Articles | Volume 26, issue 2
https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-469-2022
© Author(s) 2022. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-469-2022
© Author(s) 2022. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Research article
| 
31 Jan 2022
Research article |
| 31 Jan 2022
| 31 Jan 2022
Extreme floods in Europe: going beyond observations using reforecast ensemble pooling
Manuela I. Brunner
CORRESPONDING AUTHOR
Institute of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Freiburg, Freiburg, Germany
Louise J. Slater
School of Geography and the Environment, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom
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Sadaf Nasreen, Oldrich Rakovec, Rohini Kumar, Manuela I. Brunner, Ujjwal Singh, Petr Maca, Yannis Markonis, and Martin Hanel
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This preprint is open for discussion and under review for Hydrology and Earth System Sciences (HESS).
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European droughts threaten water and agriculture, but how distinct drought processes will change under warming is uncertain. We examine seven mechanisms across Europe using 1971 to 2000 observations and 2070 to 2099 projections. Changes are regional: the Mediterranean shifts to longer, more severe droughts, while Northern and Western Central Europe often improve. Temperature-driven mechanisms, especially rain to snow transitions, respond most, guiding targeted adaptation.
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Flood impacts can be enhanced when they occur after droughts, yet the effectiveness of hydrological models in simulating these events remains unclear. Here, we calibrated four conceptual hydrological models across 63 catchments in Chile and Switzerland to assess their ability to detect streamflow extremes and their transitions. We show that drought-to-flood transitions are generally poorly captured, especially in semi-arid high-mountain catchments than in humid low-elevation ones.
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While the effect of water bodies on flood peaks at different time resolutions has been demonstrated in the past, it remains unclear how they affect the ratio between daily and hourly peaks. Our results show that (1) hourly flows are dampened much more strongly than daily flows, which leads to similar daily and hourly flood peaks downstream of reservoirs; and (2) the attenuation effect is particularly pronounced in catchments that are heavily influenced by water bodies.
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Process representation in hyper-resolution large-scale hydrological models (LHMs) limits model performance, particularly in mountain regions. Here, we update mountain process representation in an LHM and compare different meteorological forcing products. Structural and parametric changes in snow, glacier, and soil processes improve discharge simulations, while meteorological forcing remains a major control on model performance. Our work can guide future development of LHMs.
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When floods happen during or shortly after droughts, the impacts of each of the events can be magnified. In hydrological research, defining these events represents a challenging and important task in the process of understanding where and why they occur. We have used real-word examples to address some of these challenges and show different approaches influence outcomes. We make suggestions on when to use which approach and outline some pitfalls of which researchers should be aware.
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To assess climate impacts on streamflow, we need models that can predict streamflow under future conditions. This study compares three model types: data-driven (LSTM), conceptual (HBV), and hybrid (LSTM-HBV). LSTMs perform best overall, but HBV and hybrid models generalize better to warmer climates. Hybrid models are a promising tool for climate impact assessments, combining LSTMs accuracy with better generalizability of traditional models. In snowy regions, all models struggle to generalize.
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To study floods and droughts that are likely to change in the future, we use climate projections from climate models. However, we first need to adjust the systematic biases of these projections at the catchment scale before using them in hydrological models. Our study compares statistical methods that can adjust these biases but specifically for climate projections that enable a quantification of internal climate variability. We provide recommendations on the most appropriate methods.
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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 for 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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Suspended sediment is a natural component of rivers, but extreme suspended sediment concentrations (SSCs) can have negative impacts on water use and aquatic ecosystems. We identify the main factors influencing the spatial and temporal variability of annual SSC regimes and extreme SSC events. Our analysis shows that different processes are more important for annual SSC regimes than for extreme events and that compound events driven by glacial melt and high-intensity rainfall led to the highest SSCs.
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This study aims to improve prediction and understanding of extreme flood events in UK near-natural catchments. We develop a machine learning framework to assess the contribution of different features to flood magnitude estimation. We find weather patterns are weak predictors and stress the importance of evaluating model performance across and within catchments.
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I discuss different types of multivariate hydrological extremes and their dependencies, including regional extremes affecting multiple locations, such as spatially connected flood events; consecutive extremes occurring in close temporal succession, such as successive droughts; extremes characterized by multiple characteristics, such as floods with jointly high peak discharge and flood volume; and transitions between different types of extremes, such as drought-to-flood transitions.
