Influence of Dam to Rainfall-Runoff Response in a Tropical Climate – A Case Study of Selangor River Basin, Malaysia

Abstract This paper discusses the rainfall-runoff response by comparing the runoff coefficient, c between two catchments of different characteristics within the Selangor River Basin, namely Catchment A (CA) and Catchment B (CB). Catchment B is a sub-catchment of Catchment A, whereby CA is about 6.8 times larger than to CB. The landscape of CB is largely covered by forest, has higher river slope and a dam completed in year 2004 at upstream of the basin. Annual mean-areal-rainfall (MAR) and total runoff from 1990 until 2018 was used for the rainfall-runoff coefficient, c calculations. The rainfall-runoff response was assessed by separating the analysis into 2-time frames; 1990 to 2000 (before dam construction) and 2007 to 2018 (after dam construction). The analysis before dam construction showed that CB has higher runoff response compared to CA. This was due to the difference in land use, catchment slope and lesser water abstractions compared to CA. The runoff coefficient, c for CA was in the range of 0.19-0.48, while CB was in the range of 0.59-0.79. This means that 19% to 48% of the rainfall was converted into runoff for CA, and 59% to 79% of the precipitation turned into runoff for CB. As suspected, after the dam construction the c coefficient for CB changed to 0.28-0.89, indicating a higher variability in the catchment response due to dam operations and control at the upstream.