Articles | Volume 19, issue 6
https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-2821-2015
© Author(s) 2015. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.
https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-2821-2015
© Author(s) 2015. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.
Research article
| 
19 Jun 2015
Research article |
| 19 Jun 2015
Including the dynamic relationship between climatic variables and leaf area index in a hydrological model to improve streamflow prediction under a changing climate
Z. K. Tesemma
Department of Infrastructure Engineering, The University of Melbourne, Parkville, Victoria, 3010, Australia
Y. Wei
CORRESPONDING AUTHOR
Department of Infrastructure Engineering, The University of Melbourne, Parkville, Victoria, 3010, Australia
M. C. Peel
Department of Infrastructure Engineering, The University of Melbourne, Parkville, Victoria, 3010, Australia
A. W. Western
Department of Infrastructure Engineering, The University of Melbourne, Parkville, Victoria, 3010, Australia
Related authors
Z. K. Tesemma, Y. Wei, M. C. Peel, and A. W. Western
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/hessd-11-10515-2014, https://doi.org/10.5194/hessd-11-10515-2014, 2014
Revised manuscript not accepted
Hansini Gardiya Weligamage, Keirnan Fowler, Margarita Saft, Tim Peterson, Dongryeol Ryu, and Murray Peel
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2024-373, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2024-373, 2025
Preprint under review for HESS
Short summary
Short summary
This study is the first to propose actual evapotranspiration (AET) signatures, which can be used to assess multiple aspects of AET dynamics across various temporal scales. As a demonstration, we applied AET signatures to evaluate two remotely sensed (RS) AET products against flux tower AET. The results reveal specific deficiencies in RS AET and provide guidance for selecting appropriate RS AET, including for modelling studies.
Tobias F. Selkirk, Andrew W. Western, and J. Angus Webb
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-3149, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-3149, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
This study investigated rainfall in eastern Australia to search for patterns that may aid in predicting flood and drought. The current popular consensus is that such cycles do not exist. We analysed 130 years of rainfall using a very modern technique for identifying cycles in complex signals. The results showed strong evidence for three clear cycles of 12.9, 20.4 and 29.1 years with a confidence of 99.99 %. When combined, they showed an 80 % alignment to years of extremely high and low rainfall.
Theresa Boas, Heye Reemt Bogena, Dongryeol Ryu, Harry Vereecken, Andrew Western, and Harrie-Jan Hendricks Franssen
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 3143–3167, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-3143-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-3143-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
In our study, we tested the utility and skill of a state-of-the-art forecasting product for the prediction of regional crop productivity using a land surface model. Our results illustrate the potential value and skill of combining seasonal forecasts with modelling applications to generate variables of interest for stakeholders, such as annual crop yield for specific cash crops and regions. In addition, this study provides useful insights for future technical model evaluations and improvements.
Keirnan Fowler, Murray Peel, Margarita Saft, Tim J. Peterson, Andrew Western, Lawrence Band, Cuan Petheram, Sandra Dharmadi, Kim Seong Tan, Lu Zhang, Patrick Lane, Anthony Kiem, Lucy Marshall, Anne Griebel, Belinda E. Medlyn, Dongryeol Ryu, Giancarlo Bonotto, Conrad Wasko, Anna Ukkola, Clare Stephens, Andrew Frost, Hansini Gardiya Weligamage, Patricia Saco, Hongxing Zheng, Francis Chiew, Edoardo Daly, Glen Walker, R. Willem Vervoort, Justin Hughes, Luca Trotter, Brad Neal, Ian Cartwright, and Rory Nathan
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 26, 6073–6120, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-6073-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-6073-2022, 2022
Short summary
Short summary
Recently, we have seen multi-year droughts tending to cause shifts in the relationship between rainfall and streamflow. In shifted catchments that have not recovered, an average rainfall year produces less streamflow today than it did pre-drought. We take a multi-disciplinary approach to understand why these shifts occur, focusing on Australia's over-10-year Millennium Drought. We evaluate multiple hypotheses against evidence, with particular focus on the key role of groundwater processes.
Luca Trotter, Wouter J. M. Knoben, Keirnan J. A. Fowler, Margarita Saft, and Murray C. Peel
Geosci. Model Dev., 15, 6359–6369, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-15-6359-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-15-6359-2022, 2022
Short summary
Short summary
MARRMoT is a piece of software that emulates 47 common models for hydrological simulations. It can be used to run and calibrate these models within a common environment as well as to easily modify them. We restructured and recoded MARRMoT in order to make the models run faster and to simplify their use, while also providing some new features. This new MARRMoT version runs models on average 3.6 times faster while maintaining very strong consistency in their outputs to the previous version.
Qichun Yang, Quan J. Wang, Andrew W. Western, Wenyan Wu, Yawen Shao, and Kirsti Hakala
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 26, 941–954, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-941-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-941-2022, 2022
Short summary
Short summary
Forecasts of evaporative water loss in the future are highly valuable for water resource management. These forecasts are often produced using the outputs of climate models. We developed an innovative method to correct errors in these forecasts, particularly the errors caused by deficiencies of climate models in modeling the changing climate. We apply this method to seasonal forecasts of evaporative water loss across Australia and achieve significant improvements in the forecast quality.
Keirnan J. A. Fowler, Suwash Chandra Acharya, Nans Addor, Chihchung Chou, and Murray C. Peel
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 13, 3847–3867, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-13-3847-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-13-3847-2021, 2021
Short summary
Short summary
This paper presents the Australian edition of the Catchment Attributes and Meteorology for Large-sample Studies (CAMELS) series of datasets. CAMELS-AUS comprises data for 222 unregulated catchments with long-term monitoring, combining hydrometeorological time series (streamflow and 18 climatic variables) with 134 attributes related to geology, soil, topography, land cover, anthropogenic influence and hydroclimatology. It is freely downloadable from https://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.921850.
Shuci Liu, Dongryeol Ryu, J. Angus Webb, Anna Lintern, Danlu Guo, David Waters, and Andrew W. Western
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 25, 2663–2683, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-2663-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-2663-2021, 2021
Short summary
Short summary
Riverine water quality can change markedly at one particular location. This study developed predictive models to represent the temporal variation in stream water quality across the Great Barrier Reef catchments, Australia. The model structures were informed by a data-driven approach, which is useful for identifying important factors determining temporal changes in water quality and, in turn, providing critical information for developing management strategies.
Theresa Boas, Heye Bogena, Thomas Grünwald, Bernard Heinesch, Dongryeol Ryu, Marius Schmidt, Harry Vereecken, Andrew Western, and Harrie-Jan Hendricks Franssen
Geosci. Model Dev., 14, 573–601, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-14-573-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-14-573-2021, 2021
Short summary
Short summary
In this study we were able to significantly improve CLM5 model performance for European cropland sites by adding a winter wheat representation, specific plant parameterizations for important cash crops, and a cover-cropping and crop rotation subroutine to its crop module. Our modifications should be applied in future studies of CLM5 to improve regional yield predictions and to better understand large-scale impacts of agricultural management on carbon, water, and energy fluxes.
Danlu Guo, Anna Lintern, J. Angus Webb, Dongryeol Ryu, Ulrike Bende-Michl, Shuci Liu, and Andrew William Western
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 24, 827–847, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-827-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-827-2020, 2020
Short summary
Short summary
This study developed predictive models to represent the spatial and temporal variation of stream water quality across Victoria, Australia. The model structures were informed by a data-driven approach, which identified the key controls of water quality variations from long-term records. These models are helpful to identify likely future changes in water quality and, in turn, provide critical information for developing management strategies to improve stream water quality.
