Applicability of the InVEST Model for Estimating Water Yield in Upper Ganga Basin

The value of ecosystem services to society has increased many folds with time, along with the efforts to manage it. Integrated Valuation of Ecosystem Services and Tradeoffs (InVEST) occurs to be an effective model that assists in managing ecosystem services. However, the applicability of the InVEST model still requires testing in various geographic locations. With recent trends and observations, it is understood that there is a large Spatio-temporal variation in the hydro-meteorological parameters. Subsequently, the estimated water yield cannot be predicted better if the model assessed the single mean values of all the input hydro-meteorological parameters. Thus, a comprehensive analysis has been done in estimating water yield by mean Lumped Zhang model and spatial InVEST model. Also, the study weighed the performance of the InVEST model in estimating water yield in one of the most diverse and undulated topographic basins of India, i.e., Upper Ganga Basin. The estimated water yield values are compared with the observed in order to understand the variability of the yield models in predicting water yield in the Upper Ganga Basin.