Effects of network design on climatic maps of precipitation

We use a simulation study to investigate the effect of network arrangement on the spatial and volumetric estimation of rain fields from a limited number of gauges. Rainfall fields are created as summations of a number of random elliptical events. Each simulation is sampled by 6 different fixed network designs of 9 points. Isohyet maps provide spatial and volumetric estimates, which are then compared to the known characteristics of the events comprising the simulations. Additionally, 100 random network designs for each simulation provide sampling distributions of the number of dry points sampled, from which the efficiency of each network design is inferred. The choice of the 'best' design depends on the criterion which it is most important to satisfy and on the spatial characteristics of the rainfall events across the study area.