Abstract

The snowmelt runoff is foundation to various resource based economics i e Agriculture Tourism Horticulture and Hydropower The Glacier in the Himanchal Pradesh Himalayas have been reported to be receding rapidly due to the global climate change Due to its economic and scientific importance it is mandatory to access theses resources and its release is essential to predict the flow during the snowmelt period The essence of this study is to invent and develop a model for pragmatic purpose The Snowmelt runoff model SRM has been widely used in simulation and forecasting daily streamflow in mountain basin where snowmelt is a major runoff factor A degree day approach for the snowmelt runoff modelling is used here which integrates the input from Remote sensing data and metrological data including the parameter i e runoff coefficient degree day factor temperature lapse rate critical temperature rainfall contributing area and recession coefficient This paper represents is simulate the daily snowmelt runoff in summer season i e 21st March to 10th July in the year of 2006 to 2010 respectively and also determining the contribution of snowmelt to the river For developing the model MODIS 8 day snow cover data are used for the runoff estimation The basin is distributed into different elevation zone to increase the efficiency of the model ASTER DEM to extrapolate temperature to each zone In the SRM model used degree day approach the model is developed for Tosh Nala located at Himanchal Pradesh The summer runoff was estimated as 20 50 25 35 23 86 28 57 40 29 m3 s in the year of 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 respectively The analysis of results proves that the SRM model is best tool for computing the snowmelt runoff in the mountainous areas