GRACE-Based Drought Assessment in Hydrological Systems
Summary
The Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) satellite mission has transformed drought assessment by directly measuring changes in terrestrial water storage (TWS) at continental and regional scales. By tracking minute variations in Earth’s gravity field, GRACE captures combined anomalies in groundwater, soil moisture, surface water and snow, enabling construction of integrated drought indices that reflect true hydrological deficits. These indices complement meteorological measures by revealing the propagation of rainfall deficits through subsurface reservoirs, and they are particularly valuable in regions lacking dense ground observations. Analytical approaches range from simple standardised anomaly methods to more advanced signal‐processing techniques that remove long-term trends and suppress spatial noise. Recent advancements incorporate machine-learning algorithms to apportion contributions of storage components and to improve the detection of onset and recovery phases. Practical applications span from mapping multiyear droughts in arid basins to guiding water-resource management in irrigated plains. Ongoing work seeks to refine spatial resolution, integrate GRACE data with hydrological models and extend monitoring capabilities under the follow-on mission, thereby enhancing early warning and resilience to hydrological extremes worldwide.
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GRACE-Based Drought Assessment in Hydrological Systems publication trend
The graph below shows the total number of articles in grace-based drought assessment in hydrological systems across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).
Technical terms
Terrestrial Water Storage (TWS): The combined volume of water contained in surface water, soil moisture, groundwater and snow, as inferred from GRACE gravity measurements.
Total Storage Deficit Index (TSDI): A drought metric defined by the deviation of GRACE-derived TWS from its long-term mean, used to quantify storage deficits.
GRACE Drought Severity Index (GRACE-DSI): An index calculating the severity of hydrological drought based on standardised anomalies of monthly GRACE TWS.
Empirical Mode Decomposition (EMD): A signal-processing method that decomposes non-stationary time series into intrinsic mode functions to identify abrupt changes.
Random Forest: An ensemble machine-learning algorithm that builds multiple decision trees to assess the relative importance of variables, such as TWS components, in driving drought.
References
- Response Analysis of Terrestrial Water Storage Components to Drought Based on Random Forests During 20112020 in Yunnan, China. IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Applied Earth Observations and Remote Sensing (2024).
- GRACE Gravity Satellite Observations of Terrestrial Water Storage Changes for Drought Characterization in the Arid Land of Northwestern China. Remote Sensing (2015).
- A framework for deriving drought indicators from the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE). Hydrology and Earth System Sciences (2020).
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