Wouter J. M. Knoben, Jim E. Freer, Keirnan J. A. Fowler, Murray C. Peel, and Ross A. Woods
Geosci. Model Dev., 12, 2463–2480, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-12-2463-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-12-2463-2019, 2019
Short summary
Short summary
Computer models are used to predict river flows. A good model should represent the river basin to which it is applied so that flow predictions are as realistic as possible. However, many different computer models exist, and selecting the most appropriate model for a given river basin is not always easy. This study combines computer code for 46 different hydrological models into a single coding framework so that models can be compared in an objective way and we can learn about model differences.
Chinchu Mohan, Andrew W. Western, Yongping Wei, and Margarita Saft
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 22, 2689–2703, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-22-2689-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-22-2689-2018, 2018
Short summary
Short summary
To ensure a sustainable supply of groundwater, scientific information about what is going into the system as recharge and what is taken out of the system via pumping is essential. This study identified the most influential factors in groundwater recharge and developed an empirical global recharge model. The meteorological and vegetation factors were the most important factors, and the long-term global average recharge was 134 mm per year. This model will aid in groundwater policy-making.
Shabnam Saffarpour, Andrew W. Western, Russell Adams, and Jeffrey J. McDonnell
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 20, 4525–4545, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-20-4525-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-20-4525-2016, 2016
Short summary
Short summary
A variety of threshold mechanisms influence the transfer of rainfall to runoff from catchments. Some of these mechanisms depend on the occurrence of intense rainfall and others depend on the catchment being wet. This article first provides a framework for considering which mechanisms are important in different situations and then uses that framework to examine the behaviour of a catchment in Australia that exhibits a mix of both rainfall intensity and catchment wetness dependent thresholds.
Z. Lu, Y. Wei, H. Xiao, S. Zou, J. Xie, J. Ren, and A. Western
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 19, 2261–2273, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-2261-2015, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-2261-2015, 2015
Short summary
Short summary
This paper quantitatively analyzed the evolution of human-water relationships in the Heihe River basin over the past 2000 years by reconstructing the catchment water balance. The results provided the basis for investigating the impacts of human societies on hydrological systems. The evolutionary processes of human-water relationships can be divided into four stages: predevelopment, take-off, acceleration, and rebalancing. And the transition of the human-water relationship had no fixed pattern.
M. C. Peel, R. Srikanthan, T. A. McMahon, and D. J. Karoly
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 19, 1615–1639, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-1615-2015, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-1615-2015, 2015
Short summary
Short summary
We present a proof-of-concept approximation of within-GCM uncertainty using non-stationary stochastic replicates of monthly precipitation and temperature projections and investigate the impact of within-GCM uncertainty on projected runoff and reservoir yield. Amplification of within-GCM variability from precipitation to runoff to reservoir yield suggests climate change impact assessments ignoring within-GCM uncertainty would provide water resources managers with an unjustified sense of certainty
J. F. Costelloe, T. J. Peterson, K. Halbert, A. W. Western, and J. J. McDonnell
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 19, 1599–1613, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-1599-2015, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-1599-2015, 2015
Short summary
Short summary
Groundwater surface mapping is used as an independent data set to better estimate groundwater discharge to streamflow. The groundwater surfaces indicated when other techniques likely overestimated the groundwater discharge component of baseflow. Groundwater surfaces also identified areas where regional groundwater could not be contributing to tributary streamflow. This method adds significant value to water resource management where sufficient groundwater monitoring data are available.
T. A. McMahon, M. C. Peel, and D. J. Karoly
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 19, 361–377, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-361-2015, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-361-2015, 2015
Short summary
Short summary
Here we assess GCM performance from a hydrologic perspective. We identify five better performing CMIP3 GCMs that reproduce grid-scale climatological statistics of observed precipitation and temperature over global land regions for future hydrologic simulation. GCM performance in reproducing observed mean and standard deviation of annual precipitation, mean annual temperature and mean monthly precipitation and temperature was assessed and ranked, and five better performing GCMs were identified.
Z. K. Tesemma, Y. Wei, M. C. Peel, and A. W. Western
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/hessd-11-10515-2014, https://doi.org/10.5194/hessd-11-10515-2014, 2014
Revised manuscript not accepted
T. A. McMahon, M. C. Peel, and J. Szilagyi
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 17, 4865–4867, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-17-4865-2013, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-17-4865-2013, 2013
T. A. McMahon, M. C. Peel, L. Lowe, R. Srikanthan, and T. R. McVicar
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 17, 1331–1363, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-17-1331-2013, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-17-1331-2013, 2013
Related subject area
Subject: Catchment hydrology | Techniques and Approaches: Modelling approaches
A diversity-centric strategy for the selection of spatio-temporal training data for LSTM-based streamflow forecasting
Simulating the Tone River eastward diversion project in Japan carried out 4 centuries ago
Lack of robustness of hydrological models: a large-sample diagnosis and an attempt to identify hydrological and climatic drivers
Achieving water budget closure through physical hydrological process modelling: insights from a large-sample study
Heavy-tailed flood peak distributions: what is the effect of the spatial variability of rainfall and runoff generation?
State updating of the Xin'anjiang model: joint assimilating streamflow and multi-source soil moisture data via the asynchronous ensemble Kalman filter with enhanced error models
Improving the hydrological consistency of a process-based solute-transport model by simultaneous calibration of streamflow and stream concentrations
Leveraging a time-series event separation method to disentangle time-varying hydrologic controls on streamflow – application to wildfire-affected catchments
The significance of the leaf area index for evapotranspiration estimation in SWAT-T for characteristic land cover types of West Africa
Improved representation of soil moisture processes through incorporation of cosmic-ray neutron count measurements in a large-scale hydrologic model
Spatio-temporal patterns and trends of streamflow in water-scarce Mediterranean basins
A large-sample modelling approach towards integrating streamflow and evaporation data for the Spanish catchments
Technical note: An approach for handling multiple temporal frequencies with different input dimensions using a single LSTM cell
Seasonal variation in land cover estimates reveals sensitivities and opportunities for environmental models
Estimating response times, flow velocities, and roughness coefficients of Canadian Prairie basins
Learning landscape features from streamflow with autoencoders
On the use of streamflow transformations for hydrological model calibration
Simulation-based inference for parameter estimation of complex watershed simulators
Multi-scale soil moisture data and process-based modeling reveal the importance of lateral groundwater flow in a subarctic catchment
Catchment response to climatic variability: implications for root zone storage and streamflow predictions
Hybrid hydrological modeling for large alpine basins: a semi-distributed approach
Karst aquifer discharge response to rainfall interpreted as anomalous transport
HESS Opinions: Never train a Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) network on a single basin
Large-sample hydrology – a few camels or a whole caravan?
Comment on “Are soils overrated in hydrology?” by Gao et al. (2023)
Projections of streamflow intermittence under climate change in European drying river networks
Multi-decadal fluctuations in root zone storage capacity through vegetation adaptation to hydro-climatic variability have minor effects on the hydrological response in the Neckar River basin, Germany
Technical note: What does the Standardized Streamflow Index actually reflect? Insights and implications for hydrological drought analysis
Extended range forecasting of stream water temperature with deep learning models
Projected future changes in the cryosphere and hydrology of a mountainous catchment in the upper Heihe River, China
On the importance of plant phenology in the evaporative process of a semi-arid woodland: could it be why satellite-based evaporation estimates in the miombo differ?
Analyzing the generalization capabilities of hybrid hydrological models for extrapolation to extreme events
Regionalization of GR4J model parameters for river flow prediction in Paraná, Brazil
Evolution of river regimes in the Mekong River basin over 8 decades and the role of dams in recent hydrological extremes
Skill of seasonal flow forecasts at catchment scale: an assessment across South Korea
To what extent do flood-inducing storm events change future flood hazards?
