Determining water reservoir locations to meet the projected population and land cover land use using GIS and remote sensing techniques.

Abstract

Water forms a critical component of the basic human needs (Peter & Mubea, 2006) Water scarcity occurs where there are insufficient water resources available to meet average requirements. As such, balancing water scarcity and population demand is the major challenge in many arid and semi-arid regions in the world (Larry, 2009). Water storage is like an insurance mechanism that tackles consequences from this imbalance. Storage opens the possibilities for new economic activities where water is a production factor. Reliable access to irrigation water from storage opens a great potential for crop diversification. In addition, more reliable water supply is improved from storage (Jean , Jean-Marc , & Domitille , 2012). The success of surface Water Distribution Systems depends heavily on the identification of suitable sites and their technical design and components (Water Reservoirs). (Rida , Saad , & Al-Amoush, 2012) The selection of appropriate sites for different water reservoirs, in larger areas is a great challenge (Weerasinghe, 2011). GIS and remote sensing in hydrology and water resources have relieved some of the stress from the large time and effort that has been invested in realizing spatial and temporal patterns and characteristics of individual hydrologic processes by providing access to spatial and temporal information on watershed, regional, continental and global scales (Mohamad & Zhang , 2008). In this study Multi Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) is the technique which is used to select most optimal locations for Water reservoirs.