Articles | Volume 28, issue 16
https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3755-2024
© Author(s) 2024. 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-28-3755-2024
© Author(s) 2024. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Research article
| Highlight paper
| 
20 Aug 2024
Research article | Highlight paper |
| 20 Aug 2024
| 20 Aug 2024
An increase in the spatial extent of European floods over the last 70 years
Department of Compound Environmental Risks, Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research – UFZ, Permoserstr. 15, 04318 Leipzig, Germany
Emanuele Bevacqua
Department of Compound Environmental Risks, Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research – UFZ, Permoserstr. 15, 04318 Leipzig, Germany
Oldrich Rakovec
Department of Computational Hydrosystems, Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research – UFZ, Permoserstr. 15, 04318 Leipzig, Germany
Faculty of Environmental Sciences, Czech University of Life Sciences Prague, Prague-Suchdol 16500, Czech Republic
Jakob Zscheischler
Department of Compound Environmental Risks, Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research – UFZ, Permoserstr. 15, 04318 Leipzig, Germany
Department of Hydro Sciences, TUD Dresden University of Technology, Dresden, Germany
Related authors
No articles found.
Daniel Klotz, Peter Miersch, Thiago V. M. do Nascimento, Fabrizio Fenicia, Martin Gauch, and Jakob Zscheischler
Earth Syst. Sci. Data Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2024-450, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2024-450, 2025
Preprint under review for ESSD
Short summary
Short summary
Data availability is central to hydrological science. It is the basis for advancing our understanding of hydrological processes, building prediction models, and anticipatory water management. We present a data-driven daily runoff reconstruction product for natural streamflow. We name it EARLS: European aggregated reconstruction for large-sample studies. The reconstructions represent daily simulations of natural streamflow across Europe and cover the period from 1953 to 2020.
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.
Vishal Thakur, Yannis Markonis, Rohini Kumar, Johanna Ruth Thomson, Mijael Rodrigo Vargas Godoy, Martin Hanel, and Oldrich Rakovec
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2024-341, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2024-341, 2024
Preprint under review for HESS
Short summary
Short summary
Understanding the changes in water movement in earth is crucial for everyone. To quantify this water movement there are several techniques. We examined how different methods of estimating evaporation impact predictions of various types of water movement across Europe. We found that, while these methods generally agree on whether changes are increasing or decreasing, they differ in magnitude. This means selecting the right evaporation method is crucial for accurate predictions of water movement.
Lou Brett, Christopher J. White, Daniela I.V. Domeisen, Bart van den Hurk, Philip Ward, and Jakob Zscheischler
Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-2024-182, https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-2024-182, 2024
Revised manuscript under review for NHESS
Short summary
Short summary
Compound events, where multiple weather or climate hazards occur together, pose significant risks to both society and the environment. These events, like simultaneous wind and rain, can have more severe impacts than single hazards. Our review of compound event research from 2012–2022 reveals a rise in studies, especially on events that occur concurrently, hot and dry events and compounding flooding. The review also highlights opportunities for research in the coming years.
Daniel Klotz, Martin Gauch, Frederik Kratzert, Grey Nearing, and Jakob Zscheischler
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 3665–3673, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3665-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3665-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
The evaluation of model performance is essential for hydrological modeling. Using performance criteria requires a deep understanding of their properties. We focus on a counterintuitive aspect of the Nash–Sutcliffe efficiency (NSE) and show that if we divide the data into multiple parts, the overall performance can be higher than all the evaluations of the subsets. Although this follows from the definition of the NSE, the resulting behavior can have unintended consequences in practice.
Fabiola Banfi, Emanuele Bevacqua, Pauline Rivoire, Sérgio C. Oliveira, Joaquim G. Pinto, Alexandre M. Ramos, and Carlo De Michele
Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci., 24, 2689–2704, https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-24-2689-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-24-2689-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Landslides are complex phenomena causing important impacts in vulnerable areas, and they are often triggered by rainfall. Here, we develop a new approach that uses information on the temporal clustering of rainfall, i.e. multiple events close in time, to detect landslide events and compare it with the use of classical empirical rainfall thresholds, considering as a case study the region of Lisbon, Portugal. The results could help to improve the prediction of rainfall-triggered landslides.