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Reservoir regulation affects various streamflow characteristics. Still, information on when water is stored in and released from reservoirs is hardly available. We develop a statistical model to reconstruct reservoir operation signals from observed streamflow time series. By applying this approach to 74 catchments in the Alps, we find that reservoir management varies by catchment elevation and that seasonal redistribution from summer to winter is strongest in high-elevation catchments.
Veit Blauhut, Michael Stoelzle, Lauri Ahopelto, Manuela I. Brunner, Claudia Teutschbein, Doris E. Wendt, Vytautas Akstinas, Sigrid J. Bakke, Lucy J. Barker, Lenka Bartošová, Agrita Briede, Carmelo Cammalleri, Ksenija Cindrić Kalin, Lucia De Stefano, Miriam Fendeková, David C. Finger, Marijke Huysmans, Mirjana Ivanov, Jaak Jaagus, Jiří Jakubínský, Svitlana Krakovska, Gregor Laaha, Monika Lakatos, Kiril Manevski, Mathias Neumann Andersen, Nina Nikolova, Marzena Osuch, Pieter van Oel, Kalina Radeva, Renata J. Romanowicz, Elena Toth, Mirek Trnka, Marko Urošev, Julia Urquijo Reguera, Eric Sauquet, Aleksandra Stevkov, Lena M. Tallaksen, Iryna Trofimova, Anne F. Van Loon, Michelle T. H. van Vliet, Jean-Philippe Vidal, Niko Wanders, Micha Werner, Patrick Willems, and Nenad Živković
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Recent drought events caused enormous damage in Europe. We therefore questioned the existence and effect of current drought management strategies on the actual impacts and how drought is perceived by relevant stakeholders. Over 700 participants from 28 European countries provided insights into drought hazard and impact perception and current management strategies. The study concludes with an urgent need to collectively combat drought risk via a European macro-level drought governance approach.
Álvaro Ossandón, Manuela I. Brunner, Balaji Rajagopalan, and William Kleiber
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 26, 149–166, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-149-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-149-2022, 2022
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Timely projections of seasonal streamflow extremes on a river network can be useful for flood risk mitigation, but this is challenging, particularly under space–time nonstationarity. We develop a space–time Bayesian hierarchical model (BHM) using temporal climate covariates and copulas to project seasonal streamflow extremes and the attendant uncertainties. We demonstrate this on the Upper Colorado River basin to project spring flow extremes using the preceding winter’s climate teleconnections.
Manuela I. Brunner, Eric Gilleland, and Andrew W. Wood
Earth Syst. Dynam., 12, 621–634, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-12-621-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-12-621-2021, 2021
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Compound hot and dry events can lead to severe impacts whose severity may depend on their timescale and spatial extent. Here, we show that the spatial extent and timescale of compound hot–dry events are strongly related, spatial compound event extents are largest at
sub-seasonal timescales, and short events are driven more by high temperatures, while longer events are more driven by low precipitation. Future climate impact studies should therefore be performed at different timescales.
Sadaf Nasreen, Oldrich Rakovec, Rohini Kumar, Manuela I. Brunner, Ujjwal Singh, Petr Maca, Yannis Markonis, and Martin Hanel
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2026-973, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2026-973, 2026
This preprint is open for discussion and under review for Hydrology and Earth System Sciences (HESS).
Short summary
Short summary
European droughts threaten water and agriculture, but how distinct drought processes will change under warming is uncertain. We examine seven mechanisms across Europe using 1971 to 2000 observations and 2070 to 2099 projections. Changes are regional: the Mediterranean shifts to longer, more severe droughts, while Northern and Western Central Europe often improve. Temperature-driven mechanisms, especially rain to snow transitions, respond most, guiding targeted adaptation.
Eduardo Muñoz-Castro, Bailey J. Anderson, Paul C. Astagneau, Daniel L. Swain, Pablo A. Mendoza, and Manuela I. Brunner
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 30, 825–848, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-30-825-2026, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-30-825-2026, 2026
Short summary
Short summary
Flood impacts can be enhanced when they occur after droughts, yet the effectiveness of hydrological models in simulating these events remains unclear. Here, we calibrated four conceptual hydrological models across 63 catchments in Chile and Switzerland to assess their ability to detect streamflow extremes and their transitions. We show that drought-to-flood transitions are generally poorly captured, especially in semi-arid high-mountain catchments than in humid low-elevation ones.
