Articles | Volume 21, issue 4
https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-21-2107-2017
© Author(s) 2017. 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-21-2107-2017
© Author(s) 2017. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.
Research article
| 
19 Apr 2017
Research article |
| 19 Apr 2017
Sensitivity of potential evapotranspiration to changes in climate variables for different Australian climatic zones
Danlu Guo
CORRESPONDING AUTHOR
School of Civil, Environmental and Mining Engineering, University of Adelaide, North Terrace, Adelaide, SA 5005, Australia
Seth Westra
School of Civil, Environmental and Mining Engineering, University of Adelaide, North Terrace, Adelaide, SA 5005, Australia
Holger R. Maier
School of Civil, Environmental and Mining Engineering, University of Adelaide, North Terrace, Adelaide, SA 5005, Australia
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Conrad Wasko, Seth Westra, Rory Nathan, Acacia Pepler, Timothy H. Raupach, Andrew Dowdy, Fiona Johnson, Michelle Ho, Kathleen L. McInnes, Doerte Jakob, Jason Evans, Gabriele Villarini, and Hayley J. Fowler
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 1251–1285, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-1251-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-1251-2024, 2024
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In response to flood risk, design flood estimation is a cornerstone of infrastructure design and emergency response planning, but design flood estimation guidance under climate change is still in its infancy. We perform the first published systematic review of the impact of climate change on design flood estimation and conduct a meta-analysis to provide quantitative estimates of possible future changes in extreme rainfall.
Wenyan Wu, Seth Westra, and Michael Leonard
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 25, 2821–2841, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-2821-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-2821-2021, 2021
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Flood probability estimation is important for applications such as land use planning, reservoir operation, infrastructure design and safety assessments. However, it is a challenging task, especially in estuarine areas where floods are caused by both intense rainfall and storm surge. This study provides a review of approaches to flood probability estimation in these areas. Based on analysis of a real-world river system, guidance on method selection is provided.
Hong Xuan Do, Fang Zhao, Seth Westra, Michael Leonard, Lukas Gudmundsson, Julien Eric Stanislas Boulange, Jinfeng Chang, Philippe Ciais, Dieter Gerten, Simon N. Gosling, Hannes Müller Schmied, Tobias Stacke, Camelia-Eliza Telteu, and Yoshihide Wada
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 24, 1543–1564, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-1543-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-1543-2020, 2020
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We presented a global comparison between observed and simulated trends in a flood index over the 1971–2005 period using the Global Streamflow Indices and Metadata archive and six global hydrological models available through The Inter-Sectoral Impact Model Intercomparison Project. Streamflow simulations over 2006–2099 period robustly project high flood hazard in several regions. These high-flood-risk areas, however, are under-sampled by the current global streamflow databases.
Phuong Dong Le, Michael Leonard, and Seth Westra
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 23, 4851–4867, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-23-4851-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-23-4851-2019, 2019
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While conventional approaches focus on flood designs at individual locations, there are many situations requiring an understanding of spatial dependence of floods at multiple locations. This research describes a new framework for analyzing flood characteristics across civil infrastructure systems, including conditional and joint probabilities of floods. This work leads to a new flood estimation paradigm, which focuses on the risk of the entire system rather than each system element in isolation.
Stephen Blenkinsop, Hayley J. Fowler, Renaud Barbero, Steven C. Chan, Selma B. Guerreiro, Elizabeth Kendon, Geert Lenderink, Elizabeth Lewis, Xiao-Feng Li, Seth Westra, Lisa Alexander, Richard P. Allan, Peter Berg, Robert J. H. Dunn, Marie Ekström, Jason P. Evans, Greg Holland, Richard Jones, Erik Kjellström, Albert Klein-Tank, Dennis Lettenmaier, Vimal Mishra, Andreas F. Prein, Justin Sheffield, and Mari R. Tye
Adv. Sci. Res., 15, 117–126, https://doi.org/10.5194/asr-15-117-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/asr-15-117-2018, 2018
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Measurements of sub-daily (e.g. hourly) rainfall totals are essential if we are to understand short, intense bursts of rainfall that cause flash floods. We might expect the intensity of such events to increase in a warming climate but these are poorly realised in projections of future climate change. The INTENSE project is collating a global dataset of hourly rainfall measurements and linking with new developments in climate models to understand the characteristics and causes of these events.
