• Journal of the Korean Society of Hazard Mitigation
• /
• v.5 no.4 s.19
• /
• pp.59-69
• /
• 2005

Drought is difficult to detect and monitor, but it is easy to interpret through the drought index. The Palmer Drought Severity Index(PDSI), which is most commonly used as one of drought indices, have been widely used, however, the index have limitation as operational tools and triggers for policy responses. Recently, a new index, the Standardized Precipitation Index(SPI), was developed to improve drought detection and monitoring capabilities. The SPI has an improvement over previous indices md has several characteristics including its simplicity and temporal flexibility that allow its application for water resources on all timescales. Keetch-Byram Dought Index(KBDI) was defined as a number representing the net effect of evapotranspiration and precipitation in producing cumulative moisture deficiency in deep duff or upper soil layer. The purpose of this study is to analyze drought in Korea by using PDSI, SPI and KBDI. The result of this study suggests standard drought index by comparing of estimated drought indices. The data are obtained from Korea Meteorological Administration 56 stations over 30 years in each of the 8 sub-basins covering the whole nation. It is found that the PDSI had the advantage to detect the stage of drought resulting from cumulative shortage of rainfall, while SPI and KBDI had the advantage to detect the stage of drought resulting from short-term shortage of rainfall.

• Journal of Korea Water Resources Association
• /
• v.34 no.6
• /
• pp.673-685
• /
• 2001

In this study, the drought indicator is calculate from the rainfall, daily highest temperature, streamflow and Palmer Drought Severity Index(PDSI) for water plan and drought management in a relatively wide region. Three levels of drought severity, called drought watch, drought warning, and drought emergency, are established for these series which determine exceedance levels. The 25% nonexceedance level is used for drought watch, 10% for drought warning, and 5% for drought emergency to figure how well the drought indicators represent the past-drought and that those can be used for drought monitoring. As a result, 9-month and 12-month precipitation, and PDSI series shows the best consistency and high correlation indicate droughts. Because the results are based on the gauged data and simply calculated, the suggested indices can be used for basic data for drought monitoring system of a basin.

• Journal of Korea Water Resources Association
• /
• v.45 no.1
• /
• pp.75-89
• /
• 2012

This study attempted to analyze statistical characteristics of historical drought of Korea through trend, periodicity and drought spell analysis by using the drought indices. Standard Precipitation Index (SPI) and Palmer Drought Severity Index (PDSI) were calculated using weather data of 59 weather stations under Korea Meteorological Administration (KMA). As a result of analysis, SP13 and SP16 showed trend of drier spring, drier winter and wetter summer in all basin of Korea. However, SPI12 and PDSI showed different trends with shorter duration drought indices. In case of wavelet transform analysis for drought periodicities, in a band of 1~2 years or below 6 years showed significant spectrum. SP13 showed strongest power spectrum near the band of 1~2 year variance, and SPI12 and PDSI showed 6 years periodicities. The results from drought spell showed that Nakdong River Basin, Geum River Basin and Youngsan River Basin were appeared as severe drought vulnerable area of Korea.

• Journal of The Korean Society of Agricultural Engineers
• /
• v.48 no.2
• /
• pp.37-43
• /
• 2006

A hydrological drought index, MSWSI (Modified Surface Water Supply Index) was suggested based on SWSI (Surface Water Supply Index). With the available data of spatially distributed observation station of precipitation, dam storage, stream water level and natural groundwater level, South Korea was divided into 32 regions. This was conducted to represent the calculated index as a spatially distributed information. Monthly MSWSI was evaluated for the period of 1974 and 2001. It is necessary to compare this result with PDSI (Palmer Drought Severity Index) and SPI (Standard Precipitation Index), and check the applicability of the suggested index in our hydrological drought situation.

• Journal of Environmental Science International
• /
• v.23 no.4
• /
• pp.649-660
• /
• 2014

Spatial and temporal patterns of precipitation and temperature occur with regard to aspect and elevation of Mt. Halla in Jeju Island. Therefore, there is a need to predict regional drought associate with them to mitigate of impacts of drought. In this study, regional drought is predicted based on Palmer drought severity index (PDSI) and standardized precipitation index (SPI) using future (2015~2044) climate change scenario RCP (representative concentration pathways) 4.5 classified as 24 regions according to aspect and elevation. The results show that number and duration of drought will be decrease in Jeju Island. However, severity of severe drought will be increase in western and northern aspect with under 200 meters above mean sea level. These findings provide primary information for developing the proactive strategies to mitigate impacts of drought by future climate change in Jeju Island.

• KSCE Journal of Civil and Environmental Engineering Research
• /
• v.26 no.4B
• /
• pp.345-354
• /
• 2006

Drought brings on long term damage in contrast to flood, on economic loss in the region, and on ecologic and environmental disruptions. Drought is one of major natural disasters and gives a painful hardship to human beings. So we have tried to quantify the droughts for reducing drought damage and developed the drought indices for drought monitoring and management. The Palmer's drought severity index (PDSI) is widely used for the drought monitoring but it has the disadvanges and limitations in that the PDSI is estimated by considering just climate conditions as pointed out by many researchers. Thus this study uses the SWAT model which can consider soil conditions like soil type and land use in addition to climate conditions. We estimate soil water (SW) and soil moisture index (SMI) by SWAT which is a long term runoff simulation model. We apply the SWAT model to Soyang dam watershed for SMI estimation and compare SMI with PDSI for drought analysis. Say, we calibrate and validate the SWAT model by daily inflows of Soyang dam site and we estimate long term daily soil water. The estimated soil water is used for the computation of SMI based on the soil moisture deficit and we compare SMI with PDSI. As the results, we obtained the determination coefficient of 0.651 which means the SWAT model is applicable for drought monitoring and we can monitor drought in more high resolution by using GIS. So, we suggest that SMI based on the soil moisture deficit can be used for the drought monitoring and management.