When ancient numerical demons meet physics-informed machine learning: adjoint-based gradients for implicit differentiable modeling
Assessing the value of high-resolution rainfall and streamflow data for hydrological modeling: An analysis based on 63 catchments in southeast China
Runoff component quantification and future streamflow projection in a large mountainous basin based on a multidata-constrained cryospheric-hydrological model
Assessing the impact of climate change on high return levels of peak flows in Bavaria applying the CRCM5 large ensemble
Impacts of climate and land surface change on catchment evapotranspiration and runoff from 1951 to 2020 in Saxony, Germany
Quantifying and reducing flood forecast uncertainty by the CHUP-BMA method
Developing a tile drainage module for the Cold Regions Hydrological Model: lessons from a farm in southern Ontario, Canada
To bucket or not to bucket? Analyzing the performance and interpretability of hybrid hydrological models with dynamic parameterization
Widespread flooding dynamics under climate change: characterising floods using grid-based hydrological modelling and regional climate projections
HESS Opinions: The sword of Damocles of the impossible flood
Scale-dependency in modeling nivo-glacial hydrological systems: the case of the Arolla basin, Switzerland
Evaluating the effects of topography and land use change on hydrological signatures: a comparative study of two adjacent watersheds
Metamorphic testing of machine learning and conceptual hydrologic models
The influence of human activities on streamflow reductions during the megadrought in central Chile
Everett Snieder and Usman T. Khan
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 785–798, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-785-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-785-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
Improving the accuracy of flood forecasts is paramount to minimising flood damage. Machine learning (ML) models are increasingly being applied for flood forecasting. Such models are typically trained on large historic hydrometeorological datasets. In this work, we evaluate methods for selecting training datasets that maximise the spatio-temporal diversity of the represented hydrological processes. Empirical results showcase the importance of hydrological diversity in training ML models.
Joško Trošelj and Naota Hanasaki
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 753–766, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-753-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-753-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
This study presents the first distributed hydrological simulation which confirms claims raised by historians that the eastward diversion project of the Tone River in Japan was conducted 4 centuries ago to increase low flows and subsequent travelling possibilities surrounding the capital, Edo (Tokyo), using inland navigation. We showed that great steps forward can be made for improving quality of life with small human engineering waterworks and small interventions in the regime of natural flows.
Léonard Santos, Vazken Andréassian, Torben O. Sonnenborg, Göran Lindström, Alban de Lavenne, Charles Perrin, Lila Collet, and Guillaume Thirel
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 683–700, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-683-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-683-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
This work investigates how hydrological models are transferred to a period in which climate conditions are different to the ones of the period in which they were set up. The robustness assessment test built to detect dependencies between model error and climatic drivers was applied to three hydrological models in 352 catchments in Denmark, France and Sweden. Potential issues are seen in a significant number of catchments for the models, even though the catchments differ for each model.
Xudong Zheng, Dengfeng Liu, Shengzhi Huang, Hao Wang, and Xianmeng Meng
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 627–653, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-627-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-627-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
Water budget non-closure is a widespread phenomenon among multisource datasets which undermines the robustness of hydrological inferences. This study proposes a Multisource Dataset Correction Framework grounded in Physical Hydrological Process Modelling to enhance water budget closure, termed PHPM-MDCF. We examined the efficiency and robustness of the framework using the CAMELS dataset and achieved an average reduction of 49 % in total water budget residuals across 475 CONUS basins.
Elena Macdonald, Bruno Merz, Viet Dung Nguyen, and Sergiy Vorogushyn
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 447–463, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-447-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-447-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
Flood peak distributions indicate how likely the occurrence of an extreme flood is at a certain river. If the distribution has a so-called heavy tail, extreme floods are more likely than might be anticipated. We find heavier tails in small catchments compared to large catchments, and spatially variable rainfall leads to a lower occurrence probability of extreme floods. Spatially variable runoff does not show effects. The results can improve estimations of probabilities of extreme floods.
Junfu Gong, Xingwen Liu, Cheng Yao, Zhijia Li, Albrecht H. Weerts, Qiaoling Li, Satish Bastola, Yingchun Huang, and Junzeng Xu
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 335–360, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-335-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-335-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
Our study introduces a new method to improve flood forecasting by combining soil moisture and streamflow data using an advanced data assimilation technique. By integrating field and reanalysis soil moisture data and assimilating this with streamflow measurements, we aim to enhance the accuracy of flood predictions. This approach reduces the accumulation of past errors in the initial conditions at the start of the forecast, helping to better prepare for and respond to floods.
Jordy Salmon-Monviola, Ophélie Fovet, and Markus Hrachowitz
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 127–158, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-127-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-127-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
To increase the predictive power of hydrological models, it is necessary to improve their consistency, i.e. their physical realism, which is measured by the ability of the model to reproduce observed system dynamics. Using a model to represent the dynamics of water and nitrate and dissolved organic carbon concentrations in an agricultural catchment, we showed that using solute-concentration data for calibration is useful to improve the hydrological consistency of the model.
Haley A. Canham, Belize Lane, Colin B. Phillips, and Brendan P. Murphy
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 27–43, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-27-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-27-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
The influence of watershed disturbances has proved challenging to disentangle from natural streamflow variability. This study evaluates the influence of time-varying hydrologic controls on rainfall–runoff in undisturbed and wildfire-disturbed watersheds using a novel time-series event separation method. Across watersheds, water year type and season influenced rainfall–runoff patterns. Accounting for these controls enabled clearer isolation of wildfire effects.
Fabian Merk, Timo Schaffhauser, Faizan Anwar, Ye Tuo, Jean-Martial Cohard, and Markus Disse
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 5511–5539, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-5511-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-5511-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Evapotranspiration (ET) is computed from the vegetation (plant transpiration) and soil (soil evaporation). In western Africa, plant transpiration correlates with vegetation growth. Vegetation is often represented using the leaf area index (LAI). In this study, we evaluate the importance of the LAI for ET calculation. We take a close look at this interaction and highlight its relevance. Our work contributes to the understanding of terrestrial water cycle processes .
Eshrat Fatima, Rohini Kumar, Sabine Attinger, Maren Kaluza, Oldrich Rakovec, Corinna Rebmann, Rafael Rosolem, Sascha E. Oswald, Luis Samaniego, Steffen Zacharias, and Martin Schrön
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 5419–5441, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-5419-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-5419-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
This study establishes a framework to incorporate cosmic-ray neutron measurements into the mesoscale Hydrological Model (mHM). We evaluate different approaches to estimate neutron counts within the mHM using the Desilets equation, with uniformly and non-uniformly weighted average soil moisture, and the physically based code COSMIC. The data improved not only soil moisture simulations but also the parameterisation of evapotranspiration in the model.
Laia Estrada, Xavier Garcia, Joan Saló-Grau, Rafael Marcé, Antoni Munné, and Vicenç Acuña
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 5353–5373, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-5353-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-5353-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Hydrological modelling is a powerful tool to support decision-making. We assessed spatio-temporal patterns and trends of streamflow for 2001–2022 with a hydrological model, integrating stakeholder expert knowledge on management operations. The results provide insight into how climate change and anthropogenic pressures affect water resources availability in regions vulnerable to water scarcity, thus raising the need for sustainable management practices and integrated hydrological modelling.
Patricio Yeste, Matilde García-Valdecasas Ojeda, Sonia R. Gámiz-Fortis, Yolanda Castro-Díez, Axel Bronstert, and María Jesús Esteban-Parra
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 5331–5352, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-5331-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-5331-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Integrating streamflow and evaporation data can help improve the physical realism of hydrologic models. We investigate the capabilities of the Variable Infiltration Capacity (VIC) to reproduce both hydrologic variables for 189 headwater located in Spain. Results from sensitivity analyses indicate that adding two vegetation parameters is enough to improve the representation of evaporation and that the performance of VIC exceeded that of the largest modelling effort currently available in Spain.
