CREST v2.1 and previous versions are based on very simple and efficient land surface process computation, i.e., scaling the precipitation and PET to account for the vegetation interception and ET and using the variable infiltration curve in the Xinanjiang model, with emphasizing the modelling of flow. Vegetation structure, transpiration, interception and the snow process are not explicitly simulated. Although simple in simulating land surface process, CREST v2.1 works well for river discharge simulation. The major upgrade made in CREST v2.1 is the fully distributed linear reservoir routing method[1-2] that addresses the flow underestimation issue and is theoretically sound for a distributed hydrological model. A minor upgrade is the fully vectorization of the v2.1 matlab code, which increases the efficiency significantly. CREST v2.1.3 is compatible for both linux and windows x64 OS. However, pre-installation of the GDAL libraries on the machine is required for linux users, for which we are not responsible. After installing GDAL libraries, linux users need to compile the mex files to link GDAL dlls to CREST. Both tasks are not needed for win64 users. Please read the user manual for details. The model executables and an example basin, Tar River in North Carolina, is downloadable.

 

References:

[1] Shen, Xinyi, Yang Hong, Ke Zhang, and Zengchao Hao. “Refining a distributed linear reservoir routing method to improve performance of the CREST model.” Journal of Hydrologic Engineering 22, no. 3 (2016): 04016061.

[2] Shen, X., Y. Hong, K. Zhang, Z. Hao, and D. Wang. “CREST v2. 1 Refined by a Distributed Linear Reservoir Routing Scheme.” In AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts. 2014.

[3] Shen, Xinyi, Yang Hong, Emmanouil N. Anagnostou, Ke Zhang, and Zengchao Hao. “7 An Advanced Distributed Hydrologic Framework.” Hydrologic Remote Sensing: Capacity Building for Sustainability and Resilience (2016): 127.