Jonas Götte, Paul Charles Astagneau, and Manuela Irene Brunner
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2025-6119, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2025-6119, 2026
This preprint is open for discussion and under review for Hydrology and Earth System Sciences (HESS).
Short summary
Short summary
While the effect of water bodies on flood peaks at different time resolutions has been demonstrated in the past, it remains unclear how they affect the ratio between daily and hourly peaks. Our results show that (1) hourly flows are dampened much more strongly than daily flows, which leads to similar daily and hourly flood peaks downstream of reservoirs; and (2) the attenuation effect is particularly pronounced in catchments that are heavily influenced by water bodies.
Joren Janzing, Niko Wanders, Marit van Tiel, Barry van Jaarsveld, Dirk N. Karger, and Manuela I. Brunner
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 7041–7071, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-7041-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-7041-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
Process representation in hyper-resolution large-scale hydrological models (LHMs) limits model performance, particularly in mountain regions. Here, we update mountain process representation in an LHM and compare different meteorological forcing products. Structural and parametric changes in snow, glacier, and soil processes improve discharge simulations, while meteorological forcing remains a major control on model performance. Our work can guide future development of LHMs.
Bailey J. Anderson, Eduardo Muñoz-Castro, Lena M. Tallaksen, Alessia Matano, Jonas Götte, Rachael Armitage, Eugene Magee, and Manuela I. Brunner
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 6069–6092, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-6069-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-6069-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
When floods happen during or shortly after droughts, the impacts of each of the events can be magnified. In hydrological research, defining these events represents a challenging and important task in the process of understanding where and why they occur. We have used real-word examples to address some of these challenges and show different approaches influence outcomes. We make suggestions on when to use which approach and outline some pitfalls of which researchers should be aware.
Jan P. Bohl, Raul R. Wood, Corinna Frank, Paul C. Astagneau, Jonas Peters, and Manuela I. Brunner
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2025-5201, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2025-5201, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
To assess climate impacts on streamflow, we need models that can predict streamflow under future conditions. This study compares three model types: data-driven (LSTM), conceptual (HBV), and hybrid (LSTM-HBV). LSTMs perform best overall, but HBV and hybrid models generalize better to warmer climates. Hybrid models are a promising tool for climate impact assessments, combining LSTMs accuracy with better generalizability of traditional models. In snowy regions, all models struggle to generalize.
Paul C. Astagneau, Raul R. Wood, Mathieu Vrac, Sven Kotlarski, Pradeebane Vaittinada Ayar, Bastien François, and Manuela I. Brunner
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 5695–5718, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-5695-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-5695-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
To study floods and droughts that are likely to change in the future, we use climate projections from climate models. However, we first need to adjust the systematic biases of these projections at the catchment scale before using them in hydrological models. Our study compares statistical methods that can adjust these biases but specifically for climate projections that enable a quantification of internal climate variability. We provide recommendations on the most appropriate methods.
Raul R. Wood, Joren Janzing, Amber van Hamel, Jonas Götte, Dominik L. Schumacher, and Manuela I. Brunner
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 4153–4178, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-4153-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-4153-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
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 for 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.
Amber van Hamel, Peter Molnar, Joren Janzing, and Manuela Irene Brunner
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 2975–2995, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-2975-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-2975-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
Suspended sediment is a natural component of rivers, but extreme suspended sediment concentrations (SSCs) can have negative impacts on water use and aquatic ecosystems. We identify the main factors influencing the spatial and temporal variability of annual SSC regimes and extreme SSC events. Our analysis shows that different processes are more important for annual SSC regimes than for extreme events and that compound events driven by glacial melt and high-intensity rainfall led to the highest SSCs.
Alessia Matanó, Raed Hamed, Manuela I. Brunner, Marlies H. Barendrecht, and Anne F. Van Loon
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 2749–2764, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-2749-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-2749-2025, 2025
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Short summary
Persistent droughts change how rivers respond to rainfall. Our study of over 5000 catchments worldwide found that hydrological and soil moisture droughts decrease river-flow response to rain, especially in arid regions, while vegetation decline slightly increases it. Snow-covered areas are more resilient due to stored water buffering changes. Droughts can also cause long-lasting changes, with short and intense droughts reducing river response to rainfall and prolonged droughts increasing it.