• Journal of the Korean earth science society
• /
• v.27 no.7
• /
• pp.804-815
• /
• 2006

Meteorologists define a drought as a period of common dry weather. This may sound straightforward, but it is not so in reality. In this study, we attempted to identify meteorological drought conditions over South Korea. To evaluate the temporal and spatial variability of drought, we calculated two commonly used drought indices, the percent of normal precipitation (PNP) and the Palmer drought severity index (PDSI) calculated from fifty-eight meteorological stations below the Korean Meteorological Administration (KMA). The yearly precipitation has been growing gradually, and the amplitude between maximum and minimum also grow more explicitly from 1960's. According to the analysis of percentile anomaly of monthly precipitation, major drought duration was $1927{\sim}1929,\;1937{\sim}1939,\;1942{\sim}1944,\;1967{\sim}1968,\;1976{\sim}1977,\;1982{\sim}1983,\;1988,\;and\;1994{\sim}1995$. The severe drought occurred most frequently in Mokpo, Daegu, Jeonju, Busan, and Gangneung; it tended to occur more frequently in south sector than in mid sector of Korea and in south west sector than in south east sector. According to the analysis of seasonal distribution, extreme droughts occurred frequently in winter at Seoul, Gangneung, Jeonju, Daegu, and Busan. Severe droughts in summer were formed frequently at Seoul, Gangneung, and Mokpo, while that for spring at Jeonju, Daegu, and Busan. The results of PDSI distribution for the $1994{\sim}1995$ drought period were one of the most severe and widely spreaded droughts; it occurred most frequently in the south sector of South Korea. The comparison of time series between PDSI and Normal Percent showed that they exhibit a strong compatibility for the entire study period; it implies that both drought indices are useful method to indicate drought severity.

• Atmosphere
• /
• v.23 no.4
• /
• pp.539-547
• /
• 2013

The objective of this study is to standardize the calculation method of Palmer Drought Severity Index (PDSI) for the three Drought Management Agencies (DMA) in south Korea, and to evaluate the PDSI applicability. For comparison and review of the method, the code and input data of PDSI are collected from each DMA. The calculation method is the same, but the used input data (number of meteorological stations, normal year period, Available Water Capacity (AWC) of the soil) are different. Through discussions with drought experts and literature review, the standardized method is determined. 61 stations which have the data period more than 30 years are selected. Also the normal year is fixed for 30 years and updated every 10 years. The observed AWC is utilized using GIS data. Empirical equation of PDSI is re-estimated according to domestic climate characteristics. For evaluating the standardized PDSI, past drought events are investigated and drought indices including the existing SPI and PDSI are used for comparative analysis. As results, although the accuracy of standardized PDSI through ROC analysis is lower than SPI, the newly standardized PDSI is better than existing PDSI from DMA, Also it reasonably explain the spatial drought situation through the spatial analysis.

• Journal of the Korean Association of Geographic Information Studies
• /
• v.13 no.1
• /
• pp.128-141
• /
• 2010

Drought indices such as SPI(Standard Precipitation Index) and PDSI(Palmer Drought Severity Index) estimated using ground observations are not enough to describe detail spatial distribution of drought condition. In this study, the drought index with improved spatial resolution was estimated by using the CART algorithm and ancillary data such as MODIS NDVI, MODIS LST, land cover, rainfall, average air temperature, SPI, and PDSI data. Estimated drought index using the proposed approach for the year 2008 demonstrates better spatial information than that of traditional approaches. Results show that the availability of satellite imageries and various associated data allows us to get improved spatial drought information using a data mining technique and ancillary data and get better understanding of drought condition and prediction.

• KSCE Journal of Civil and Environmental Engineering Research
• /
• v.30 no.6B
• /
• pp.541-549
• /
• 2010

While the number of rainy days is decreasing, the mean annual precipitation is increasing due to abnormal climate changes caused by the global warming in Korea. Owing to the biased-concentration of rainfall during specific short terms, not only flood but also drought becomes more and more serious. From the literature, it is easily found that previous studies about flood have been intensively conducted. However, previous studies about drought have been performed rarely. This study conducted the comparison between two representative drought indexes calculated from soil moisture and precipitation. Study area was Haenam-gun, Jeollanam-do in Korea. Soil Moisture Index(SMI) was calculated from soil moisture data while the Standardized Precipitation Index(SPI) and the Palmer Drought Severity Index(PDSI) were calculated from meteorological data. All monthly data utilized in this study were observed at the KoFlux Tower. After the comparative analysis, three indexes showed similar tendency. Therefore, it is thought that the drought index using soil moisture measured at the KoFlux Tower is reasonable, which is because the soil moisture is immediately affected by all the meteorological factors.