Determine the Best Geostatistic Method for Spatial Analyzing of the Standard Distribution Index of drought in Yazd Province

Document Type : Research

Authors

1 Senior expert on desertification, University of Tehran

2 Faculty member of Yazd Province Agriculture and Natural Resources Research Center

3 Assistant Professor, Faculty of Natural Resources, University of Tehran

10.22092/wmej.2016.112499

Abstract

In order to assess drought situation in Yazd province and planning programs, zoning drought map should be prepare to reduce damage resulting from this phenomenon. For this aim, in this study after calculating standard precipitation index in time series of 6 and 12 months in 39 meteorological stations located in Yazd province, Kriging and Inverse Distance Weighted 1 to 5 were used to interpolate Standardized Precipitation Index in March 2010. Then error maps were estimated using cross-validation, root mean squared error (RMSE), mean absolute error (MAE) and coefficient between estimated and observed values (R2). The Results showed in time series of 6 and 12 months, IDW3 and 2 are more accurate, respectively. Also, the drought severity classification showed that the most percent of area belongs to low class of drought in time series of 6 and 12 months. However, with increasing time step the wet severity is decreased in the north and high drought has been changed to the moderate class in the south of the study area.

Keywords