Journal of Hydrology: Regional Studies 21 (2019) 57–67

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Journal of Hydrology: Regional Studies

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ejrh

The usefulness of alos-palsar dem data for drainage extraction in

T
semi-arid environments in The Iishana sub-basin
⁎
Johanna Ngula Niipele , Jianping Chen
China University of Geosciences, Earth Science and Resources Institute, Beijing, China

A R T IC LE I N F O ABS TRA CT

Keywords: Study region: The study area is the Iishana sub-basin located in north-central Namibia. The basin
Semi-arid environments is characterised by low-lying interconnected ephemeral drainage networks locally known as
Drainage networks Iishana. In the past decade, the basin has experienced frequent droughts and flooding events due
ArcHydro to recent weather anomalies possibly enhanced by the sprawling urban development.
Coefficient of line correspondence
Study focus: Although extensive studies have been conducted on water availability in the basin,
Normalized Difference Wetness Index
no attempts have been made to update existing hydrological maps which provide limited in-
Iishana sub-basin
formation on the impacts of geo-hydrological dynamics in the area. The aim of this study was to
test the effectiveness of the Advanced Land Observing Satellite Digital Elevation Model (ALOS
DEM) for drainage network extraction. ArcHydro tools were used for drainage feature extraction.
Validation of extracted networks was based on field observations and delineated networks from
earth observation data and Normalized Difference Wetness Index (NDWI). The accuracy of ex-
tracted drainage networks was assessed through visual observation of data overlay and the
coefficient of line correspondence (CLC).
New hydrological insights: The resulting drainage networks will be used to update the current
hydrographic map of the area which will aid in the development of flood and drought mitigating
measures for environmental management. The CLC computed metric obtained a 0.91 match
between extracted and delineated drainage networks. The results show that ALOS DEM is capable
of extracting drainage networks within the Iishana sub-basin.

1. Introduction

Arid to semi-arid environments are known to be water-scarce and therefore act as driving forces towards the advancement of
hydrological assessments (Luo et al., 2018). Lack of hydrological data in these water-scarce environments limits the ability to un-
derstand key hydrological processes. It is therefore important to assess the geomorphometric parameters of the drainage systems in
order to understand these processes as proposed by Genchi et al. (2016) for environmental management and monitoring purposes. In
this regard, earth scientists are constantly finding alternative means of environmental monitoring and naturally interested in dis-
covering new reserves of natural resources, thereby looking for effective means of deriving necessary information from earth ob-
servation (EO) data (Jensen and Jensen, 2013). EO derived information will naturally assist researchers to better understand the
environment and its operating systems, as attained in the studies by Pirotti and Tarolli (2010); Tarolli et al. (2012); Persendt and
Gomez (2016); Stanislawski et al. (2018) through DEM feature extraction. A number of studies have been conducted dealing with the
identification and extraction of drainage networks from the EO data. For instance, Pirotti and Tarolli (2010) used landform curvature

⁎
Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: 9201140005@cugb.edu.cn, jniipele@unam.na (J. Ngula Niipele).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejrh.2018.11.003
Received 12 July 2018; Received in revised form 21 November 2018; Accepted 29 November 2018
Available online 24 December 2018
2214-5818/ © 2018 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/BY-NC-ND/4.0/).
J. Ngula Niipele, J. Chen Journal of Hydrology: Regional Studies 21 (2019) 57–67

