Estimation of excess water in the Sebou basin for an interbasin water transfer

This paper aims to estimate the unusable water in the Sebou basin (Morocco) with a view to transferring them to the Bouregreg basin. To this end, a hydrological model of Belksiri Basin (7744 km2, downstream part of Sebou) was elaborated. Then, several simulations were carried out to estimate the flow resulting from rainfall, with different return periods, in the Belksiri catchment. The model validation showed good results (NSE = 0.70, R 2 = 0.78). As for simulations of flow provoked by different return periods of the rainfall depth, the results showed that the peak flow increases from 916 m3/s for the return period T = 2–6744 m3/s for T = 100. This study clearly showed the possibility of the flow and route optimization related to the North to South Water Transfer Project (NSWTP) in Morocco. Indeed, the transfer flow can be increased from some 45 m3/s to 200 m3/s.