Bastien François, Khalil Teber, Lou Brett, Richard Leeding, Luis Gimeno-Sotelo, Daniela I. V. Domeisen, Laura Suarez-Gutierrez, and Emanuele Bevacqua
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-2079, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-2079, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Spatially compounding wind and precipitation (CWP) extremes can lead to severe impacts on society. We find that concurrent climate variability modes favor the occurrence of such wintertime spatially compounding events in the Northern Hemisphere, and can even amplify the number of regions and population exposed. Our analysis highlights the importance of considering the interplay between variability modes to improve risk management of such spatially compounding events.
Sergiy Vorogushyn, Li Han, Heiko Apel, Viet Dung Nguyen, Björn Guse, Xiaoxiang Guan, Oldrich Rakovec, Husain Najafi, Luis Samaniego, and Bruno Merz
Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-2024-97, https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-2024-97, 2024
Revised manuscript accepted for NHESS
Short summary
Short summary
The July 2021 flood in Central Europe was one of the deadliest floods in Europe in the past decades and the most expensive flood in Germany. In this paper we show that the hydrological impact of this event in the Ahr valley could have been even worse if the rainfall footprint trajectory was only slightly different. The presented methodology of spatial counterfactuals generates plausible unprecedented events and helps better prepare for future extreme floods.
Jan Řehoř, Rudolf Brázdil, Oldřich Rakovec, Martin Hanel, Milan Fischer, Rohini Kumar, Jan Balek, Markéta Poděbradská, Vojtěch Moravec, Luis Samaniego, and Miroslav Trnka
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-1434, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-1434, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
We present a robust method for identification and classification of global land drought events (GLDEs) based on soil moisture. Two models were used to calculate soil moisture and delimit soil drought over global land from 1980–2022, which was clustered into 775/630 GLDEs. Using four spatiotemporal and three motion-related characteristics, we categorized GLDEs into seven severity and seven dynamic categories. The frequency of GLDEs has generally increased in recent decades.
Hannes Müller Schmied, Simon Newland Gosling, Marlo Garnsworthy, Laura Müller, Camelia-Eliza Telteu, Atiq Kainan Ahmed, Lauren Seaby Andersen, Julien Boulange, Peter Burek, Jinfeng Chang, He Chen, Manolis Grillakis, Luca Guillaumot, Naota Hanasaki, Aristeidis Koutroulis, Rohini Kumar, Guoyong Leng, Junguo Liu, Xingcai Liu, Inga Menke, Vimal Mishra, Yadu Pokhrel, Oldrich Rakovec, Luis Samaniego, Yusuke Satoh, Harsh Lovekumar Shah, Mikhail Smilovic, Tobias Stacke, Edwin Sutanudjaja, Wim Thiery, Athanasios Tsilimigkras, Yoshihide Wada, Niko Wanders, and Tokuta Yokohata
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-1303, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-1303, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Global water models contribute to the evaluation of important natural and societal issues but are – as all models – simplified representation of the reality. So, there are many ways to calculate the water fluxes and storages. This paper presents a visualization of 16 global water models using a standardized visualization and the pathway towards this common understanding. Next to academic education purposes, we envisage that these diagrams will help researchers, model developers and data users.
Derrick Muheki, Axel A. J. Deijns, Emanuele Bevacqua, Gabriele Messori, Jakob Zscheischler, and Wim Thiery
Earth Syst. Dynam., 15, 429–466, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-15-429-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-15-429-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Climate change affects the interaction, dependence, and joint occurrence of climate extremes. Here we investigate the joint occurrence of pairs of river floods, droughts, heatwaves, crop failures, wildfires, and tropical cyclones in East Africa under past and future climate conditions. Our results show that, across all future warming scenarios, the frequency and spatial extent of these co-occurring extremes will increase in this region, particularly in areas close to the Nile and Congo rivers.
Kingsley Nnaemeka Ogbu, Oldrich Rakovec, Luis Samaniego, Gloria Chinwendu Okafor, Bernhard Tischbein, and Hadush Meresa
Proc. IAHS, 385, 211–218, https://doi.org/10.5194/piahs-385-211-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/piahs-385-211-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
In this study, the MPR-mHM technique was applied in four data-scarce basins in Nigeria. Remotely sensed rainfall datasets were used as model forcings to evaluate the mHM capability in reproducing observed stream discharge under single and multivariable model calibration frameworks. Overall, model calibration performances displayed satisfactory outputs as evident in the Kling-Gupta Efficiency (KGE) scores across most basins.