as an approach for channel network extraction from Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) data. Furthermore the effect of human
driven pressure on the geomorphology of different landscapes was assessed by Tarolli and Giulia (2016) using the LiDAR datasets to
extract anthropogenic induced pressure on the geomorphology across different landscapes. Equally, Cavalli et al. (2008) assessed the
potential of high-resolution airborne LiDAR data in differentiating morphological features of a landscape through the recognition of
channel-bed morphology. Persendt and Gomez (2016), made use of the airborne LiDAR data to extract drainage networks in a
complex low relief ephemeral river system of the Cuvelai River Basin. Similar studies by Doctor and Young, 2013; Stanislawski et al.,
2018, also considered the identification and extraction of morphological and hydrographical features using different Geographical
Information System (GIS) methods. Although high resolution datasets such as LiDAR have been proven to provide more reliable
extracted information especially drainage networks, the data is also known to have high amounts of noise which is expected to exist
in mega datasets. Furthermore, DEM resolution does not necessarily warrant the data free of artifacts. Even high resolution DEMs are
expected to contain some noise and errors that could affect the proper extraction of hydrological and geomorphological features. To
this effect, DEM manipulation is expected as DEMs normally contain errors that were generated during DEM production. Such errors
can be artificial depressions and pits that result from random noise effects during the DEM smoothing operation (Nourani, 2011;
Nourani et al., 2014).
Genchi et al. (2016) proposed an assessment of drainage network systems using a multivariate statistical analysis method. For this
purpose, an automated extraction of hydrographic features from Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM) DEM of 90 m resolution
was employed using the gravity concept which assumes that water flows from a higher elevation to downslope with no interception
or any other means of water loss during this process. The extracted drainage networks were validated against delineated drainage
networks from the Google imagery which were used to compare the accuracy of extracted networks. The accuracy thereof was
evaluated by setting appropriate Catchment Area Thresholds (CAT’s) according to their geomorphometric properties using the
Principal Component Analysis (PCA) coupled with the Cluster Analysis (CA) multivariate technologies. In a similar study by Zhang
et al. (2017), an optimization algorithm was developed to enhance the Triangulation Irregular Network (TIN)-based flow routing
applications by introducing a simple method of treating sinks and flat terrains while simultaneously enhancing the simulation of flow
routing in TIN structures. This triangulation-based reshaping algorithm was used as an underlying terrain model to determine
drainage patterns using a triangulation-based walking method following studies done by (Chen et al., 2014; Jones et al., 1990; Soukal
et al., 2012; Zhou et al., 2011). Furthermore, Qu et al. (2014) also developed a new algorithm which automatically extracts drainage
networks using TIN DEM. This algorithm was used to remove flat areas known to generate parallel straight lines from the DEM by
modifying the elevation of the flat triangle nodes. The accuracy of the resulting DEM-derived networks was validated with the
efficiency test, whereby the extraction of drainage networks shows a linear correlation against the number of triangles from the TIN
construction. Sousa and Paz (2017) used different methods to assess the quality of DEM-derived drainage networks from the SRTM
DEM. The results thereof were evaluated based on the ability of each method to distinctively distinguish the quality of DEM-derived
drainage networks. Amongst the evaluated methods, the mean distance metric method was deemed to be more adequate as it has the
ability to increase the quality of derived networks. The authors however, advise that this method be used in conjunction with a
detailed visual assessment which is useful in identifying complex drainage patterns not easily detected by any metrics in order to
optimize the accuracy of derived networks.
Drainage network extraction is mainly based on extracting surface drainage features which are a fundamental requirement in all
hydro-environmental studies. The extraction of surface drainage features has however proven problematic in flat reliefs whereby
areas covered by pits and flat terrains generate straight and parallel lines during processing. Therefore, algorithms tailored to solve
problems resulting from pits and flat areas have been developed. These algorithms are amongst the numerous existing methods
developed for the purpose of retrieving environmental parameters from DEMs. However, most of these algorithms are area and
terrain specific and therefore are not applicable to all areas even those with the same environmental parameters. It is therefore
imperative to find and identify algorithms that are more accurate in extracting information in specific study areas, given their
landscape characteristics. Example of such algorithms can be noted in studies by Jones (2002); Yang et al. (2010) who developed
algorithms effective in recognizing and processing pits and flat areas by searching for cells with the lowest elevation between eight
adjacent cells. These algorithms use a 3-by-3 moving window to determine the maximum drop from all cells to their eight adjacent
neighbours. However, if the elevation of the eight adjacent neighbours are higher than the central cell, then the central cell is
regarded as a pit or flat area which can be processed further using a specific algorithm such as the heuristic information algorithm
proposed by Yang et al. (2010). The aforementioned studies, followed the concept introduced by O’Callaghan and Mark (1984) who
also suggested assigning flow directions to flat areas from the adjacent eight neighbouring cells, whereby flow is either adjacent or
diagonal towards the steepest downslope directional cell. This method was however found to produce unrealistic parallel flow
patterns as explained in a study by (Stanislawski et al., 2018). Therefore, it is advisable that further processing be done on the DEM to
ensure that networks across areas representing natural depressions are correctly extracted (Stanislawski et al., 2018).
Additionally, DEMs are known to contain errors that can hamper with algorithms used in extracting hydrographic, morphological
and anthropogenic features in the calculations of water flow directions. Most of these errors are presented by depressions which are
minimal points in the DEM locally surrounded by elevated areas. Generally, depressions do not drain, and although most of them are
errors resulting from DEM productions, a few of them are actually real depressions especially those found around channel mean-
dering (Colombo et al., 2001).
Drainage networks automatically derived from DEM are in all cases usually denser than digitised networks. Also, when well pre-
conditioned DEM data are used in hydrographic feature extraction the derivatives are more accurate as compared to digitised features
which are influenced by scale differences. However, Colombo et al. (2001) suggested that the accurate evaluation of extracted
hydrographic features is best tested against an existing hydrographic dataset digitised from maps ranging between 1:10,000 and