Jason M. Hunter, Holger R. Maier, Matthew S. Gibbs, Eloise R. Foale, Naomi A. Grosvenor, Nathan P. Harders, and Tahali C. Kikuchi-Miller
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 22, 2987–3006, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-22-2987-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-22-2987-2018, 2018
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This research proposes a generalised hybrid model development framework and applies it to a case study of salinity prediction in a reach of the Murray River. The hybrid model combines five sub-models which describe one process of salt entry each and are developed based on the amount of system knowledge and data that are available to support each individual process. The model demonstrates increased performance over two benchmark models and has implications for future model development processes.
Hong Xuan Do, Lukas Gudmundsson, Michael Leonard, and Seth Westra
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 10, 765–785, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-10-765-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-10-765-2018, 2018
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The production of 30 959 daily streamflow time series in the Global Streamflow and Metadata Archive (GSIM) project is presented. The paper also describes the development of three metadata products that are freely available. Having collated an unprecedented number of stations and associated metadata, GSIM can be used to advance large-scale hydrological research and improve understanding of the global water cycle.
Lukas Gudmundsson, Hong Xuan Do, Michael Leonard, and Seth Westra
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 10, 787–804, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-10-787-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-10-787-2018, 2018
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Time-series indices characterizing streamflow at annual, seasonal and monthly resolution at more than 30 000 stations around the world are presented. The data belong to the Global Streamflow and Metadata Archive (GSIM) and allow for an assessment of water balance components, hydrological extremes and the seasonality of water availability. The quality of the data is tested using automated methods to aid potential users to gauge the suitability of the data for specific applications.
Matthew S. Gibbs, David McInerney, Greer Humphrey, Mark A. Thyer, Holger R. Maier, Graeme C. Dandy, and Dmitri Kavetski
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 22, 871–887, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-22-871-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-22-871-2018, 2018
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This work developed models to predict how much water will be available in the next month to maximise environmental and social outcomes in southern Australia. Initialising the models with observed streamflow data, instead of warmed up by rainfall data, improved the results, even at a monthly lead time, making sure only data representative of the forecast period to develop the models were also important. If this step was ignored, and instead all data were used, poor predictions could be produced.
Related subject area
Subject: Hydrometeorology | Techniques and Approaches: Uncertainty analysis
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André Bertoncini and John W. Pomeroy
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Katharine Owen Sink and Tom Brikowski
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Kevin K. W. Cheung, Fei Ji, Nidhi Nishant, Jin Teng, James Bennett, and De Li Liu
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Revised manuscript accepted for HESS
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This study evaluates two reanalysis datasets, which are critical in climate, weather research and water resources analysis, for the Australian region in simulating mean precipitation and six selected precipitation extremes. While spatial patterns of mean precipitation are well reproduced, substantial biases exist in precipitation variability, trends and extremes. Caution in applying these datasets is thus advised in terms of the latter aspects.
Raul R. Wood, Joren Janzing, Amber van Hamel, Jonas Götte, Dominik L. Schumacher, and Manuela I. Brunner
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-2905, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-2905, 2024
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Continuous and high-quality meteorological datasets are crucial to study extreme hydro-climatic events. We here conduct a comprehensive spatio-temporal evaluation of precipitation and temperature from four climate reanalysis datasets, focusing on mean and extreme metrics, variability, trends, and the representation of droughts and floods over Switzerland. Our analysis shows that all datasets have some merit when limitations are considered, and that one dataset performs better than the others.
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This study compared global satellite and one reanalysis precipitation dataset to assess diurnal variability. We found that all datasets capture key diurnal precipitation patterns, with maximum precipitation in the afternoon over land and early morning over the ocean. However, there are differences in the exact timing and amount of precipitation. This suggests that it is better to use a combination of datasets for potential applications rather than relying on a single dataset.