Eduardo Acuña Espinoza, Frederik Kratzert, Daniel Klotz, Martin Gauch, Manuel Álvarez Chaves, Ralf Loritz, and Uwe Ehret
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-3355, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-3355, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) networks have demonstrated state-of-the-art performance for rainfall-runoff hydrological modeling. However, most studies focus on daily-scale predictions, limiting the benefits of sub-daily (e.g. hourly) predictions in applications like flood forecasting. In this study, we introduce a new architecture, multi-frequency LSTM (MF-LSTM), designed to use input of various temporal frequencies to produce sub-daily (e.g. hourly) predictions at a moderate computational cost.
Daniel T. Myers, David Jones, Diana Oviedo-Vargas, John Paul Schmit, Darren L. Ficklin, and Xuesong Zhang
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 5295–5310, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-5295-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-5295-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
We studied how streamflow and water quality models respond to land cover data collected by satellites during the growing season versus the non-growing season. The land cover data showed more trees during the growing season and more built areas during the non-growing season. We next found that the use of non-growing season data resulted in a higher modeled nutrient export to streams. Knowledge of these sensitivities would be particularly important when models inform water resource management.
Kevin R. Shook, Paul H. Whitfield, Christopher Spence, and John W. Pomeroy
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 5173–5192, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-5173-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-5173-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Recent studies suggest that the velocities of water running off landscapes in the Canadian Prairies may be much smaller than generally assumed. Analyses of historical flows for 23 basins in central Alberta show that many of the rivers responded more slowly and that the flows are much slower than would be estimated from equations developed elsewhere. The effects of slow flow velocities on the development of hydrological models of the region are discussed, as are the possible causes.
Alberto Bassi, Marvin Höge, Antonietta Mira, Fabrizio Fenicia, and Carlo Albert
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 4971–4988, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4971-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4971-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
The goal is to remove the impact of meteorological drivers in order to uncover the unique landscape fingerprints of a catchment from streamflow data. Our results reveal an optimal two-feature summary for most catchments, with a third feature associated with aridity and intermittent flow that is needed for challenging cases. Baseflow index, aridity, and soil or vegetation attributes strongly correlate with learnt features, indicating their importance for streamflow prediction.
Guillaume Thirel, Léonard Santos, Olivier Delaigue, and Charles Perrin
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 4837–4860, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4837-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4837-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
We discuss how mathematical transformations impact calibrated hydrological model simulations. We assess how 11 transformations behave over the complete range of streamflows. Extreme transformations lead to models that are specialized for extreme streamflows but show poor performance outside the range of targeted streamflows and are less robust. We show that no a priori assumption about transformations can be taken as warranted.
Robert Hull, Elena Leonarduzzi, Luis De La Fuente, Hoang Viet Tran, Andrew Bennett, Peter Melchior, Reed M. Maxwell, and Laura E. Condon
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 4685–4713, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4685-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4685-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Large-scale hydrologic simulators are a needed tool to explore complex watershed processes and how they may evolve with a changing climate. However, calibrating them can be difficult because they are costly to run and have many unknown parameters. We implement a state-of-the-art approach to model calibration using neural networks with a set of experiments based on streamflow in the upper Colorado River basin.
Jari-Pekka Nousu, Kersti Leppä, Hannu Marttila, Pertti Ala-aho, Giulia Mazzotti, Terhikki Manninen, Mika Korkiakoski, Mika Aurela, Annalea Lohila, and Samuli Launiainen
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 4643–4666, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4643-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4643-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
We used hydrological models, field measurements, and satellite-based data to study the soil moisture dynamics in a subarctic catchment. The role of groundwater was studied with different ways to model the groundwater dynamics and via comparisons to the observational data. The choice of groundwater model was shown to have a strong impact, and representation of lateral flow was important to capture wet soil conditions. Our results provide insights for ecohydrological studies in boreal regions.
Nienke Tempel, Laurène Bouaziz, Riccardo Taormina, Ellis van Noppen, Jasper Stam, Eric Sprokkereef, and Markus Hrachowitz
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 4577–4597, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4577-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4577-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
This study explores the impact of climatic variability on root zone water storage capacities and, thus, on hydrological predictions. Analysing data from 286 areas in Europe and the US, we found that, despite some variations in root zone storage capacity due to changing climatic conditions over multiple decades, these changes are generally minor and have a limited effect on water storage and river flow predictions.
Bu Li, Ting Sun, Fuqiang Tian, Mahmut Tudaji, Li Qin, and Guangheng Ni
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 4521–4538, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4521-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4521-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
This paper developed hybrid semi-distributed hydrological models by employing a process-based model as the backbone and utilizing deep learning to parameterize and replace internal modules. The main contribution is to provide a high-performance tool enriched with explicit hydrological knowledge for hydrological prediction and to improve understanding about the hydrological sensitivities to climate change in large alpine basins.
Dan Elhanati, Nadine Goeppert, and Brian Berkowitz
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 4239–4249, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4239-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4239-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
A continuous time random walk framework was developed to allow modeling of a karst aquifer discharge response to measured rainfall. The application of the numerical model yielded robust fits between modeled and measured discharge values, especially for the distinctive long tails found during recession times. The findings shed light on the interplay of slow and fast flow in the karst system and establish the application of the model for simulating flow and transport in such systems.
Frederik Kratzert, Martin Gauch, Daniel Klotz, and Grey Nearing
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 4187–4201, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4187-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4187-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Recently, a special type of neural-network architecture became increasingly popular in hydrology literature. However, in most applications, this model was applied as a one-to-one replacement for hydrology models without adapting or rethinking the experimental setup. In this opinion paper, we show how this is almost always a bad decision and how using these kinds of models requires the use of large-sample hydrology data sets.
Franziska Clerc-Schwarzenbach, Giovanni Selleri, Mattia Neri, Elena Toth, Ilja van Meerveld, and Jan Seibert
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 4219–4237, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4219-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4219-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
We show that the differences between the forcing data included in three CAMELS datasets (US, BR, GB) and the forcing data included for the same catchments in the Caravan dataset affect model calibration considerably. The model performance dropped when the data from the Caravan dataset were used instead of the original data. Most of the model performance drop could be attributed to the differences in precipitation data. However, differences were largest for the potential evapotranspiration data.
Ying Zhao, Mehdi Rahmati, Harry Vereecken, and Dani Or
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 4059–4063, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4059-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4059-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Gao et al. (2023) question the importance of soil in hydrology, sparking debate. We acknowledge some valid points but critique their broad, unsubstantiated views on soil's role. Our response highlights three key areas: (1) the false divide between ecosystem-centric and soil-centric approaches, (2) the vital yet varied impact of soil properties, and (3) the call for a scale-aware framework. We aim to unify these perspectives, enhancing hydrology's comprehensive understanding.
Louise Mimeau, Annika Künne, Alexandre Devers, Flora Branger, Sven Kralisch, Claire Lauvernet, Jean-Philippe Vidal, Núria Bonada, Zoltán Csabai, Heikki Mykrä, Petr Pařil, Luka Polović, and Thibault Datry
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2024-272, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2024-272, 2024
Revised manuscript accepted for HESS
Short summary
Short summary
Our study projects how climate change will affect drying of river segments and stream networks in Europe, using advanced modeling techniques to assess changes in six river networks across diverse ecoregions. We found that drying events will become more frequent, intense and start earlier or last longer, potentially turning some river sections from perennial to intermittent. The results are valuable for river ecologists in evaluating the ecological health of river ecosystem.
Siyuan Wang, Markus Hrachowitz, and Gerrit Schoups
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 4011–4033, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4011-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4011-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Root zone storage capacity (Sumax) changes significantly over multiple decades, reflecting vegetation adaptation to climatic variability. However, this temporal evolution of Sumax cannot explain long-term fluctuations in the partitioning of water fluxes as expressed by deviations ΔIE from the parametric Budyko curve over time with different climatic conditions, and it does not have any significant effects on shorter-term hydrological response characteristics of the upper Neckar catchment.