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1:100,000 using qualitative and quantitative validation methods as long as the data is validated and provide an acceptable accuracy.
In the case of the study area, most depressions are representing the numerous seasonal pans that exist in the area. Therefore, in
order to ensure that the resulting hydrographic features extracted from the DEM are accurate, the resulting depression errors need to
be removed from the DEM before feature extraction. Since flat areas have no defined flow direction, it is necessary to assign flow
directions to these areas. In the study by Jenson and Domingue (1988) cells representing flat areas in the DEM were assigned flow
directions pointing to adjacent cells having flow directions.
Ozulu and Gökgöz (2018) emphasized on the importance of determining stream threshold as the basis on which flow accumu-
lation statistics are calculated and are therefore important parameters that have direct influence on drainage network and basin
boundary extraction. As it is a case of the current study, stream thresholds were assessed along other parameters, however were not
given further attention. In a similar study by Fairfield and Leymarie (1991), a stochastic approach was proposed to solve drainage
flow directional problems generated through the D8 algorithm. Although this method was able to successfully solve the directional
problems, it was noted to generate unwanted features in some areas such as multiple flow directional lines that are normally noted
across pit areas (Jana et al., 2007; Jones, 2002; Tarboton, 1997). Furthermore, the importance of DEM in feature extraction is
resourceful and therefore the topographic data derived “must be sufficiently accurate” (Colombo et al., 2001) so as to ensure error
free results.
The accuracy of extracted drainage networks can be validated through various methods such as the conflation analysis method,
which is a process used to combine geographic information from overlapping data sources in order to obtain accurate data, minimize
redundancy and reconcile data conflict. Another method is the coefficient of line correspondence (CLC), a method used to auto-
matically identify matching and mismatching linear features from two separate networks (Stanislawski et al., 2018; Stanislawski and
Buttenfield, 2010).
This study is organized into five sections as follows: section one gives a brief background to the study area. Section two, in-
troduces the study area. Section three provides highlights on the methodologies used in identifying and extracting drainage networks
through the ArcHydro Groundwater (AHGW) extension tools in ArcGIS 10.3. Section four discusses the obtained results. Section five
summarises the conclusions drawn from this study.

Fig. 1. Map of the study area.