Laurent Strohmenger, Eric Sauquet, Claire Bernard, Jérémie Bonneau, Flora Branger, Amélie Bresson, Pierre Brigode, Rémy Buzier, Olivier Delaigue, Alexandre Devers, Guillaume Evin, Maïté Fournier, Shu-Chen Hsu, Sandra Lanini, Alban de Lavenne, Thibault Lemaitre-Basset, Claire Magand, Guilherme Mendoza Guimarães, Max Mentha, Simon Munier, Charles Perrin, Tristan Podechard, Léo Rouchy, Malak Sadki, Myriam Soutif-Bellenger, François Tilmant, Yves Tramblay, Anne-Lise Véron, Jean-Philippe Vidal, and Guillaume Thirel
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 3375–3391, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-3375-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-3375-2023, 2023
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We present the results of a large visual inspection campaign of 674 streamflow time series in France. The objective was to detect non-natural records resulting from instrument failure or anthropogenic influences, such as hydroelectric power generation or reservoir management. We conclude that the identification of flaws in flow time series is highly dependent on the objectives and skills of individual evaluators, and we raise the need for better practices for data cleaning.
Rui Guo and Alberto Montanari
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 2847–2863, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-2847-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-2847-2023, 2023
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Zun Yin, Kirsten L. Findell, Paul Dirmeyer, Elena Shevliakova, Sergey Malyshev, Khaled Ghannam, Nina Raoult, and Zhihong Tan
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 861–872, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-861-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-861-2023, 2023
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Land–atmosphere (L–A) interactions typically focus on daytime processes connecting the land state with the overlying atmospheric boundary layer. However, much prior L–A work used monthly or daily means due to the lack of daytime-only data products. Here we show that monthly smoothing can significantly obscure the L–A coupling signal, and including nighttime information can mute or mask the daytime processes of interest. We propose diagnosing L–A coupling within models or archiving subdaily data.
Lei Xu, Nengcheng Chen, Chao Yang, Hongchu Yu, and Zeqiang Chen
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 26, 2923–2938, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-2923-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-2923-2022, 2022
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Precipitation forecasting has potential uncertainty due to data and model uncertainties. Here, an integrated predictive uncertainty modeling framework is proposed by jointly considering data and model uncertainties through an uncertainty propagation theorem. The results indicate an effective predictive uncertainty estimation for precipitation forecasting, indicating the great potential for uncertainty quantification of numerous predictive applications.
Thibault Lemaitre-Basset, Ludovic Oudin, Guillaume Thirel, and Lila Collet
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 26, 2147–2159, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-2147-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-2147-2022, 2022
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Increasing temperature will impact evaporation and water resource management. Hydrological models are fed with an estimation of the evaporative demand of the atmosphere, called potential evapotranspiration (PE). The objectives of this study were (1) to compute the future PE anomaly over France and (2) to determine the impact of the choice of the method to estimate PE. Our results show that all methods present similar future trends. No method really stands out from the others.
Jing Xu, François Anctil, and Marie-Amélie Boucher
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 26, 1001–1017, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-1001-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-1001-2022, 2022
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The performance of the non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm II (NSGA-II) is compared with a conventional post-processing method of affine kernel dressing. NSGA-II showed its superiority in improving the forecast skill and communicating trade-offs with end-users. It allows the enhancement of the forecast quality since it allows for setting multiple specific objectives from scratch. This flexibility should be considered as a reason to implement hydrologic ensemble prediction systems (H-EPSs).
Emixi Sthefany Valdez, François Anctil, and Maria-Helena Ramos
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 26, 197–220, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-197-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-197-2022, 2022
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We investigated how a precipitation post-processor interacts with other tools for uncertainty quantification in a hydrometeorological forecasting chain. Four systems were implemented to generate 7 d ensemble streamflow forecasts, which vary from partial to total uncertainty estimation. Overall analysis showed that post-processing and initial condition estimation ensure the most skill improvements, in some cases even better than a system that considers all sources of uncertainty.
Haowen Yue, Mekonnen Gebremichael, and Vahid Nourani
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 26, 167–181, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-167-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-167-2022, 2022
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The development of high-resolution global precipitation forecasts and the lack of reliable precipitation forecasts over Africa motivates this work to evaluate the precipitation forecasts from the Global Forecast System (GFS) over the Niger river basin in Africa. The GFS forecasts, at a 15 d accumulation timescale, have an acceptable performance; however, the forecasts are highly biased. It is recommended to apply bias correction to GFS forecasts before their application.