Fabián Lema, Pablo A. Mendoza, Nicolás A. Vásquez, Naoki Mizukami, Mauricio Zambrano-Bigiarini, and Ximena Vargas
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2024-221, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2024-221, 2024
Revised manuscript accepted for HESS
Short summary
Short summary
Hydrological droughts affect ecosystems and socioeconomic activities worldwide. Despite they are commonly described with the Standardized Streamflow Index (SSI), there is limited understanding of what it truly reflects in terms of water cycle processes. Here, we used state-of-the-art hydrological models in Andean basins to examine drivers of SSI fluctuations. The results highlight the importance of careful selection of indices and time scales for accurate drought characterization and monitoring.
Ryan S. Padrón, Massimiliano Zappa, Luzi Bernhard, and Konrad Bogner
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-2591, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-2591, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
We generate operational forecasts of daily maximum stream water temperature for the next month at 54 stations in Switzerland with our best performing data-driven model. The average forecast error is 0.38 °C for 1 day ahead and increases to 0.90 °C for 1 month ahead given the uncertainty in the meteorological variables influencing water temperature. Here we compare the skill of several models, how well they can forecast at new and ungauged stations, and the importance of different model inputs.
Zehua Chang, Hongkai Gao, Leilei Yong, Kang Wang, Rensheng Chen, Chuntan Han, Otgonbayar Demberel, Batsuren Dorjsuren, Shugui Hou, and Zheng Duan
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 3897–3917, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3897-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3897-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
An integrated cryospheric–hydrologic model, FLEX-Cryo, was developed that considers glaciers, snow cover, and frozen soil and their dynamic impacts on hydrology. We utilized it to simulate future changes in cryosphere and hydrology in the Hulu catchment. Our projections showed the two glaciers will melt completely around 2050, snow cover will reduce, and permafrost will degrade. For hydrology, runoff will decrease after the glacier has melted, and permafrost degradation will increase baseflow.
Henry M. Zimba, Miriam Coenders-Gerrits, Kawawa E. Banda, Petra Hulsman, Nick van de Giesen, Imasiku A. Nyambe, and Hubert H. G. Savenije
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 3633–3663, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3633-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3633-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
The fall and flushing of new leaves in the miombo woodlands co-occur in the dry season before the commencement of seasonal rainfall. The miombo species are also said to have access to soil moisture in deep soils, including groundwater in the dry season. Satellite-based evaporation estimates, temporal trends, and magnitudes differ the most in the dry season, most likely due to inadequate understanding and representation of the highlighted miombo species attributes in simulations.
Eduardo Acuna Espinoza, Ralf Loritz, Frederik Kratzert, Daniel Klotz, Martin Gauch, Manuel Álvarez Chaves, Nicole Bäuerle, and Uwe Ehret
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-2147, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-2147, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Data-driven techniques have shown the potential to outperform process-based models in rainfall-runoff simulations. Hybrid models, combining both approaches, aim to enhance accuracy and maintain interpretability. Expanding the set of test cases to evaluate hybrid models under different conditions we test their generalization capabilities for extreme hydrological events.
Louise Akemi Kuana, Arlan Scortegagna Almeida, Emílio Graciliano Ferreira Mercuri, and Steffen Manfred Noe
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 3367–3390, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3367-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3367-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
The authors compared regionalization methods for river flow prediction in 126 catchments from the south of Brazil, a region with humid subtropical and hot temperate climate. The regionalization method based on physiographic–climatic similarity had the best performance for predicting daily and Q95 reference flow. We showed that basins without flow monitoring can have a good approximation of streamflow using machine learning and physiographic–climatic information as inputs.
Huy Dang and Yadu Pokhrel
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 3347–3365, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3347-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3347-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
By examining basin-wide simulations of a river regime over 83 years with and without dams, we present evidence that climate variation was a key driver of hydrologic variabilities in the Mekong River basin (MRB) over the long term; however, dams have largely altered the seasonality of the Mekong’s flow regime and annual flooding patterns in major downstream areas in recent years. These findings could help us rethink the planning of future dams and water resource management in the MRB.
Yongshin Lee, Francesca Pianosi, Andres Peñuela, and Miguel Angel Rico-Ramirez
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 3261–3279, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3261-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3261-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Following recent advancements in weather prediction technology, we explored how seasonal weather forecasts (1 or more months ahead) could benefit practical water management in South Korea. Our findings highlight that using seasonal weather forecasts for predicting flow patterns 1 to 3 months ahead is effective, especially during dry years. This suggest that seasonal weather forecasts can be helpful in improving the management of water resources.
Mariam Khanam, Giulia Sofia, and Emmanouil N. Anagnostou
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 3161–3190, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3161-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3161-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Flooding worsens due to climate change, with river dynamics being a key in local flood control. Predicting post-storm geomorphic changes is challenging. Using self-organizing maps and machine learning, this study forecasts post-storm alterations in stage–discharge relationships across 3101 US stream gages. The provided framework can aid in updating hazard assessments by identifying rivers prone to change, integrating channel adjustments into flood hazard assessment.
Yalan Song, Wouter J. M. Knoben, Martyn P. Clark, Dapeng Feng, Kathryn Lawson, Kamlesh Sawadekar, and Chaopeng Shen
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 3051–3077, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3051-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3051-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Differentiable models (DMs) integrate neural networks and physical equations for accuracy, interpretability, and knowledge discovery. We developed an adjoint-based DM for ordinary differential equations (ODEs) for hydrological modeling, reducing distorted fluxes and physical parameters from errors in models that use explicit and operation-splitting schemes. With a better numerical scheme and improved structure, the adjoint-based DM matches or surpasses long short-term memory (LSTM) performance.
Mahmut Tudaji, Yi Nan, and Fuqiang Tian
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-1438, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-1438, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Common intuition holds that higher input data resolution leads to better results. To assess the benefits of high-resolution data, we conducted simulation experiments using data with various temporal resolutions across multiple catchments, and found that higher resolution data does not always improve model performance, challenging the necessity of pursuing such data. In catchments with small areas or significant flow variability, high-resolution data is more valuable.
Mengjiao Zhang, Yi Nan, and Fuqiang Tian
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-1464, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-1464, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Our study conducted a detailed analysis of runoff component and future trend in the Yarlung Tsangpo River basin owing to the existed differences in the published results, and find that the contributions of snowmelt and glacier melt runoff to streamflow were limited, both for ~5 % which were much lower than previous results. The streamflow there will continuously increase in the future, but the overestimated contribution from glacier melt would lead to an underestimation on such increasing trend.
Florian Willkofer, Raul R. Wood, and Ralf Ludwig
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 2969–2989, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2969-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2969-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Severe flood events pose a threat to riverine areas, yet robust estimates of the dynamics of these events in the future due to climate change are rarely available. Hence, this study uses data from a regional climate model, SMILE, to drive a high-resolution hydrological model for 98 catchments of hydrological Bavaria and exploits the large database to derive robust values for the 100-year flood events. Results indicate an increase in frequency and intensity for most catchments in the future.
Maik Renner and Corina Hauffe
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 2849–2869, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2849-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2849-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Climate and land surface changes influence the partitioning of water balance components decisively. Their impact is quantified for 71 catchments in Saxony. Germany. Distinct signatures in the joint water and energy budgets are found: (i) past forest dieback caused a decrease in and subsequent recovery of evapotranspiration in the affected regions, and (ii) the recent shift towards higher aridity imposed a large decline in runoff that has not been seen in the observation records before.
