings that could be able to use in decision making, developing policy and planning at root level. This chapter also provides future challenges in water resources and geospatial technology.