Hadush Meresa, Conor Murphy, Rowan Fealy, and Saeed Golian
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 25, 5237–5257, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-5237-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-5237-2021, 2021
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The assessment of future impacts of climate change is associated with a cascade of uncertainty linked to the modelling chain employed in assessing local-scale changes. Understanding and quantifying this cascade is essential for developing effective adaptation actions. We find that not only do the contributions of different sources of uncertainty vary by catchment, but that the dominant sources of uncertainty can be very different on a catchment-by-catchment basis.
Qichun Yang, Quan J. Wang, Kirsti Hakala, and Yating Tang
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 25, 4773–4788, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-4773-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-4773-2021, 2021
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Forecasts of water losses from land surface to the air are highly valuable for water resource management and planning. In this study, we aim to fill a critical knowledge gap in the forecasting of evaporative water loss. Model experiments across Australia clearly suggest the necessity of correcting errors in input variables for more reliable water loss forecasting. We anticipate that the strategy developed in our work will benefit future water loss forecasting and lead to more skillful forecasts.
Mostafa Tarek, François Brissette, and Richard Arsenault
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 25, 3331–3350, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-3331-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-3331-2021, 2021
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It is not known how much uncertainty the choice of a reference data set may bring to impact studies. This study compares precipitation and temperature data sets to evaluate the uncertainty contribution to the results of climate change studies. Results show that all data sets provide good streamflow simulations over the reference period. The reference data sets also provided uncertainty that was equal to or larger than that related to general circulation models over most of the catchments.
Liming Wang, Songjun Han, and Fuqiang Tian
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 25, 375–386, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-375-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-375-2021, 2021
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It remains unclear at which timescale the complementary principle performs best in estimating evaporation. In this study, evaporation estimation was assessed over 88 eddy covariance monitoring sites at multiple timescales. The results indicate that the generalized complementary functions perform best in estimating evaporation at the monthly scale. This study provides a reference for choosing a suitable time step for evaporation estimations in relevant studies.
Okjeong Lee, Jeonghyeon Choi, Jeongeun Won, and Sangdan Kim
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 24, 5077–5093, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-5077-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-5077-2020, 2020
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The uncertainty of the model interpreting rainfall extremes with temperature is analyzed. The performance of the model focuses on the reliability of the output. It has been found that the selection of temperatures suitable for extreme levels plays an important role in improving model reliability. Based on this, a methodology is proposed to quantify the degree of uncertainty inherent in the change in rainfall extremes due to global warming.
Chao Gao, Martijn J. Booij, and Yue-Ping Xu
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 24, 3251–3269, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-3251-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-3251-2020, 2020
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This paper studies the impact of climate change on high and low flows and quantifies the contribution of uncertainty sources from representative concentration pathways (RCPs), global climate models (GCMs) and internal climate variability in extreme flows. Internal climate variability was reflected in a stochastic rainfall model. The results show the importance of internal climate variability and GCM uncertainty in high flows and GCM and RCP uncertainty in low flows especially for the far future.
Marc Schleiss, Jonas Olsson, Peter Berg, Tero Niemi, Teemu Kokkonen, Søren Thorndahl, Rasmus Nielsen, Jesper Ellerbæk Nielsen, Denica Bozhinova, and Seppo Pulkkinen
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 24, 3157–3188, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-3157-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-3157-2020, 2020
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A multinational assessment of radar's ability to capture heavy rain events is conducted. In total, six different radar products in Denmark, the Netherlands, Finland and Sweden were considered. Results show a fair agreement, with radar underestimating by 17 %-44 % on average compared with gauges. Despite being adjusted for bias, five of six radar products still exhibited strong conditional biases with intensities of 1–2% per mm/h. Median peak intensity bias was significantly higher, reaching 44 %–67%.