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2. study area

The study area is the Iishana sub-basin located in the north-central parts of Namibia (Fig. 1). The basin covers an area of
approximately 13,625 km2. The area coverage of the basin was calculated from the boundary extend in the ArcGIS 10.3 software. The
boundary shape of the basin was developed by Bittner Water Consult CC (BIWAC) under the project on the “Demarcation of Water
Basins on National level” which was commissioned by the Ministry of Water and Forestry, Department of Water Affairs, Government
Republic of Namibia in collaboration with the Deutsche Gesellschaft für technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ) GmbH. The basin is
mainly characterised by homogeneous landscapes of low-lying shallow interconnected water ponds and network systems locally
known as Oshana (singular) or (Iishana) plural and sparse vegetation cover. These systems have a slight downhill sloping in a north-
south direction. Vegetation type is mostly made up of sparsely distributed woody tree stands, shrubs and grasses (Mendelsohn Jarvis
and Robertson (2013)). Between the network systems exist mounds of elevated sandy soils traditionally used for household con-
struction, crop fields and livestock grazing (Niipele et al., 2015). Equally, the area is fragile and susceptible to extreme climatic events
and as a result faces occasional water problems.
The geology of the area is characterised by sparsely distributed sedimentary rocks, clay, calcrete, and sandy soils which are
believed to have been instigated by the foundation of depressed earth slumps and excessive periods of deposition. The basin is highly
characterised by deep Kalahari sandy soils dominated by arenosols. The nature of the soil depends on the degree by which they were
deposited and influenced by erosional factors such as wind or water. The wind-blown soils are generally infertile and can only hold a
limited amount of water. The water borne sediments are concentrated in the main drainage channels. These sediments have high clay
content, deeming it difficult for the cultivation of locally grown staple crops. The higher parts of the channel are characterised by
darker soils, which become lighter towards the center of the channel flow, (Mendelsohn Jarvis et al., 2002). Existing information on
the geology of the study area is based on the reconstruction of the marginal outcrops combined with seismic, aeromagnetic and
gravity surveys that were conducted in the area as well as a few sparsely distributed lithological wells. These information do not
provide a broad picture of the geology of the wider basin which stretches from Angola into northern Namibia, as the Angolan half of
the basin is poorly represented (Hipondoka, 2005).

3. Methods

3.1. Remotely sensed data

The ALOS DEM with 12.5 m resolution, downloaded from the Alaska Satellite Facility (ASF) Distributed Active Archive Center
(DAAC) was used to identify and automatically extract drainage networks in the study area.
The Landsat 8 OLI scenes (Path 179, Row 072 and 073; Path 189, Row 072 and 073) with spatial resolution of 30 × 30 m
retrieved from (NASA Landsat Program, 2000) were used to digitise networks as well as for the calculation of the wetness index.
Topographic maps drawn from air photographs taken in 1970 (Job No. 878/70) with a scale factor of 1:250 000 and 1:50 000
respectively surveyed and mapped in 1974 were also used to recognise and digitise drainage networks. These maps were acquired
from the Office of the Survey General, Ministry of Land Reform, Government Republic of Namibia. Further information pertaining to
remote sensing imageries used in the study are indicated in Table 1.

3.2. Drainage network extraction

The Iishana sub-basin has a complex landscape which is characterised by broad and shallow interconnected drainage networks
which are not well defined in terms of channel delineation. These characteristics hamper the accurate assessments of the landscape of
the area. Also, the absence of riparian vegetation stands along ephemeral river channels prevents the application of traditional
methods of assessing hydrographic features. In this regard, an objective and automatic extraction method has been employed to
effectively recognise channel features, therefore presenting answers to the development of accurate hydrological maps of the study
area (Pirotti and Tarolli, 2010). Drainage patterns have mainly been extracted from DEM of higher resolution and smaller pixel sizes
as DEMs with larger cell sizes are considered to be close to the minimum width of channels that might be under investigation as

Table 1
Information on remote sensing data used in the study.
ALOS - PALSAR DEM Landsat 8 OLI Topographic Maps (tile/ scenes covering extent of the study area)

Spatial Resolution 12.5 m x 12.5 m 30 m x 30 m 1:250 000 and 1:50 000

Scene AP_08822_FBD_F6820_RT1 p179r072_20170429 1715
AP_08997_F6810_RT1 p179r073_20170206 1716
AP_08997_F6820_RT1 p180r072_20170213 1815
AP_08997 _F6830_RT1 p180r073_20170213 1816
AP_10091_F6810_RT1
AP_10835_F6810_RT1
Date of acquisition 20 September 2017 February to April 2017 1974
Source https://vertex.daac.asf.alaska.edu http://earthexplorer.usgs.gov/ http://www.mlr.gov.na