Mijael Rodrigo Vargas Godoy, Yannis Markonis, Oldrich Rakovec, Michal Jenicek, Riya Dutta, Rajani Kumar Pradhan, Zuzana Bešťáková, Jan Kyselý, Roman Juras, Simon Michael Papalexiou, and Martin Hanel
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 1–19, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-1-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-1-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
The study introduces a novel benchmarking method based on the water cycle budget for hydroclimate data fusion. Using this method and multiple state-of-the-art datasets to assess the spatiotemporal patterns of water cycle changes in Czechia, we found that differences in water availability distribution are dominated by evapotranspiration. Furthermore, while the most significant temporal changes in Czechia occur during spring, the median spatial patterns stem from summer changes in the water cycle.
Colin Manning, Martin Widmann, Douglas Maraun, Anne F. Van Loon, and Emanuele Bevacqua
Weather Clim. Dynam., 4, 309–329, https://doi.org/10.5194/wcd-4-309-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/wcd-4-309-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
Climate models differ in their representation of dry spells and high temperatures, linked to errors in the simulation of persistent large-scale anticyclones. Models that simulate more persistent anticyclones simulate longer and hotter dry spells, and vice versa. This information is important to consider when assessing the likelihood of such events in current and future climate simulations so that we can assess the plausibility of their future projections.
Shijie Jiang, Emanuele Bevacqua, and Jakob Zscheischler
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 26, 6339–6359, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-6339-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-6339-2022, 2022
Short summary
Short summary
Using a novel explainable machine learning approach, we investigated the contributions of precipitation, temperature, and day length to different peak discharges, thereby uncovering three primary flooding mechanisms widespread in European catchments. The results indicate that flooding mechanisms have changed in numerous catchments over the past 70 years. The study highlights the potential of artificial intelligence in revealing complex changes in extreme events related to climate change.
Natacha Le Grix, Jakob Zscheischler, Keith B. Rodgers, Ryohei Yamaguchi, and Thomas L. Frölicher
Biogeosciences, 19, 5807–5835, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-19-5807-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-19-5807-2022, 2022
Short summary
Short summary
Compound events threaten marine ecosystems. Here, we investigate the potentially harmful combination of marine heatwaves with low phytoplankton productivity. Using satellite-based observations, we show that these compound events are frequent in the low latitudes. We then investigate the drivers of these compound events using Earth system models. The models share similar drivers in the low latitudes but disagree in the high latitudes due to divergent factors limiting phytoplankton production.
Friedrich Boeing, Oldrich Rakovec, Rohini Kumar, Luis Samaniego, Martin Schrön, Anke Hildebrandt, Corinna Rebmann, Stephan Thober, Sebastian Müller, Steffen Zacharias, Heye Bogena, Katrin Schneider, Ralf Kiese, Sabine Attinger, and Andreas Marx
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 26, 5137–5161, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-5137-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-5137-2022, 2022
Short summary
Short summary
In this paper, we deliver an evaluation of the second generation operational German drought monitor (https://www.ufz.de/duerremonitor) with a state-of-the-art compilation of observed soil moisture data from 40 locations and four different measurement methods in Germany. We show that the expressed stakeholder needs for higher resolution drought information at the one-kilometer scale can be met and that the agreement of simulated and observed soil moisture dynamics can be moderately improved.
Bahar Bahrami, Anke Hildebrandt, Stephan Thober, Corinna Rebmann, Rico Fischer, Luis Samaniego, Oldrich Rakovec, and Rohini Kumar
Geosci. Model Dev., 15, 6957–6984, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-15-6957-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-15-6957-2022, 2022
Short summary
Short summary
Leaf area index (LAI) and gross primary productivity (GPP) are crucial components to carbon cycle, and are closely linked to water cycle in many ways. We develop a Parsimonious Canopy Model (PCM) to simulate GPP and LAI at stand scale, and show its applicability over a diverse range of deciduous broad-leaved forest biomes. With its modular structure, the PCM is able to adapt with existing data requirements, and run in either a stand-alone mode or as an interface linked to hydrologic models.
