Navigation and service

Station Selection Criteria

Summary, for detailed explanation see the adjacent Information note on GRDC station selection criteria, data format and transfer.

The guiding criteria for the selection of a station for provision to the GRDC (only a few are sufficient to select a station) are:

  • stations at rivers which reflect best the hydrological regime of a region or part of a country
  • stations at rivers which are economically important in terms of population density and/or agro-based or industrial production
  • last downstream stations at rivers which drain into the oceans or have an internal drainage
  • stations with annual average discharge

    • greater than around 100 cbm/s
    • among the 10-50 highest in a region or country
  • stations with basin sizes

    • greater than around 25.000 sqkm, if next station to the sea
    • greater than around 50.000 - 100.000 sq km
    • among the 10-50 largest in a region or country
  • stations at rivers where the basin population is greater than 1.000.000 inhabitants
  • stations of rivers in pristine basin (often very small ones)
  • stations with long records, i.e. longer than 30-40 years, ideally covering the WMO periods 1931-60 and 1961-90.
  • stations with up-to-date information (1990-now)
  • stations which provide Near-Real-Time (NRT) access to current data, preferably via internet

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