Xudong Zhou, Jan Polcher, Tao Yang, and Ching-Sheng Huang
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 24, 2061–2081, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-2061-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-2061-2020, 2020
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This article proposes a new estimation approach for assessing the uncertainty with multiple datasets by fully considering all variations in temporal and spatial dimensions. Comparisons demonstrate that classical metrics may underestimate the uncertainties among datasets due to an averaging process in their algorithms. This new approach is particularly suitable for overall assessment of multiple climatic products, but can be easily applied to other spatiotemporal products in related fields.
Lionel Berthet, François Bourgin, Charles Perrin, Julie Viatgé, Renaud Marty, and Olivier Piotte
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 24, 2017–2041, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-2017-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-2017-2020, 2020
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An increasing number of flood forecasting services assess and communicate the uncertainty associated with their forecasts. We present a crash-testing framework that evaluates the quality of hydrological forecasts in an extrapolation context. Overall, the results highlight the challenge of uncertainty quantification when forecasting high flows. They show a significant drop in reliability when forecasting high flows and considerable variability among catchments and across lead times.
Shaoning Lv, Bernd Schalge, Pablo Saavedra Garfias, and Clemens Simmer
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 24, 1957–1973, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-1957-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-1957-2020, 2020
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Passive remote sensing of soil moisture has good potential to improve weather forecasting via data assimilation in theory. We use the virtual reality data set (VR01) to infer the impact of sampling density on soil moisture ground cal/val activity. It shows how the sampling error is growing with an increasing sampling distance for a SMOS–SMAP scale footprint in about 40 km, 9 km, and 3 km. The conclusion will help in understanding the passive remote sensing soil moisture products.
Thanh Le and Deg-Hyo Bae
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 24, 1131–1143, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-1131-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-1131-2020, 2020
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Here we investigate the response of global evaporation to main climate modes, including the Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD), the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) and the El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO). Our results indicate that ENSO is an important driver of evaporation for many regions, while the impacts of NAO and IOD are substantial. This study allows us to obtain insight about the predictability of evaporation and, hence, may help to improve the early-warning systems of climate extremes.
Jean-Philippe Baudouin, Michael Herzog, and Cameron A. Petrie
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 24, 427–450, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-427-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-427-2020, 2020
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The amount of precipitation falling in the Indus River basin remains uncertain while its variability impacts 100 million inhabitants. A comparison of datasets from diverse sources (ground remote observations, model outputs) reduces this uncertainty significantly. Grounded observations offer the most reliable long-term variability but with important underestimation in winter over the mountains. By contrast, recent model outputs offer better estimations of total amount and short-term variability.
Kamal Ahmed, Dhanapala A. Sachindra, Shamsuddin Shahid, Mehmet C. Demirel, and Eun-Sung Chung
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 23, 4803–4824, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-23-4803-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-23-4803-2019, 2019
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This study evaluated the performance of 36 CMIP5 GCMs in simulating seasonal precipitation and maximum and minimum temperature over Pakistan using spatial metrics (SPAtial EFficiency, fractions skill score, Goodman–Kruskal's lambda, Cramer's V, Mapcurves, and Kling–Gupta efficiency) for the period 1961–2005. NorESM1-M, MIROC5, BCC-CSM1-1, and ACCESS1-3 were identified as the most suitable GCMs for simulating all three climate variables over Pakistan.
Sungmin O and Ulrich Foelsche
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 23, 2863–2875, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-23-2863-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-23-2863-2019, 2019
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We analyze heavy local rainfall to address questions regarding the spatial uncertainty due to the approximation of areal rainfall using point measurements. Ten years of rainfall data from a dense network of 150 rain gauges in southeastern Austria are employed, which permits robust examination of small-scale rainfall at various horizontal resolutions. Quantitative uncertainty information from the study can guide both data users and producers to estimate uncertainty in their own rainfall dataset.
Aifeng Lv, Bo Qu, Shaofeng Jia, and Wenbin Zhu
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 23, 883–896, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-23-883-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-23-883-2019, 2019
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ENSO-related changes in daily precipitation regimes are currently ignored by the scientific community. We analyzed the anomalies of daily precipitation and hydrological extremes caused by different phases of ENSO events, as well as the possible driving mechanisms, to reveal the influence of ENSO on China's daily precipitation regimes. Our results provide a valuable tool for daily precipitation prediction and enable the prioritization of adaptation efforts ahead of extreme events in China.