Sadaf Nasreen, Markéta Součková, Mijael Rodrigo Vargas Godoy, Ujjwal Singh, Yannis Markonis, Rohini Kumar, Oldrich Rakovec, and Martin Hanel
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 14, 4035–4056, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-14-4035-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-14-4035-2022, 2022
Short summary
Short summary
This article presents a 500-year reconstructed annual runoff dataset for several European catchments. Several data-driven and hydrological models were used to derive the runoff series using reconstructed precipitation and temperature and a set of proxy data. The simulated runoff was validated using independent observed runoff data and documentary evidence. The validation revealed a good fit between the observed and reconstructed series for 14 catchments, which are available for further analysis.
Alexandre Tuel, Bettina Schaefli, Jakob Zscheischler, and Olivia Martius
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 26, 2649–2669, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-2649-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-26-2649-2022, 2022
Short summary
Short summary
River discharge is strongly influenced by the temporal structure of precipitation. Here, we show how extreme precipitation events that occur a few days or weeks after a previous event have a larger effect on river discharge than events occurring in isolation. Windows of 2 weeks or less between events have the most impact. Similarly, periods of persistent high discharge tend to be associated with the occurrence of several extreme precipitation events in close succession.
Elisabeth Tschumi, Sebastian Lienert, Karin van der Wiel, Fortunat Joos, and Jakob Zscheischler
Biogeosciences, 19, 1979–1993, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-19-1979-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-19-1979-2022, 2022
Short summary
Short summary
Droughts and heatwaves are expected to occur more often in the future, but their effects on land vegetation and the carbon cycle are poorly understood. We use six climate scenarios with differing extreme occurrences and a vegetation model to analyse these effects. Tree coverage and associated plant productivity increase under a climate with no extremes. Frequent co-occurring droughts and heatwaves decrease plant productivity more than the combined effects of single droughts or heatwaves.
Camelia-Eliza Telteu, Hannes Müller Schmied, Wim Thiery, Guoyong Leng, Peter Burek, Xingcai Liu, Julien Eric Stanislas Boulange, Lauren Seaby Andersen, Manolis Grillakis, Simon Newland Gosling, Yusuke Satoh, Oldrich Rakovec, Tobias Stacke, Jinfeng Chang, Niko Wanders, Harsh Lovekumar Shah, Tim Trautmann, Ganquan Mao, Naota Hanasaki, Aristeidis Koutroulis, Yadu Pokhrel, Luis Samaniego, Yoshihide Wada, Vimal Mishra, Junguo Liu, Petra Döll, Fang Zhao, Anne Gädeke, Sam S. Rabin, and Florian Herz
Geosci. Model Dev., 14, 3843–3878, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-14-3843-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-14-3843-2021, 2021
Short summary
Short summary
We analyse water storage compartments, water flows, and human water use sectors included in 16 global water models that provide simulations for the Inter-Sectoral Impact Model Intercomparison Project phase 2b. We develop a standard writing style for the model equations. We conclude that even though hydrologic processes are often based on similar equations, in the end these equations have been adjusted, or the models have used different values for specific parameters or specific variables.
Roberto Villalobos-Herrera, Emanuele Bevacqua, Andreia F. S. Ribeiro, Graeme Auld, Laura Crocetti, Bilyana Mircheva, Minh Ha, Jakob Zscheischler, and Carlo De Michele
Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci., 21, 1867–1885, https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-21-1867-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-21-1867-2021, 2021
Short summary
Short summary
Climate hazards may be caused by events which have multiple drivers. Here we present a method to break down climate model biases in hazard indicators down to the bias caused by each driving variable. Using simplified fire and heat stress indicators driven by temperature and relative humidity as examples, we show how multivariate indicators may have complex biases and that the relationship between driving variables is a source of bias that must be considered in climate model bias corrections.
Erwin Rottler, Axel Bronstert, Gerd Bürger, and Oldrich Rakovec
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 25, 2353–2371, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-2353-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-2353-2021, 2021
Short summary
Short summary
The mesoscale hydrological model (mHM) forced with an ensemble of climate projection scenarios was used to assess potential future changes in flood seasonality in the Rhine River basin. Results indicate that future changes in flood characteristics are controlled by increases in precipitation sums and diminishing snowpacks. The decreases in snowmelt can counterbalance increasing precipitation, resulting in only small and transient changes in streamflow maxima.