Simon Moulds, Louise Slater, Louise Arnal, and Andrew W. Wood
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 2393–2406, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-2393-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-2393-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
Seasonal streamflow forecasts are an important component of flood risk management. Here, we train and test a machine learning model to predict the monthly maximum daily streamflow up to 4 months ahead. We train the model on precipitation and temperature forecasts to produce probabilistic hindcasts for 579 stations across the UK for the period 2004–2016. We show skilful results up to 4 months ahead in many locations, although, in general, the skill declines with increasing lead time.
Emma Ford, Manuela I. Brunner, Hannah Christensen, and Louise Slater
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2025-1493, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2025-1493, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
This study aims to improve prediction and understanding of extreme flood events in UK near-natural catchments. We develop a machine learning framework to assess the contribution of different features to flood magnitude estimation. We find weather patterns are weak predictors and stress the importance of evaluating model performance across and within catchments.
Rutong Liu, Jiabo Yin, Louise Slater, Shengyu Kang, Yuanhang Yang, Pan Liu, Jiali Guo, Xihui Gu, Xiang Zhang, and Aliaksandr Volchak
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 3305–3326, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3305-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3305-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Climate change accelerates the water cycle and alters the spatiotemporal distribution of hydrological variables, thus complicating the projection of future streamflow and hydrological droughts. We develop a cascade modeling chain to project future bivariate hydrological drought characteristics over China, using five bias-corrected global climate model outputs under three shared socioeconomic pathways, five hydrological models, and a deep-learning model.
Solomon H. Gebrechorkos, Julian Leyland, Simon J. Dadson, Sagy Cohen, Louise Slater, Michel Wortmann, Philip J. Ashworth, Georgina L. Bennett, Richard Boothroyd, Hannah Cloke, Pauline Delorme, Helen Griffith, Richard Hardy, Laurence Hawker, Stuart McLelland, Jeffrey Neal, Andrew Nicholas, Andrew J. Tatem, Ellie Vahidi, Yinxue Liu, Justin Sheffield, Daniel R. Parsons, and Stephen E. Darby
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 3099–3118, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3099-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3099-2024, 2024
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This study evaluated six high-resolution global precipitation datasets for hydrological modelling. MSWEP and ERA5 showed better performance, but spatial variability was high. The findings highlight the importance of careful dataset selection for river discharge modelling due to the lack of a universally superior dataset. Further improvements in global precipitation data products are needed.
Marcus Buechel, Louise Slater, and Simon Dadson
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 2081–2105, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2081-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2081-2024, 2024
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Afforestation has been proposed internationally, but the hydrological implications of such large increases in the spatial extent of woodland are not fully understood. In this study, we use a land surface model to simulate hydrology across Great Britain with realistic afforestation scenarios and potential climate changes. Countrywide afforestation minimally influences hydrology, when compared to climate change, and reduces low streamflow whilst not lowering the highest flows.
Bailey J. Anderson, Manuela I. Brunner, Louise J. Slater, and Simon J. Dadson
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 1567–1583, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-1567-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-1567-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Elasticityrefers to how much the amount of water in a river changes with precipitation. We usually calculate this using average streamflow values; however, the amount of water within rivers is also dependent on stored water sources. Here, we look at how elasticity varies across the streamflow distribution and show that not only do low and high streamflows respond differently to precipitation change, but also these differences vary with water storage availability.
Julia Miller, Andrea Böhnisch, Ralf Ludwig, and Manuela I. Brunner
Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci., 24, 411–428, https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-24-411-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-24-411-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
We assess the impacts of climate change on fire danger for 1980–2099 in different landscapes of central Europe, using the Canadian Forest Fire Weather Index (FWI) as a fire danger indicator. We find that today's 100-year FWI event will occur every 30 years by 2050 and every 10 years by 2099. High fire danger (FWI > 21.3) becomes the mean condition by 2099 under an RCP8.5 scenario. This study highlights the potential for severe fire events in central Europe from a meteorological perspective.