Zhen Cui, Shenglian Guo, Hua Chen, Dedi Liu, Yanlai Zhou, and Chong-Yu Xu
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 2809–2829, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2809-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2809-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Ensemble forecasting facilitates reliable flood forecasting and warning. This study couples the copula-based hydrologic uncertainty processor (CHUP) with Bayesian model averaging (BMA) and proposes the novel CHUP-BMA method of reducing inflow forecasting uncertainty of the Three Gorges Reservoir. The CHUP-BMA avoids the normal distribution assumption in the HUP-BMA and considers the constraint of initial conditions, which can improve the deterministic and probabilistic forecast performance.
Mazda Kompanizare, Diogo Costa, Merrin L. Macrae, John W. Pomeroy, and Richard M. Petrone
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 2785–2807, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2785-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2785-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
A new agricultural tile drainage module was developed in the Cold Region Hydrological Model platform. Tile flow and water levels are simulated by considering the effect of capillary fringe thickness, drainable water and seasonal regional groundwater dynamics. The model was applied to a small well-instrumented farm in southern Ontario, Canada, where there are concerns about the impacts of agricultural drainage into Lake Erie.
Eduardo Acuña Espinoza, Ralf Loritz, Manuel Álvarez Chaves, Nicole Bäuerle, and Uwe Ehret
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 2705–2719, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2705-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2705-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Hydrological hybrid models promise to merge the performance of deep learning methods with the interpretability of process-based models. One hybrid approach is the dynamic parameterization of conceptual models using long short-term memory (LSTM) networks. We explored this method to evaluate the effect of the flexibility given by LSTMs on the process-based part.
Adam Griffin, Alison L. Kay, Paul Sayers, Victoria Bell, Elizabeth Stewart, and Sam Carr
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 2635–2650, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2635-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2635-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Widespread flooding is a major problem in the UK and is greatly affected by climate change and land-use change. To look at how widespread flooding changes in the future, climate model data (UKCP18) were used with a hydrological model (Grid-to-Grid) across the UK, and 14 400 events were identified between two time slices: 1980–2010 and 2050–2080. There was a strong increase in the number of winter events in the future time slice and in the peak return periods.
Alberto Montanari, Bruno Merz, and Günter Blöschl
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 2603–2615, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2603-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2603-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Floods often take communities by surprise, as they are often considered virtually
impossibleyet are an ever-present threat similar to the sword suspended over the head of Damocles in the classical Greek anecdote. We discuss four reasons why extremely large floods carry a risk that is often larger than expected. We provide suggestions for managing the risk of megafloods by calling for a creative exploration of hazard scenarios and communicating the unknown corners of the reality of floods.
Anne-Laure Argentin, Pascal Horton, Bettina Schaefli, Jamal Shokory, Felix Pitscheider, Leona Repnik, Mattia Gianini, Simone Bizzi, Stuart Lane, and Francesco Comiti
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-1687, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-1687, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
In this article, we show that by taking the optimal parameters calibrated with a semi-lumped model for the discharge at a catchment's outlet, we can accurately simulate runoff at various points within the study area, including three nested and three neighboring catchments. In addition, we demonstrate that employing more intricate melt models, which better represent physical processes, enhances the transfer of parameters in the simulation, until an overparametrization limit is reached.
Haifan Liu, Haochen Yan, and Mingfu Guan
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2024-136, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2024-136, 2024
Revised manuscript accepted for HESS
Short summary
Short summary
In mountainous areas, the relationship between slope and annual hydrological processes is pronounced. However, at lower elevations, this relationship is weak in steeper watersheds. In addition, urbanization leads to an increase in annual surface runoff in all watersheds, especially in steep-slope watersheds. Flatter watersheds exhibit a buffering capacity against urbanization. However, this buffering capacity is diminishing as annual rainfall intensity increases.
Peter Reichert, Kai Ma, Marvin Höge, Fabrizio Fenicia, Marco Baity-Jesi, Dapeng Feng, and Chaopeng Shen
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 2505–2529, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2505-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2505-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
We compared the predicted change in catchment outlet discharge to precipitation and temperature change for conceptual and machine learning hydrological models. We found that machine learning models, despite providing excellent fit and prediction capabilities, can be unreliable regarding the prediction of the effect of temperature change for low-elevation catchments. This indicates the need for caution when applying them for the prediction of the effect of climate change.
Nicolás Álamos, Camila Alvarez-Garreton, Ariel Muñoz, and Álvaro González-Reyes
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 2483–2503, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2483-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2483-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
In this study, we assess the effects of climate and water use on streamflow reductions and drought intensification during the last 3 decades in central Chile. We address this by contrasting streamflow observations with near-natural streamflow simulations. We conclude that while the lack of precipitation dominates streamflow reductions in the megadrought, water uses have not diminished during this time, causing a worsening of the hydrological drought conditions and maladaptation conditions.
Cited articles
Ainsworth, E. A. and Rogers, A.: The response of photosynthesis and stomatal conductance to rising [CO2]: mechanisms and environmental interactions, Plant Cell Environ., 30, 258–270, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-3040.2007.01641.x, 2007.
Allen, R. G., Pereira, L. S., Raes, D., and Smith, M.: Crop evapotranspiration Guidelines for computing crop water requirements, FAO Irrigation and Drainage Paper 56, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, 1998.
Bunce, J. A.: Carbon dioxide effects on stomatal responses to the environment and water use by crops under field conditions, Oecologia, 140, 1–10, https://doi.org/10.1007/s00442-003-1401-6, 2004.
Cai, W. and Cowan, T.: Evidence of impacts from rising temperature on inflows to the Murray–Darling Basin, Geophys. Res. Lett., 35, L07701, https://doi.org/10.1029/2008GL033390, 2008.
Chiew, F. H. S., Teng, J., Vaze, J., Post, D. A., Perraud, J. M., Kirono, D. G. C., and Viney, N. R.: Estimating climate change impact on runoff across southeast Australia: method, results, and implications of the modeling method, Water Resour. Res., 45, W10414, https://doi.org/10.1029/2008WR007338, 2009.
Chiew, F. H. S., Young, W. J., Cai, W., and Teng, J.: Current drought and future hydroclimate projections in southeast Australia and implications for water resources management, Stoch. Environ. Res. Risk A., 25, 601–612, https://doi.org/10.1007/s00477-010-0424-x, 2011.
Chiew, F. H. S., Potter, N. J., Vaze, J., Petheram, C., Zhang, L., Teng, J., and Post, D. A.: Observed hydrologic non-stationarity in far south-eastern Australia: implications for modelling and prediction, Stoch. Environ. Res. Risk A., 28, 3–15, 2014.
Cornish, P. M. and Vertessy, R. A.: Forest age-induced changes in evapotranspiration and water yield in a eucalypt forest, J. Hydrol., 242, 43–63, https://doi.org/10.1016/S0022-1694(00)00384-X, 2001.
Crimmins, S. M., Dobrowski, S. Z., Greenberg, J. A., Abatzoglou, J. T., and Mynsberge, A. R.: Changes in climatic water balance drive downhill shifts in plant species' optimum elevations, Science, 331, 324–327, 2011.
Cuo, L., Zhang, Y., Gao, Y., Hao, Z., and Cairang, L.: The impacts of climate change and land cover/use transition on the hydrology in the upper Yellow River Basin, China, J. Hydrol., 502, 37–52, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2013.08.003, 2013.
Demaria, E. M., Nijssen, B., and Wagener, T.: Monte Carlo sensitivity analysis of land surface parameters using the Variable Infiltration Capacity model, J. Geophys. Res., 112, D11113, https://doi.org/10.1029/2006JD007534, 2007.
Ellis, T. W. and Hatton, T. J.: Relating leaf area index of natural eucalypt vegetation to climate variables in southern Australia, Agr. Water Manage., 95, 743–747, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.agwat.2008.02.007, 2008.
Ewert, F.: Modelling plant responses to elevated CO2: how important is leaf area index?, Ann. Bot., 93, 619–627, https://doi.org/10.1093/aob/mch101, 2004.
Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO): Digital soil map of the world, Version 3.5. FAO, Rome, Italy, 1995.
Fernández-Martínez, M., Vicca, S., Janssens, I., Sardans, J., Luyssaert, S., Campioli, M., Chapin III, F., Ciais, P., Malhi, Y., and Obersteiner, M.: Nutrient availability as the key regulator of global forest carbon balance, Nature Climate Change, 4, 471–476, 2014.
Fowler, H. J., Blenkinsop, S., and Tebaldi, C.: Linking climate change modelling to impacts studies: recent advances in downscaling techniques for hydrological modelling, Int. J. Climatol., 27, 1547–1578, https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.1556, 2007.
Ford, T. W. and Quiring, S. M.: Influence of MODIS-Derived Dynamic Vegetation on VIC-Simulated Soil Moisture in Oklahoma, J. Hydrometeorol., 14, 1910–1921, https://doi.org/10.1175/JHM-D-13-037.1, 2013.
Geoscience Australia: GEODATA 9 Second Digital Elevation Model (DEM-9S) Version 3, avaialble at: http://www.ga.gov.au/metadata-gateway/metadata/record/gcat_66006, last access: 20 December 2013, 2008.
Gerten, D., Rost, S., von Bloh, W., and Lucht, W.: Causes of change in 20th century global river discharge, Geophys. Res. Lett., 35, L20405, https://doi.org/10.1029/2008GL035258, 2008.
Harrold, T. I., Jones, R. N, and Watterson, I. G.: Applying climate changes simulated by GCMs to the generation of fine-scale rainfall scenarios, Hydro 2005, 29th Hydrology and Water Resources Symposium, Canberra, 2005.
Heath, J. T., Chafer, C. J., van Ogtrop, F. F., and Bishop, T. F. A.: Post-wildfire recovery of water yield in the Sydney Basin water supply catchments: An assessment of the 2001/2002 wildfires, J. Hydrol., 519, 1428–1440, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2014.09.033, 2014.
Hikosaka, K., Onoda, Y., Kinugasa, T., Nagashima, H., Anten, N. P. R., and Hirose, T.: Plant responses to elevated CO2 concentration at different scales: leaf, whole plant, canopy, and population, Ecol. Res., 20, 243–253, https://doi.org/10.1007/s11284-005-0041-1, 2005.
Hughes, J. D., Petrone, K. C., and Silberstein, R. P.: Drought, groundwater storage and stream flow decline in southwestern Australia, Geophys. Res. Lett., 39, L03408, https://doi.org/10.1029/2011GL050797, 2012.
Huntington, T. G.: CO2-induced suppression of transpiration cannot explain increasing runoff, Hydrol. Process., 22, 311–314, https://doi.org/10.1002/hyp.6925, 2008.
Jahan, N. and Gan, T. Y.: Modelling the vegetation–climate relationship in a boreal mixedwood forest of Alberta using normalized difference and enhanced vegetation indices, Int. J. Remote Sens., 32, 313–335, https://doi.org/10.1080/01431160903464146, 2011.
Jones, D. A., Wang, W., and Fawcett, R.: High-quality spatial climate data-sets for Australia, Australian Meteorological and Oceanographic Journal, 58, 233–248, 2009.
Kalma, J. D., Bates, B. C., and Woods, R. A.: Predicting catchment-scale soil moisture status with limited field measurements, Hydrol. Process., 9, 445–467, https://doi.org/10.1002/hyp.3360090315, 1995.
Kimball, J. S., Running, S. W., and Nemani, R. R.: An improved method for estimating surface humidity from daily minimum temperature, Agr. Forest Meteorol., 85, 87–98, 1997.
Körner, C.: Plant CO2 responses: an issue of definition, time and resource supply, New Phytol., 172, 393–411, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-8137.2006.01886.x, 2006.
Lenihan, J. M., Drapek, R., Bachelet, D., and Neilson, R. P.: Climate change effects on vegetation distribution, carbon, and fire in California, Ecol. Appl., 13, 1667–1681, 2003.
Liang, X., Lettenmaier, D. P., Wood, E. F., and Burges, S. J.: A Simple hydrologically based model of land surface water and energy fluxes of general circulation models, J. Geophys. Res., 99, 14415–14428, https://doi.org/10.1029/94jd00483, 1994.
Liang, X., Wood, E. F., and Lettenmaier, D. P.: Surface soil moisture parameterization of the VIC-2L model: Evaluation and modification, Global Planet. Change, 13, 195–206, https://doi.org/10.1016/0921-8181(95)00046-1, 1996.
Lockart, N., Kavetski, D., and Franks, S. W.: On the recent warming in the Murray–Darling Basin: land surface interactions misunderstood, Geophys. Res. Lett., 36, L24405, https://doi.org/10.1029/2009GL040598, 2009.
Lockart, N., Kavetski, D., and Franks, S. W.: On the recent warming in the Murray-Darling Basin: Land surface interactions misunderstood, Geophys. Res. Lett., 36, L24405, https://doi.org/10.1029/2009GL040598, 2009.
McMahon, T. A., Peel, M. C., and Karoly, D. J.: Assessment of precipitation and temperature data from CMIP3 global climate models for hydrologic simulation, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 19, 361–377, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-361-2015, 2015.
McVicar, T. R., Van Niel, T. G., Li, L. T., Roderick, M. L., Rayner, D. P., Ricciardulli, L., and Donohue, R. J.: Wind speed climatology and trends for Australia, 1975–2006: Capturing the stilling phenomenon and comparison with near-surface reanalysis output, Geophys. Res. Lett., 35, L20403, https://doi.org/10.1029/2008GL035627, 2008.
Meinshausen, M., Smith, S. J., Calvin, K., Daniel, J. S., Kainuma, M. L. T., Lamarque, J. F., Matsumoto, K., Montzka, S. A., Raper, S. C. B., Riahi, K., Thomson, A., Velders, G. J. M., and van Vuuren, D. P. P.: The RCP greenhouse gas concentrations and their extensions from 1765 to 2300, Climatic Change, 109, 213–241, https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-011-0156-z, 2011.
Milly, P. C. D., Dunne, K. A., and Vecchia, A. V.: Global pattern of trends in streamflow and water availability in a changing climate, Nature, 438, 347–350, 2005.
Moriasi, D. N., Arnold, J. G., Van Liew, M. W., Bingner, R. L., Harmel, R. D., and Veith, T. L.: Model evaluation guidelines for systematic quantification of accuracy in watershed simulations, T. ASABE, 50, 885–900, 2007.
Moss, R. H., Edmonds, J. A., Hibbard, K. A., Manning, M. R., Rose, S. K., van Vuuren, D. P., Carter, T. R., Emori, S., Kainuma, M., Kram, T., Meehl, G. A., Mitchell, J. F. B., Nakicenovic, N., Riahi, K., Smith, S. J., Stouffer, R. J., Thomson, A. M., Weyant, J. P., and Wilbanks, T. J.: The next generation of scenarios for climate change research and assessment, Nature, 463, 747–756, https://doi.org/10.1038/nature08823, 2010.
Murray, S. J., Foster, P. N., and Prentice, I. C.: Evaluation of global continental hydrology as simulated by the Land-surface Processes and eXchanges Dynamic Global Vegetation Model, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 15, 91–105, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-15-91-2011, 2011.
Murray, S. J., Foster, P. N., and Prentice, I. C.: Future global water resources with respect to climate change and water withdrawals as estimated by a dynamic global vegetation model, J. Hydrol., 448–449, 14–29, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2012.02.044, 2012.
Murray, S. J., Watson, I. M., and Prentice, I. C.: The use of dynamic global vegetation models for simulating hydrology and the potential integration of satellite observations, Prog. Phys. Geog., https://doi.org/10.1177/0309133312460072, 2013.