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explained in the study by (Cavalli et al., 2008) and hence not suitable for hydrographic and morphological extractions.
In the case of the current research study, the ALOS DEM was considered as alternative dataset for drainage network extraction as
opposed to the airborne LiDAR data which has a much higher spectral resolution. The dataset was considered since it provides a finer
spatial resolution that can detect much shallower and narrower drainage networks such as those found in the study area which are
not detectable from coarse resolution datasets. Furthermore, the dataset is freely available and is error free making it useful for large
geographic areas. The study was mainly concerned with drainage network feature recognition and extraction. For this purpose, a
depicted DEM was used in extracting drainage networks as it is deemed essential in ruling out possibilities of subjectivities of channel
identification such as those produced during image interpretation. In order to recognise the hydrographic directions, the ArcHydro
terrain processing tools were used.
ArcHydro is a GIS data structure for hydrographic analysis. The ArcHydro application provides the basis for hydrological data
modelling (ESRI, 2013). The application is also able to automatically remove artifacts from DEM by conditioning the DEM dataset
(Nourani et al., 2014). The process of automatically removing artifacts does not discriminate between true depressions and artifacts
generated through the fill process. Therefore, in order to preserve the true depressions, manual digitisation of polylines across
anthropogenic features such as bridges and culverts is required. The digitised features are then burned into the DEM to represent a
perceived low elevation point that allows water-flow to pass through, (Doctor and Young, 2013). Furthermore, Doctor and Young
(2013) used the depression extraction processing technique in ArcHydro to automatically detect and derive depressions as well as to
incorporate delineated depressions and drainage networks into the DEM in order to extract accurate drainage flow lines. Although the
technique was found to be effective, the accuracy of extracted features was totally dependent upon the pre-conditioning of the DEM
dataset. In a similar study by (Gopinath et al., 2014), the ArcHydro application tools were used to extract drainage networks from the
SRTM DEM dataset. However, due to the coarse resolution of the dataset, the default stream threshold was not sufficient enough to
identify all networks especially narrower tributaries that cover an area less than the cell size of the SRTM DEM. Therefore, the study
employed different stream thresholds to determine the threshold most suitable for extracting a sufficient amount of drainage network
density. In the case of the current study, the default stream threshold was adopted as the ALOS DEM used was able to detect all
necessary drainage networks as most of them were equivalent to the cell size of the dataset, even those that could not be detected
from conventional satellite imageries such as Landsat 8 OLI dataset.

3.2.1. Drainage network digitisation

Before commencement, it was necessary to manually delineate drainage networks from topographic maps of the study area as the
current existing hydrographic network of the area is outdated and does not perfectly match drainage networks from satellite data.
Delineating drainage networks in a complex ephemeral network system proved to be a cumbersome task. Therefore, in order to
effectively digitise drainage networks in the study area, a combination of datasets were used as back drapes. Landsat 8 OLI and
topographic maps were used to manually digitise drainage networks across the study area. Due to the complexity and dense drainage
network system in the northern parts of the study area, manually delineating these networks proved problematic even from the
Landsat 8 OLI as it was difficult to identify proper networks from the complex mesh as shown in Fig. 2. Therefore, a wetness index
was calculated from the Landsat 8 OLI (of the wet season) from Fig. 3 to aid in identifying drainage networks. The wetness index was
calculated using Eq. (1) Normalized Differential Wetness Index (NDWI).
NIR − GREEN
NDWI =
NIR + GREEN (1)
A wet season image was considered as the area is highly characterised by low-lying flat terrains made up of ephemeral drainage
networks and sparsely distributed vegetation stands of which most will be difficult to identify from a dry season image considering
the fact that most parts of the area will be indicated as bare ground during the dry period. Also, a few points collected in the field
along drainage networks were overlain and used as guidance through the digitisation process. Furthermore, manual digitisation of
networks was limited to drainage networks that run along the drainage lines where field points were available.

3.2.2. Drainage network identification and extraction

Drainage networks were extracted through the ArcHydro tools from the ALOS DEM. ArcHydro is an ArcGIS extension tool,
specifically tailored for hydro-geomorphological analysis and modeling (ESRI, 2009; Nourani et al., 2014). Given the complexity and
shallow seasonal water collecting ponds within the study area, it was necessary to conduct DEM preprocessing by performing DEM
manipulation. Generally, preprocessing analyses are conducted on the DEM to filter out errors that might exist. For this purpose, DEM
reconditioning was considered in order to remove possible existing depressions as well as to increase the degree of agreement
between automatically extracted drainage networks and the delineated drainage networks. Automatic drainage networks were ex-
tracted using terrain preprocessing tools under the NDNR Hydrology toolbox. Terrain preprocessing tools provide multiple func-
tionality processing sequence, whereby it performs DEM reconditioning, depression filling, while in the same processing step it also
creates flow directions, flow accumulations, catchments, drainage lines and drainage head points. The first step was to remove
depressions from the DEM. Depressions are removed by filling. Depressions were removed as they are assumed to be artifacts that
resulted during DEM generation. Removing depressions limits the interference of drainage flow across the DEM which means that the
elevation point of depression removal is raised to the level of drainage networks. After depressions were removed, manually deli-
neated networks were burned into the DEM to reduce the possibility of extracting straight and parallel lines across depressions and
anthropogenic morphological features (e.g. bridges, water canal, roads, etc.). However, the output hereof in Fig. 4 (a) consisted of
errors of straight and parallel lines. Therefore, DEM manipulation was employed to filter out and minimize or eliminate errors

