HYdraulic PRoperties of European Soils

The HYdraulic PRoperties of European Soils (HYPRES) database Was developed as an integral part of the EU funded project "Using existing soil data to derive hydraulic parameters for simulation modelling in environmental studies and in land use planning".

This Network activity also constituteD a working group of the European Soil Bureau Network. The project was funded under DG XII, Human Capital and Mobility ~ CHRX-CT94-0639.

Introduction

Simulation models are often used to investigate and predict a wide range of complex environmental processes. Many of these models are concerned with water and solute movement in the vadose zone and require water retention and unsaturated hydraulic conductivity data. However, these properties are difficult and time consuming to measure so, they are often estimated from more easily measured soil properties by a method known as pedotransfer.

• Project Coordinator: Henk Wösten [1], Alterra [2]
• Project Researcher: Allan Lilly [3], James Hutton Institute