A distributed groundwater/surface water model for the Suså-catchment. Part 1: Model description

A distributed hydrological model has been developed for the Suså catchment, covering about 1,000 km² of Zealand, Denmark. Being a physically based description of the entire land phase of the hydrological cycle, the model is the result of an integration of an integrated finite difference groundwater model, an aquitard model, a model for unconfined phreatic aquifers and a root zone model. The main objective of the model has been to make possible predictions of the hydrological consequences of groundwater abstraction on the river discharges and on the hydraulic heads of the aquifers. Therefore special attention is given to the interaction between the streams and the aquifers. The model was tested against field data of streamflow, actual evapotranspiration, soil moisture deficit, drain water discharges and hydraulic heads of the confined aquifer. A model description and some results from the calibration and tests are given.