Rainfall erosivity in municipalities of the Brazilian Cerrado Biome

The objective of this work was to estimate the rainfall erosivity in 101 municipalities in the Brazilian Cerrado biome. First, a filling of missing data was carried out for 81 rain gauge stations, with a 20-year historical series, in the states of Mato Grosso (MT), Mato Grosso do Sul (MS), Minas Gerais (MG), and Goias (GO). The corrected data were subjected to 16 regionally calibrated equations, which enabled the determination of the rainfall erosivity. The results indicated that municipalities in northeastern MS present the highest monthly erosivity indexes (El(30m)), reaching 2,796.5 MJ mm ha(-1) h(-1 )year(-1) in January, whereas the lowest index for this same month was 733.0 MJ mm ha(-1) h(-1) in the eastern MT. The rainfall annual erosivity, or R factor, varied between 3,713.1 and 12,345.6 MJ mm ha(-1) h(-1) year(-1), with the lowest values for municipalities in eastern MT and the highest values for those in northeastern MS. Although the municipalities studied are within the same biome, the spatial distribution makes them present regional effects due to different climatic factors, resulting in different rainfall volumes and intensities, which is reflected in the results of the monthly erosivity index and R factor.