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Fig. 2. A complex mesh of interconnected drainage network systems in the study area.

observed in the first output. DEM manipulation entailed smoothing out the DEM in order to preserve the rougher morphology of the
depressions and other landforms that might exist in the study area as well as manually erasing known artifacts such as road networks,
fence boundaries and bridge walls.
Although depression filling is intended to aid in the extraction of accurate drainage networks, improper filling can result in
disconnected networks especially in filled areas where natural occurring features and pans that act as depressions are located.
Extracted networks may include straight and parallel features appearing in filled areas as observed in Fig. 4 (a). Drainage networks
appearing as straight and parallel features originating or passing through identified depressions were modified by generating a
difference raster image. The difference raster image was generated by subtracting the smooth DEM from the filled DEM and the
resulting raster converted to a polygon file. The smooth DEM can also be referred to as the mean DEM which was generated by
calculating the mean of the original DEM using the focal statistics tool in ArcGIS.
The resulting polygon file is a representative of the possible depressions from the reconditioned filled-difference raster based on
the accuracy of the ALOS DEM. The new polygon layer was refined by superimposing existing polygon (features and pans) layers as
training feature classes. Only polygons representing areas with the depths equalling to and greater than 10 m were considered from
the extracted depressions. Furthermore, the derived depressions were superimposed onto the Landsat imagery to assess the cor-
rectness of the extracted polygons. Existing polygons were equally superimposed onto the Landsat imagery and polygons that were
not correctly overlain were manually digitised to correct them. The resulting polygon file was converted to a polyline feature in order
to define depression boundaries. The polyline file was further merged with the manually delineated drainage networks and burned
into the smooth DEM. The resulting DEM with burned in features was therefore used to re-extract drainage networks indicated in
Fig. 4 (b).

3.2.3. Validation of extracted features

Ideally, extracted drainage networks should be validated with existing standard drainage networks covering the same study area
extent. Moreover, there is no absolute defined standard method of how validating layers should appear. Hence, it is important to
define an absolute practical method of determining the accuracy of extracted features given the characteristics of the study area. For
the purpose of this study, extracted depression features from the difference raster image were validated by superimposing existing

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Fig. 3. The wetness index (NDWI) image used to aid drainage delineation.

feature and pan layers, and visually inspecting the accuracy through an overlay operation. Polygons that were correctly overlain were
assumed to be accurate. However, polygons appearing in areas where depressions are not identifiable from the overlain existing
features and raster imageries (Landsat 8, aerial photographs and topographic maps) were manually removed as they were assumed to
be errors. Furthermore, extracted drainage networks were validated through visual overlay by superimposing delineated drainage
networks and by computing the CLC metric of both datasets. Validating the accuracy of extracted drainage networks by visual
inspection alone, does not scientifically prove that the result obtained is accurate. Therefore, the CLC analysis method was employed
to calculate the accuracy of extracted drainage networks in conjunction with visual inspection of overlays. The CLC metric was
computed by dividing the total sum of the drainage network length of the matching lines for both extracted and delineated networks
from the total sum of the drainage network of both datasets using Eq. (2).

Lm
CLC = ∑ ⎛ La ⎞ (2)
⎝ ⎠

where Lm is the sum of the length of the matching lines from both datasets and La is the sum of the length of all lines in both datasets.

