SARIMA Approach to Generating Synthetic Monthly Rainfall in the Sinú River Watershed in Colombia

Seasonal Auto Regressive Integrative Moving Average models (SARIMA) were developed for monthly rainfall time series. Normality of the rainfall time series was achieved by using the Box Cox transformation. The best SARIMA models were selected based on their autocorrelation function (ACF), partial autocorrelation function (PACF), and the minimum values of the Akaike Information Criterion (AIC). The result of the Ljung–Box statistical test shows the randomness and homogeneity of each model residuals. The performance and validation of the SARIMA models were evaluated based on various statistical measures, among these, the Student’s t-test. It is possible to obtain synthetic records that preserve the statistical characteristics of the historical record through the SARIMA models. Finally, the results obtained can be applied to various hydrological and water resources management studies. This will certainly assist policy and decision-makers to establish strategies, priorities, and the proper use of water resources in the Sinu river watershed.