Jun Li, Zhaoli Wang, Xushu Wu, Jakob Zscheischler, Shenglian Guo, and Xiaohong Chen
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 25, 1587–1601, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-1587-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-1587-2021, 2021
Short summary
Short summary
We introduce a daily-scale index, termed the standardized compound drought and heat index (SCDHI), to measure the key features of compound dry-hot conditions. SCDHI can not only monitor the long-term compound dry-hot events, but can also capture such events at sub-monthly scale and reflect the related vegetation activity impacts. The index can provide a new tool to quantify sub-monthly characteristics of compound dry-hot events, which are vital for releasing early and timely warning.
Natacha Le Grix, Jakob Zscheischler, Charlotte Laufkötter, Cecile S. Rousseaux, and Thomas L. Frölicher
Biogeosciences, 18, 2119–2137, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-18-2119-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-18-2119-2021, 2021
Short summary
Short summary
Marine ecosystems could suffer severe damage from the co-occurrence of a marine heat wave with extremely low chlorophyll concentration. Here, we provide a first assessment of compound marine heat wave and
low-chlorophyll events in the global ocean from 1998 to 2018. We reveal hotspots of these compound events in the equatorial Pacific and in the Arabian Sea and show that they mostly occur in summer at high latitudes and their frequency is modulated by large-scale modes of climate variability.
Johannes Vogel, Pauline Rivoire, Cristina Deidda, Leila Rahimi, Christoph A. Sauter, Elisabeth Tschumi, Karin van der Wiel, Tianyi Zhang, and Jakob Zscheischler
Earth Syst. Dynam., 12, 151–172, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-12-151-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-12-151-2021, 2021
Short summary
Short summary
We present a statistical approach for automatically identifying multiple drivers of extreme impacts based on LASSO regression. We apply the approach to simulated crop failure in the Northern Hemisphere and identify which meteorological variables including climate extreme indices and which seasons are relevant to predict crop failure. The presented approach can help unravel compounding drivers in high-impact events and could be applied to other impacts such as wildfires or flooding.
Manuela I. Brunner, Lieke A. Melsen, Andrew W. Wood, Oldrich Rakovec, Naoki Mizukami, Wouter J. M. Knoben, and Martyn P. Clark
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 25, 105–119, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-105-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-105-2021, 2021
Short summary
Short summary
Assessments of current, local, and regional flood hazards and their future changes often involve the use of hydrologic models. A reliable model ideally reproduces both local flood characteristics and regional aspects of flooding. In this paper we investigate how such characteristics are represented by hydrologic models. Our results show that both the modeling of local and regional flood characteristics are challenging, especially under changing climate conditions.
Jakob Zscheischler, Philippe Naveau, Olivia Martius, Sebastian Engelke, and Christoph C. Raible
Earth Syst. Dynam., 12, 1–16, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-12-1-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-12-1-2021, 2021
Short summary
Short summary
Compound extremes such as heavy precipitation and extreme winds can lead to large damage. To date it is unclear how well climate models represent such compound extremes. Here we present a new measure to assess differences in the dependence structure of bivariate extremes. This measure is applied to assess differences in the dependence of compound precipitation and wind extremes between three model simulations and one reanalysis dataset in a domain in central Europe.
Andreia Filipa Silva Ribeiro, Ana Russo, Célia Marina Gouveia, Patrícia Páscoa, and Jakob Zscheischler
Biogeosciences, 17, 4815–4830, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-17-4815-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-17-4815-2020, 2020
Short summary
Short summary
This study investigates the impacts of compound dry and hot extremes on crop yields, namely wheat and barley, over two regions in Spain dominated by rainfed agriculture. We provide estimates of the conditional probability of crop loss under compound dry and hot conditions, which could be an important tool for responsible authorities to mitigate the impacts magnified by the interactions between the different hazards.
Emanuele Bevacqua, Michalis I. Vousdoukas, Theodore G. Shepherd, and Mathieu Vrac
Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci., 20, 1765–1782, https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-20-1765-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-20-1765-2020, 2020
Short summary
Short summary
Coastal compound flooding (CF), caused by interacting storm surges and high water runoff, is typically studied based on concurring storm surge extremes with either precipitation or river discharge extremes. Globally, these two approaches show similar CF spatial patterns, especially where the CF potential is the highest. Deviations between the two approaches increase with the catchment size. The precipitation-based analysis allows for considering
local-rainfall-driven CF and CF in small rivers.