4. Result and discussion

The northern part of the study area, is highly characterised by a dense drainage network system which provided a challenge in
manually digitizing networks as most networks are not well defined and exist as a mesh (Fig. 2). Therefore, the wetness index (NDWI)
was calculated to assist with drainage delineation, whereby values indicating wet areas are shown by 0 and none wet areas are
indicated by -1 in.(Fig. 3). The selected dates for Landsat 8 scenes were used as they are cloud free and the month falls within a
rainfall period making it easy to identify drainage network surface water lines. Therefore, the resulting wetness areas were assumed
to be indicative of ephemeral drainage networks.
The first drainage network results were extracted from the original DEM with burned-in streams. However, errors of straight and
parallel lines were extracted along drainage meandering as well as over depressions as indicated in Fig. 4 (a). Furthermore, the
generated double drainage lines were eliminated by manually identifying and classifying depressions, converting them into linear
features and then merging them with delineated networks. The merged files were then burned into the smoothed DEM and the result
thereof provided an improved drainage network system as shown in Fig. 4 (b). The derived depressions were coupled with existing

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Fig. 4. (a) Extracted drainage networks from a pre-conditioned original DEM with digitized networks. (b) Extracted drainage networks from a pre-
conditioned smoothed DEM with digitized networks, features, pans and extracted depressions.

pans and drainage features delineated from topographic maps and aerial photographs for DEM reconditioning. The process of
burning-in drainage networks is also known as stream burning which is performed on DEMs to force extracted drainage networks
along known drainage lines. The concept used in this study followed a similar method by Hutchinson (1989), who developed an
algorithm to automatically remove artificial pits by resampling necessary points from the original DEM to construct a new DEM.
Although the approach by Hutchinson (1989) is different from the conventional methods used in recent years, the technique follows
similar theories of identifying and removing artifacts from DEMs as well as using the data enforcement method to input existing
features into DEMs in order to improve the accuracy of derived drainage networks.
It should also be noted that delineated flow lines cannot always represent the truth. This is due to the problem of generalizing the
information during the digitisation process as well as the projection of underlying maps used to derive the networks. Therefore, it is
important to prepare the DEM in terms of projection accuracy and data quality before the commencement of feature extraction.
Furthermore, digitised networks from topographic maps of flat terrains usually do not coincide with automatically extracted drainage
networks. These types of errors originate from the generalisation of the terrain form during DEM sampling and can be eliminated
through the manual removal of stray streams and other features that might derail the delineation of accurate drainage networks. Also,
the automatic extraction of drainage networks can be forced along known accurately digitised drainage networks by burning them
into the DEM (Colombo et al., 2001). In the case of the current study, possible errors originating from the stream burning process
were avoided by concentrating the process in areas with insufficient relief represented by depressions.
The accuracy of the extracted drainage networks was evaluated by visual inspection and by computing the CLC metric. Visual
inspection was done through data overlay of the Landsat image and NDWI data. Visual inspection of extracted drainage networks
shows that most networks perfectly overlay against delineated networks (Figs. 5 and 6). In a similar study by Colombo et al. (2001),
the visual inspection method was employed to assess the correctness of extracted drainage networks by superimposing derived
networks against delineated networks. DEM derived drainage networks that did not correctly overlay onto delineated drainage
networks were corrected by eliminating stray networks that cause problems during the extraction process and also by burning-in
known flow lines digitised from topographic maps into the DEM.
In order to statistically determine the accuracy of extracted drainage networks, the CLC metric was computed as proposed in a
study by Stanislawski et al. (2018) and was employed to automatically estimate the similarities between the extracted and manually
digitised drainage networks. The metric was used as it is able to automatically identify the matching and mismatching of linear
features within network systems. The accuracy of the extracted drainage networks computed through the CLC metric was found to

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Fig. 5. Shows visual comparison of delineated drainage networks superimposed onto automatically extracted drainage networks and the ALOS
DEM. (a) Extracted drainage networks of the entire study area. Zoomed-in sections of (b) extracted drainage networks, (c) delineated networks and
(d) delineated and extracted drainage networks.