Marvin Höge, Martina Kauzlaric, Rosi Siber, Ursula Schönenberger, Pascal Horton, Jan Schwanbeck, Marius Günter Floriancic, Daniel Viviroli, Sibylle Wilhelm, Anna E. Sikorska-Senoner, Nans Addor, Manuela Brunner, Sandra Pool, Massimiliano Zappa, and Fabrizio Fenicia
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 15, 5755–5784, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-15-5755-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-15-5755-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
CAMELS-CH is an open large-sample hydro-meteorological data set that covers 331 catchments in hydrologic Switzerland from 1 January 1981 to 31 December 2020. It comprises (a) daily data of river discharge and water level as well as meteorologic variables like precipitation and temperature; (b) yearly glacier and land cover data; (c) static attributes of, e.g, topography or human impact; and (d) catchment delineations. CAMELS-CH enables water and climate research and modeling at catchment level.
Jiabo Yin, Louise J. Slater, Abdou Khouakhi, Le Yu, Pan Liu, Fupeng Li, Yadu Pokhrel, and Pierre Gentine
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 15, 5597–5615, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-15-5597-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-15-5597-2023, 2023
Short summary
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This study presents long-term (i.e., 1940–2022) and high-resolution (i.e., 0.25°) monthly time series of TWS anomalies over the global land surface. The reconstruction is achieved by using a set of machine learning models with a large number of predictors, including climatic and hydrological variables, land use/land cover data, and vegetation indicators (e.g., leaf area index). Our proposed GTWS-MLrec performs overall as well as, or is more reliable than, previous TWS datasets.
Manuela Irene Brunner
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 2479–2497, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-2479-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-2479-2023, 2023
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I discuss different types of multivariate hydrological extremes and their dependencies, including regional extremes affecting multiple locations, such as spatially connected flood events; consecutive extremes occurring in close temporal succession, such as successive droughts; extremes characterized by multiple characteristics, such as floods with jointly high peak discharge and flood volume; and transitions between different types of extremes, such as drought-to-flood transitions.
Louise J. Slater, Louise Arnal, Marie-Amélie Boucher, Annie Y.-Y. Chang, Simon Moulds, Conor Murphy, Grey Nearing, Guy Shalev, Chaopeng Shen, Linda Speight, Gabriele Villarini, Robert L. Wilby, Andrew Wood, and Massimiliano Zappa
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 1865–1889, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-1865-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-1865-2023, 2023
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Hybrid forecasting systems combine data-driven methods with physics-based weather and climate models to improve the accuracy of predictions for meteorological and hydroclimatic events such as rainfall, temperature, streamflow, floods, droughts, tropical cyclones, or atmospheric rivers. We review recent developments in hybrid forecasting and outline key challenges and opportunities in the field.
Manuela Irene Brunner and Philippe Naveau
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 673–687, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-673-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-673-2023, 2023
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Reservoir regulation affects various streamflow characteristics. Still, information on when water is stored in and released from reservoirs is hardly available. We develop a statistical model to reconstruct reservoir operation signals from observed streamflow time series. By applying this approach to 74 catchments in the Alps, we find that reservoir management varies by catchment elevation and that seasonal redistribution from summer to winter is strongest in high-elevation catchments.
Louise J. Slater, Chris Huntingford, Richard F. Pywell, John W. Redhead, and Elizabeth J. Kendon
Earth Syst. Dynam., 13, 1377–1396, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-13-1377-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-13-1377-2022, 2022
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This work considers how wheat yields are affected by weather conditions during the three main wheat growth stages in the UK. Impacts are strongest in years with compound weather extremes across multiple growth stages. Future climate projections are beneficial for wheat yields, on average, but indicate a high risk of unseen weather conditions which farmers may struggle to adapt to and mitigate against.