Nemani, R. R., Keeling C. D., Hashimoto, H., Jolly, W. M., Piper, S. C., Tucker, C. J., Myneni, R. B., and Running, S. W.: Climate-driven increases in global terrestrial net primary production from 1982 to 1999, Science, 300, 1560–1563, 2003.
O'Grady, A. P., Carter, J. L., and Bruce, J.: Can we predict groundwater discharge from terrestrial ecosystems using existing eco-hydrological concepts?, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 15, 3731–3739, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-15-3731-2011, 2011.
Obrist, D. and Arnone, J. A.: Increasing CO2 accelerates root growth and enhances water acquisition during early stages of development in Larrea tridentate, New Phytol., 159, 175–184, https://doi.org/10.1046/j.1469-8137.2003.00791.x, 2003.
Palmer, A. R., Fuentes, S., Taylor, D., Macinnis-Ng, C., Zeppel, M., Yunusa, I., and Eamus, D.: Towards a spatial understanding of water use of several land-cover classes: an examination of relationships amongst pre-dawn leaf water potential, vegetation water use, aridity and MODIS LAI, Ecohydrology, 3, 1–10, https://doi.org/10.1002/eco.63, 2010.
Peel, M. C. and Blöschl, G.: Hydrological modelling in a changing world, Prog. Phys. Geogr., 35, 249–261, https://doi.org/10.1177/0309133311402550, 2011.
Piao, S., Friedlingstein, P., Ciais, P., de Noblet-Ducoudré, N., Labat, D., and Zaehle, S.: Changes in climate and land use have a larger direct impact than rising CO2 on global river runoff trends, P. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, 104, 15242–15247, https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0707213104, 2007.
Potter, N. J. and Chiew, F. H. S.: An investigation into changes in climate characteristics causing the recent very low runoff in the southern Murray–Darling Basin using rainfall–runoff models, Water Resour. Res., 47, W00G10, https://doi.org/10.1029/2010WR010333, 2011.
Roderick, M. L. and Farquhar, G. D.: A simple framework for relating variations in runoff to variations in climatic conditions and catchment properties, Water Resour. Res., 47, W00G07, https://doi.org/10.1029/2010WR009826, 2011.
Scheiter, S., Langan, L., and Higgins, S. I.: Next-generation dynamic global vegetation models: learning from community ecology, New Phytol., 198, 957–969, 2013.
Schenk, H. J. and Jackson, R. B.: The global biogeography of roots, Ecol. Monogr., 72, 311–328, 2002.
Taylor, K. E., Stouffer, R. J., and Meehl, G. A.: An overview of CMIP5 and the experiment design, B. Am. Meteorol. Soc., 93, 485–498, https://doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-D-11-00094.1, 2012.
Teng, J., Chiew, F. H. S., Vaze, J., Marvanek, S., and Kirono, D. G. C.: Estimation of climate change impact on mean annual runoff across Continental Australia using Budyko and Fu equations and hydrological models, J. Hydrometeorol., 13, 1094–1106, 2012a.
Teng, J., Vaze, J., Chiew, F. H. S., Wang, B., and Perraud, J.-M.: Estimating the relative uncertainties sourced from GCMs and hydrological models in modeling climate change impact on runoff, J. Hydrometeorol., 13, 122–139, https://doi.org/10.1175/JHM-D-11-058.1, 2012b.
Tesemma, Z. K., Wei, Y., Western, A. W., and Peel, M. C.: Leaf area index variation for cropland, pasture and tree in response to climatic variation in the Goulburn–Broken catchment, Australia, J. Hydrometeorol., 15, 1592–1606, https://doi.org/10.1175/JHM-D-13-0108.1, 2014.
Thornton, P. E. and Running, S. W.: An improved algorithm for estimating incident daily solar radiation from measurements of temperature, humidity, and precipitation, Agr. Forest Meteorol., 93, 211–228, 1999.
Uddling, J., Teclaw, R. M., Kubiske, M. E., Pregitzer, K. S., and Ellsworth, D. S.: Sap flux in pure aspen and mixed aspen-birch forests exposed to elevated concentrations of carbon dioxide and ozone, Tree Physiol., 28, 1231–1243, 2008.
Vaze, J. and Teng, J.: Future climate and runoff projections across New South Wales, Australia: results and practical applications, Hydrol. Process., 25, 18–35, https://doi.org/10.1002/hyp.7812, 2011.
Vaze, J., Post, D. A., Chiew, F. H. S., Perraud, J. M., Viney, N. R., and Teng, J.: Climate non-stationarity – validity of calibrated rainfall–runoff models for use in climate change studies, J. Hydrol., 394, 447–457, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2010.09.018, 2010.
Verdon-Kidd, D. C. and Kiem, A. S.: Nature and causes of protracted droughts in southeast Australia: comparison between the Federation, WWII, and Big Dry droughts, Geophys. Res. Lett., 36, L22707, https://doi.org/10.1029/2009GL041067, 2009.
Vuuren, D. P., Edmonds, J., Kainuma, M., Riahi, K., Thomson, A., Hibbard, K., Hurtt, G. C., Kram, T., Krey, V., Lamarque, J.-F., Masui, T., Meinshausen, M., Nakicenovic, N., Smith, S. J., and Rose, S. K.: The representative concentration pathways: an overview, Climatic Change, 109, 5–31, 2011.
Warren, J. M., Norby, R. J., and Wullschleger, S. D.: Elevated CO2 enhances leaf senescence during extreme drought in a temperate forest, Tree Physiol., 31, 117–130, https://doi.org/10.1093/treephys/tpr002, 2011.
Western, A. W., Grayson, R. B., and Green, T. R.: The Tarrawarra project: high resolution spatial measurement, modelling and analysis of soil moisture and hydrological response, Hydrol. Process., 13, 633–652, 1999.
White, D. A., Battaglia, M., Mendham, D. S., Crombie, D. S., Kinal, J. O. E., and McGrath, J. F.: Observed and modelled leaf area index in Eucalyptus globulus plantations: tests of optimality and equilibrium hypotheses, Tree Physiol., 30, 831–844, https://doi.org/10.1093/treephys/tpq037, 2010.
Wullschleger, S. D., Epstein, H. E., Box, E. O., Euskirchen, E. S., Goswami, S., Iversen, C. M., Kattge, J., Norby, R. J., van Bodegom, P. M., and Xu, X.: Plant functional types in Earth System Models: past experiences and future directions for application of dynamic vegetation models in high-latitude ecosystems, Ann. Bot.-London, 114, 1–16, 2014.
Yapo, P. O., Gupta, H. V., and Sorooshian, S.: Multi-objective global optimization for hydrologic models, J. Hydrol., 204, 83–97, https://doi.org/10.1016/S0022-1694(97)00107-8, 1998.
Yu, M., Wang, G., Parr, D., and Ahmed, K.: Future changes of the terrestrial ecosystem based on a dynamic vegetation model driven with RCP8.5 climate projections from 19 GCMs, Clim. Change, 127, 257–271, https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-014-1249-2, 2014.
Zhao, F., Chiew, F. H. S., Zhang, L., Vaze, J., Perraud, J.-M., and Li, M.: Application of a macroscale hydrologic model to estimate streamflow across southeast Australia, J. Hydrometeorol., 13, 1233–1250, https://doi.org/10.1175/jhm-d-11-0114.1, 2012a.
Zhao, F. F., Xu, Z. X., and Zhang, L.: Changes in streamflow regime following vegetation changes from paired catchments, Hydrol. Process., 26, 1561–1573, https://doi.org/10.1002/hyp.8266, 2012b.
Zhao, R. J., Zhuang, Y. L., Fang, L. R., Liu, X. R., and Zhang, Q. S.: The Xinanjiang Model, Hydrological Forecasting Proceedings Oxford Symposium, IAHS Press, 571 pp., 1980.