highly match with delineated drainage networks, providing an accuracy of 0.91. The accuracy value is based on the CLC value range
between 0.0 indicating a no match between features and 1.0, which indicates a perfect match between features. The CLC metric is
also known as the line of best fit which best explains the relationship between two or more variables. This is based on a straight line
that results from a simple linear regression analysis of two or more independent variables. Although the study employed the CLC
validation method, other methods for determining the accuracy of extracted networks exist. The conflation analysis method is
another method used for validating extracted drainage networks. However, this method was not considered in the study as it requires
an existing detailed hydrographic dataset which is not available for our current study area. Similarly, the Principal Component
Analysis (PCA), Cluster Analysis multivariate techniques and the Coefficient of Area Correspondence (CAC) are other applicable
methods. However, the aforementioned techniques are more applicable to use for surface areas rather than linear features as provided
in studies by (Genchi et al., 2016; Stanislawski and Buttenfield, 2010).
Although numerous methods exist for validating the accuracy of extracted drainage networks, there is still no recognised
quantifiable method. Therefore, care should be taken when selecting any method, putting into consideration the landscape char-
acteristics of the observed area, the data type being used to extract drainage networks and the quality of such data.

5. Conclusion

The purpose of this study was to test the effectiveness of ALOS DEM data in extracting drainage network features within complex
ephemeral river networks as a cost-effective dataset in the absence of high-resolution imageries such as LiDAR datasets. Due to the
complex drainage network system, accurately extracting drainage networks along meanderings and over depressions proved difficult.
Therefore, these errors were eliminated by reconditioning the DEM through DEM smoothing, stream and depression burn-in.
For the purpose of this study, it was important to assess delineated drainage networks used in validating the accuracy of extracted
drainage networks as they are an important component in the extraction of accurate flow lines. Moreover, due to environmental
conditions such as extensive droughts and flooding events that frequently occur in the study area, it was assumed that digitised
feature boundaries have changed over the years given the low relief and shallow networks that characterise the area. Hence, the
accuracy of secondary data was assessed by superimposing features onto the aerial photographs, topographic maps and Landsat 8
imagery in the case of larger features covering cell size equal to or greater than the Landsat grid size of 30 m. Furthermore, for a total

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Fig. 6. Shows superimposed drainage networks depicting the relationship between networks extracted through various methods. The dashed line
indicates extracted drainage networks, the polygons shows drainage areas extracted through the NDWI, and the solid line shows digitized drainage
networks.

error elimination, an extensive cleaning and filtering of the extracted networks was employed by erasing features that are known to
be representing road networks, fencing boundaries and bridge walls. This step was necessary as the process of automatically deriving
networks does not only extract hydrographic features but also morphometric and anthropogenic features that might be identified as
drainage networks. As can be observed from the results, drainage networks extracted from the ALOS DEM showed promising results,
therefore deeming the data effective in the identification and extraction of flow lines in complex semi-arid environments with low
relief.
Even though the study employed the CLC metric for testing the accuracy of extracted drainage networks, the study is optimistic
that ALOS DEM data can effectively be used in detecting and extracting networks using different parameters. Therefore, follow-up
studies should be conducted on the ALOS DEM focusing on comparing different geomorphometric parameters for hydrographic
feature extraction as well as testing the effectiveness of the dataset in different environments in order to assess the full potential of the
dataset. Likewise, follow-up studies can also make use of different metric calculations for accuracy testing on features extracted from
the ALOS DEM data. Finally, the resulting drainage networks generated within this study will be used to update the current hy-
drographic map of the study area.

Author declaration

None.
Author contribution
The manuscript and all the related data analysis were analysed and prepared by Ms. Johanna N Niipele as part of her PhD
corresponding work.
Professor Jianping Chen provided supervisory guidance and mentorship to Ms. Niipele as her supervisor. And also provided the
ALOS DEM data used in the paper.

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J. Ngula Niipele, J. Chen Journal of Hydrology: Regional Studies 21 (2019) 57–67

Conflict of interest

None.

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank Dr. Patrik Klintenberg and Dr. Eric Thompson Brantson for their assistance and guidance in the com-
pilation of this paper. We are also grateful to NASA, USGS, GLCF and the Ministry of Land Reform (MLR), office of the Survey
General, in Namibia for freely availing EO datasets used in this study.
The ALOS data products used in the study were retrieved from the online Data Pool, courtesy of the NASA Land Processes
Distributed Active Archive Center (LP DAAC), USGS/Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) Center, Sioux Falls, South
Dakota, https://lpdaac.usgs.gov/data_access/data_pool. We are truly grateful for the provision of these data as it is the focal point of
our study.

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