Veit Blauhut, Michael Stoelzle, Lauri Ahopelto, Manuela I. Brunner, Claudia Teutschbein, Doris E. Wendt, Vytautas Akstinas, Sigrid J. Bakke, Lucy J. Barker, Lenka Bartošová, Agrita Briede, Carmelo Cammalleri, Ksenija Cindrić Kalin, Lucia De Stefano, Miriam Fendeková, David C. Finger, Marijke Huysmans, Mirjana Ivanov, Jaak Jaagus, Jiří Jakubínský, Svitlana Krakovska, Gregor Laaha, Monika Lakatos, Kiril Manevski, Mathias Neumann Andersen, Nina Nikolova, Marzena Osuch, Pieter van Oel, Kalina Radeva, Renata J. Romanowicz, Elena Toth, Mirek Trnka, Marko Urošev, Julia Urquijo Reguera, Eric Sauquet, Aleksandra Stevkov, Lena M. Tallaksen, Iryna Trofimova, Anne F. Van Loon, Michelle T. H. van Vliet, Jean-Philippe Vidal, Niko Wanders, Micha Werner, Patrick Willems, and Nenad Živković
Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci., 22, 2201–2217, https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-22-2201-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-22-2201-2022, 2022
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Recent drought events caused enormous damage in Europe. We therefore questioned the existence and effect of current drought management strategies on the actual impacts and how drought is perceived by relevant stakeholders. Over 700 participants from 28 European countries provided insights into drought hazard and impact perception and current management strategies. The study concludes with an urgent need to collectively combat drought risk via a European macro-level drought governance approach.
Thomas Lees, Steven Reece, Frederik Kratzert, Daniel Klotz, Martin Gauch, Jens De Bruijn, Reetik Kumar Sahu, Peter Greve, Louise Slater, and Simon J. Dadson
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 26, 3079–3101, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-3079-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-3079-2022, 2022
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Despite the accuracy of deep learning rainfall-runoff models, we are currently uncertain of what these models have learned. In this study we explore the internals of one deep learning architecture and demonstrate that the model learns about intermediate hydrological stores of soil moisture and snow water, despite never having seen data about these processes during training. Therefore, we find evidence that the deep learning approach learns a physically realistic mapping from inputs to outputs.
Álvaro Ossandón, Manuela I. Brunner, Balaji Rajagopalan, and William Kleiber
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 26, 149–166, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-149-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-149-2022, 2022
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Timely projections of seasonal streamflow extremes on a river network can be useful for flood risk mitigation, but this is challenging, particularly under space–time nonstationarity. We develop a space–time Bayesian hierarchical model (BHM) using temporal climate covariates and copulas to project seasonal streamflow extremes and the attendant uncertainties. We demonstrate this on the Upper Colorado River basin to project spring flow extremes using the preceding winter’s climate teleconnections.
Thomas Lees, Marcus Buechel, Bailey Anderson, Louise Slater, Steven Reece, Gemma Coxon, and Simon J. Dadson
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 25, 5517–5534, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-5517-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-5517-2021, 2021
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We used deep learning (DL) models to simulate the amount of water moving through a river channel (discharge) based on the rainfall, temperature and potential evaporation in the previous days. We tested the DL models on catchments across Great Britain finding that the model can accurately simulate hydrological systems across a variety of catchment conditions. Ultimately, the model struggled most in areas where there is chalky bedrock and where human influence on the catchment is large.
Louise J. Slater, Bailey Anderson, Marcus Buechel, Simon Dadson, Shasha Han, Shaun Harrigan, Timo Kelder, Katie Kowal, Thomas Lees, Tom Matthews, Conor Murphy, and Robert L. Wilby
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 25, 3897–3935, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-3897-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-3897-2021, 2021
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Weather and water extremes have devastating effects each year. One of the principal challenges for society is understanding how extremes are likely to evolve under the influence of changes in climate, land cover, and other human impacts. This paper provides a review of the methods and challenges associated with the detection, attribution, management, and projection of nonstationary weather and water extremes.
Manuela I. Brunner, Eric Gilleland, and Andrew W. Wood
Earth Syst. Dynam., 12, 621–634, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-12-621-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-12-621-2021, 2021
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Compound hot and dry events can lead to severe impacts whose severity may depend on their timescale and spatial extent. Here, we show that the spatial extent and timescale of compound hot–dry events are strongly related, spatial compound event extents are largest at
sub-seasonal timescales, and short events are driven more by high temperatures, while longer events are more driven by low precipitation. Future climate impact studies should therefore be performed at different timescales.
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Short summary
Assessing the rarity and magnitude of very extreme flood events occurring less than twice a century is challenging due to the lack of observations of such rare events. Here we develop a new approach, pooling reforecast ensemble members from the European Flood Awareness System to increase the sample size available to estimate the frequency of extreme flood events. We demonstrate that such ensemble pooling produces more robust estimates than observation-based estimates.
Assessing the rarity and magnitude of very extreme flood events occurring less than twice a...
