Spatio-temporal modelling of the soil water balance using a stochastic model and soil profile descriptions

A simple stochastic model of the soil water balance at a single location is combined with soil profile descriptions to obtain a full space-time description of the soil water balance, including water table depth, soil saturation, actual evapotranspiration and specific discharge. The stochastic model is first calibrated at locations where soil profile descriptions (texture) have been collected and time series of water table depth have been observed. Next, the model parameters are estimated (some through interpolation) at locations where only soil profile descriptions are available. At these locations, time series of water table depth and related properties are either predicted or stochastically simulated. A full spatio-temporal coverage is achieved thereafter by geostatistical interpolation at each time step, using a digital elevation model as exhaustive auxiliary information. The proposed method is applied in a case study in the Netherlands.