Micheal J. Simpson and Neil I. Fox
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 22, 3375–3389, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-22-3375-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-22-3375-2018, 2018
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Many researchers have expressed that one of the main difficulties in modeling watershed hydrology is that of obtaining continuous, widespread weather input data, especially precipitation. The overarching objective of this study was to provide a comprehensive study of three weather radars as a function of range. We found that radar-estimated precipitation was best at ranges between 100 and 150 km from the radar, with different radar parameters being superior at varying distances from the radar.
Vimal Mishra, Reepal Shah, Syed Azhar, Harsh Shah, Parth Modi, and Rohini Kumar
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 22, 2269–2284, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-22-2269-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-22-2269-2018, 2018
Sanjib Sharma, Ridwan Siddique, Seann Reed, Peter Ahnert, Pablo Mendoza, and Alfonso Mejia
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 22, 1831–1849, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-22-1831-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-22-1831-2018, 2018
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We investigate the relative roles of statistical weather preprocessing and streamflow postprocessing in hydrological ensemble forecasting at short- to medium-range forecast lead times (day 1–7). For this purpose, we develop and implement a regional hydrologic ensemble prediction system (RHEPS). Overall analysis shows that implementing both preprocessing and postprocessing ensures the most skill improvements, but postprocessing alone can often be a competitive alternative.
Kevin Sene, Wlodek Tych, and Keith Beven
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 22, 127–141, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-22-127-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-22-127-2018, 2018
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The theme of the paper is exploration of the potential for seasonal flow forecasting for large lakes using a range of stochastic transfer function techniques with additional insights gained from simple analytical approximations. The methods were evaluated using records for two of the largest lakes in the world. The paper concludes with a discussion of the relevance of the results to operational flow forecasting systems for other large lakes.
Fan Yang, Hui Lu, Kun Yang, Jie He, Wei Wang, Jonathon S. Wright, Chengwei Li, Menglei Han, and Yishan Li
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 21, 5805–5821, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-21-5805-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-21-5805-2017, 2017
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In this paper, we show that CLDAS has the highest spatial and temporal resolution, and it performs best in terms of precipitation, while it overestimates the shortwave radiation. CMFD also has high resolution and its shortwave radiation data match well with the station data; its annual-mean precipitation is reliable but its monthly precipitation needs improvements. Both GLDAS and CN05.1 over mainland China need to be improved. The results can benefit researchers for forcing data selection.
Rachel Bazile, Marie-Amélie Boucher, Luc Perreault, and Robert Leconte
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 21, 5747–5762, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-21-5747-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-21-5747-2017, 2017
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Meteorological forecasting agencies constantly work on pushing the limit of predictability farther in time. However, some end users need proof that climate model outputs are ready to be implemented operationally. We show that bias correction is crucial for the use of ECMWF System4 forecasts for the studied area and there is a potential for the use of 1-month-ahead forecasts. Beyond this, forecast performance is equivalent to using past climatology series as inputs to the hydrological model.
Judith Eeckman, Pierre Chevallier, Aaron Boone, Luc Neppel, Anneke De Rouw, Francois Delclaux, and Devesh Koirala
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 21, 4879–4893, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-21-4879-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-21-4879-2017, 2017
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The central part of the Himalayan Range presents tremendous heterogeneity in terms of topography and climatology, but the representation of hydro-climatic processes for Himalayan catchments is limited due to a lack of knowledge in such poorly instrumented environments. The proposed approach is to characterize the effect of altitude on precipitation by considering ensembles of acceptable altitudinal factors. Ensembles of acceptable values for the components of the water cycle are then provided.
Jefferson S. Wong, Saman Razavi, Barrie R. Bonsal, Howard S. Wheater, and Zilefac E. Asong
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 21, 2163–2185, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-21-2163-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-21-2163-2017, 2017
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This study was conducted to quantify the spatial and temporal variability of the errors associated with various gridded precipitation products in Canada. Overall, WFDEI [GPCC] and CaPA performed best with respect to different performance measures, followed by ANUSPLIN and WEDEI [CRU]. Princeton and NARR demonstrated the lowest quality. Comparing the climate model-simulated products, PCIC ensembles generally performed better than NA-CORDEX ensembles in terms of reliability in four seasons.
