Water balance and allocation modeling for irrigation departments
We deliver watershed water-balance studies, canal and reservoir inflow modeling, and drought monitoring products that help irrigation authorities allocate scarce water across competing agricultural demands.
Irrigation authorities allocate a resource that is both variable and contested. The decision is rarely whether water is available in aggregate — it is whether it will arrive at a particular offtake at a particular time, in a season whose inflows nobody can yet observe. Getting that wrong has consequences measured in crop failures rather than in engineering tolerances.
We build watershed water-balance models, reservoir and canal inflow forecasts, and satellite-based drought monitoring that together turn seasonal allocation from a negotiation into an evidence-based decision. Where a canal network is the asset, we also build the spatial asset registry that allocation depends on.
What makes this sector different
- Seasonal inflow must be estimated before the season it governs, from catchments that are often ungauged.
- Canal losses through seepage and unauthorised abstraction are significant but rarely measured directly.
- Competing agricultural demands need a defensible allocation rule, not a case-by-case negotiation.
- Asset records for large canal networks are commonly paper-based or spread across district offices.
What we deliver
- Watershed water-balance model quantifying seasonal availability by sub-basin
- Reservoir and canal inflow forecasts to support pre-season allocation decisions
- Satellite-derived drought and vegetation-health indices for in-season monitoring
- A spatial canal asset register with condition and command-area attributes
Common questions from irrigation departments
Can you forecast seasonal inflows for an ungauged catchment?
Yes, using a calibrated rainfall-runoff model driven by satellite precipitation products, with parameters transferred from hydrologically similar gauged catchments. The forecast carries a wider confidence band than one from a well-gauged basin, and we report that band rather than a single number — an allocation decision made on false precision is worse than one made on an honest range.
How do you account for canal losses?
Through the water balance itself: losses appear as the residual between measured releases and measured deliveries. Where measurement points are sparse we bound the loss rather than pretending to a precise figure, and identify where a small number of additional gauges would most reduce the uncertainty.