Vojtěch Svoboda, Martin Hanel, Petr Máca, and Jan Kyselý
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 21, 963–980, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-21-963-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-21-963-2017, 2017
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The study presents validation of precipitation events as simulated by an ensemble of regional climate models for the Czech Republic. While the number of events per season, seasonal total precipitation due to heavy events and the distribution of rainfall depths are simulated relatively well, event maximum precipitation and event intensity are strongly underestimated. This underestimation cannot be explained by scale mismatch between point observations and area average (climate model simulations).
Martin Hanel, Petr Máca, Petr Bašta, Radek Vlnas, and Pavel Pech
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 20, 4307–4322, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-20-4307-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-20-4307-2016, 2016
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The paper is focused on assessment of the contribution of various sources of uncertainty to the estimated rainfall erosivity factor. It is shown that the rainfall erosivity factor can be estimated with reasonable precision even from records shorter than recommended, provided good spatial coverage and reasonable explanatory variables are available. The research was done as an update of the R factor estimates for the Czech Republic, which were later used for climate change assessment.
Jean-Philippe Vidal, Benoît Hingray, Claire Magand, Eric Sauquet, and Agnès Ducharne
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 20, 3651–3672, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-20-3651-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-20-3651-2016, 2016
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Possible transient futures of winter and summer low flows for two snow-influenced catchments in the southern French Alps show a strong decrease signal. It is however largely masked by the year-to-year variability, which should be the main target for defining adaptation strategies. Responses of different hydrological models strongly diverge in the future, suggesting to carefully check the robustness of evapotranspiration and snowpack components under a changing climate.
Louise Arnal, Maria-Helena Ramos, Erin Coughlan de Perez, Hannah Louise Cloke, Elisabeth Stephens, Fredrik Wetterhall, Schalk Jan van Andel, and Florian Pappenberger
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 20, 3109–3128, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-20-3109-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-20-3109-2016, 2016
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Forecasts are produced as probabilities of occurrence of specific events, which is both an added value and a challenge for users. This paper presents a game on flood protection, "How much are you prepared to pay for a forecast?", which investigated how users perceive the value of forecasts and are willing to pay for them when making decisions. It shows that users are mainly influenced by the perceived quality of the forecasts, their need for the information and their degree of risk tolerance.
K. Sunilkumar, T. Narayana Rao, and S. Satheeshkumar
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 20, 1719–1735, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-20-1719-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-20-1719-2016, 2016
Vincent Roth and Tatenda Lemann
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 20, 921–934, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-20-921-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-20-921-2016, 2016
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The Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) suggests using the CFSR global rainfall data for modelling discharge and soil erosion in data-scarce parts of the world. These data are freely available and ready to use for SWAT modelling. However, simulations with the CFSR data in the Ethiopian Highlands were unable to represent the specific regional climates and showed high discrepancies. This article compares SWAT simulations with conventional rainfall data and with CFSR rainfall data.
J. Kim and S. K. Park
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 20, 651–658, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-20-651-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-20-651-2016, 2016
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This study examined the uncertainty in climatological precipitation in East Asia, calculated from five gridded analysis data sets based on in situ rain gauge observations from 1980 to 2007. It is found that the regions of large uncertainties are typically lightly populated and are characterized by severe terrain and/or very high elevations. Thus, care must be taken in using long-term trends calculated from gridded precipitation analysis data for climate studies over such regions in East Asia.
M. F. Rios Gaona, A. Overeem, H. Leijnse, and R. Uijlenhoet
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 19, 3571–3584, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-3571-2015, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-3571-2015, 2015
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Commercial cellular networks are built for telecommunication purposes. These kinds of networks have lately been used to obtain rainfall maps at country-wide scales. From previous studies, we now quantify the uncertainties associated with such maps. To do so, we divided the sources or error into two categories: from microwave link measurements and from mapping. It was found that the former is the source that contributes the most to the overall error in rainfall maps from microwave link network.
S. H. Alemohammad, K. A. McColl, A. G. Konings, D. Entekhabi, and A. Stoffelen
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 19, 3489–3503, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-3489-2015, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-3489-2015, 2015
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This paper introduces a new variant of the triple collocation technique with multiplicative error model. The method is applied, for the first time, to precipitation products across the central part of continental USA. Results show distinctive patterns of error variance in each product that are estimated without a priori assumption of any of the error distributions. The correlation coefficients between each product and the truth are also estimated, which provides another performance perspective.
M. S. Raleigh, J. D. Lundquist, and M. P. Clark
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 19, 3153–3179, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-3153-2015, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-3153-2015, 2015
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A sensitivity analysis is used to examine how error characteristics (type, distributions, and magnitudes) in meteorological forcing data impact outputs from a physics-based snow model in four climates. Bias and error magnitudes were key factors in model sensitivity and precipitation bias often dominated. However, the relative importance of forcings depended somewhat on the selected model output. Forcing uncertainty was comparable to model structural uncertainty as found in other studies.
S. Garrigues, A. Olioso, J. C. Calvet, E. Martin, S. Lafont, S. Moulin, A. Chanzy, O. Marloie, S. Buis, V. Desfonds, N. Bertrand, and D. Renard
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 19, 3109–3131, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-3109-2015, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-3109-2015, 2015
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Land surface model simulations of evapotranspiration are assessed over a 12-year Mediterranean crop succession. Evapotranspiration mainly results from soil evaporation when it is simulated over a Mediterranean crop succession. This leads to a high sensitivity to the soil parameters. Errors on soil hydraulic properties can lead to a large bias in cumulative evapotranspiration over a long period of time. Accounting for uncertainties in soil properties is essential for land surface modelling.
W. Gong, Q. Duan, J. Li, C. Wang, Z. Di, Y. Dai, A. Ye, and C. Miao
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 19, 2409–2425, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-2409-2015, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-2409-2015, 2015
S. O. Los
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 19, 1713–1725, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-1713-2015, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-1713-2015, 2015
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The study evaluates annual precipitation (largely rainfall) amounts for the tropics and subtropics; precipitation was obtained from ground observations, satellite observations and numerical weather forecasting models.
- Annual precipitation amounts from ground and satellite observations were the most realistic.
- Newer weather forecasting models better predicted annual precipitation than older models.
- Weather forecasting models predicted inaccurate precipitation amounts for Africa.
A. Kann, I. Meirold-Mautner, F. Schmid, G. Kirchengast, J. Fuchsberger, V. Meyer, L. Tüchler, and B. Bica
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 19, 1547–1559, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-1547-2015, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-1547-2015, 2015
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The paper introduces a high resolution precipitation analysis system which operates on 1 km x 1 km resolution with high frequency updates of 5 minutes. The ability of such a system to adequately assess the convective precipitation distribution is evaluated by means of an independant, high resolution station network. This dense station network allows for a thorough evaluation of the analyses under different convective situations and of the representativeness error of raingaue measurements.
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Felix, T. P., Petra, D., Stephanie, E., and Martina, F.: Impact of climate change on renewable groundwater resources: assessing the benefits of avoided greenhouse gas emissions using selected CMIP5 climate projections, Environ. Res. Lett., 8, 024023, https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/8/2/024023, 2013.
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Garcia, E. S. and Tague, C. L.: Subsurface storage capacity influences climate–evapotranspiration interactions in three western United States catchments, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 19, 4845-4858, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-4845-2015, 2015.
Gerrits, A., Savenije, H., Veling, E., and Pfister, L.: Analytical derivation of the Budyko curve based on rainfall characteristics and a simple evaporation model, Water Resour. Res., 45, W04403, https://doi.org/10.1029/2008WR007308, 2009.
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Short summary
This study assessed the impact of baseline climate conditions on the sensitivity of potential evapotranspiration (PET) to a large range of plausible changes in temperature, relative humidity, solar radiation and wind speed at 30 Australian locations. Around 2-fold greater PET changes were observed at cool and humid locations compared to others, indicating potential for elevated water loss in the future. These impacts can be useful to inform the selection of PET models under a changing climate.
This study assessed the impact of baseline climate conditions on the sensitivity of potential...