Miao Jing, Rohini Kumar, Falk Heße, Stephan Thober, Oldrich Rakovec, Luis Samaniego, and Sabine Attinger
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 24, 1511–1526, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-1511-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-24-1511-2020, 2020
Short summary
Short summary
This study investigates the response of regional groundwater system to the climate change under three global warming levels (1.5, 2, and 3 °C) in a central German basin. A comprehensive uncertainty analysis is also presented. This study indicates that the variability of responses increases with the amount of global warming, which might affect the cost of managing the groundwater system.
Inne Vanderkelen, Jakob Zschleischler, Lukas Gudmundsson, Klaus Keuler, Francois Rineau, Natalie Beenaerts, Jaco Vangronsveld, and Wim Thiery
Biogeosciences Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-2019-267, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-2019-267, 2019
Manuscript not accepted for further review
Naoki Mizukami, Oldrich Rakovec, Andrew J. Newman, Martyn P. Clark, Andrew W. Wood, Hoshin V. Gupta, and Rohini Kumar
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 23, 2601–2614, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-23-2601-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-23-2601-2019, 2019
Short summary
Short summary
We find that Nash–Sutcliffe (NSE)-based model calibrations result in poor reproduction of high-flow events, such as the annual peak flows that are used for flood frequency estimation. The use of Kling–Gupta efficiency (KGE) results in annual peak flow estimates that are better than from NSE, with only a slight degradation in performance with respect to other related metrics.
Jakob Zscheischler, Erich M. Fischer, and Stefan Lange
Earth Syst. Dynam., 10, 31–43, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-10-31-2019, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-10-31-2019, 2019
Short summary
Short summary
Many climate models have biases in different variables throughout the world. Adjusting these biases is necessary for estimating climate impacts. Here we demonstrate that widely used univariate bias adjustment methods do not work well for multivariate impacts. We illustrate this problem using fire risk and heat stress as impact indicators. Using an approach that adjusts not only biases in the individual climate variables but also biases in the correlation between them can resolve these problems.
Martha M. Vogel, Jakob Zscheischler, and Sonia I. Seneviratne
Earth Syst. Dynam., 9, 1107–1125, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-9-1107-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-9-1107-2018, 2018
Short summary
Short summary
Climate change projections of temperature extremes are particularly uncertain in central Europe. We demonstrate that varying soil moisture–atmosphere feedbacks in current climate models leads to an enhancement of model differences; thus, they can explain the large uncertainties in extreme temperature projections. Using an observation-based constraint, we show that the strong drying and large increase in temperatures exhibited by models on the hottest day in central Europe are highly unlikely.
Donghai Wu, Philippe Ciais, Nicolas Viovy, Alan K. Knapp, Kevin Wilcox, Michael Bahn, Melinda D. Smith, Sara Vicca, Simone Fatichi, Jakob Zscheischler, Yue He, Xiangyi Li, Akihiko Ito, Almut Arneth, Anna Harper, Anna Ukkola, Athanasios Paschalis, Benjamin Poulter, Changhui Peng, Daniel Ricciuto, David Reinthaler, Guangsheng Chen, Hanqin Tian, Hélène Genet, Jiafu Mao, Johannes Ingrisch, Julia E. S. M. Nabel, Julia Pongratz, Lena R. Boysen, Markus Kautz, Michael Schmitt, Patrick Meir, Qiuan Zhu, Roland Hasibeder, Sebastian Sippel, Shree R. S. Dangal, Stephen Sitch, Xiaoying Shi, Yingping Wang, Yiqi Luo, Yongwen Liu, and Shilong Piao
Biogeosciences, 15, 3421–3437, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-15-3421-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-15-3421-2018, 2018
Short summary
Short summary
Our results indicate that most ecosystem models do not capture the observed asymmetric responses under normal precipitation conditions, suggesting an overestimate of the drought effects and/or underestimate of the watering impacts on primary productivity, which may be the result of inadequate representation of key eco-hydrological processes. Collaboration between modelers and site investigators needs to be strengthened to improve the specific processes in ecosystem models in following studies.
Jannis von Buttlar, Jakob Zscheischler, Anja Rammig, Sebastian Sippel, Markus Reichstein, Alexander Knohl, Martin Jung, Olaf Menzer, M. Altaf Arain, Nina Buchmann, Alessandro Cescatti, Damiano Gianelle, Gerard Kiely, Beverly E. Law, Vincenzo Magliulo, Hank Margolis, Harry McCaughey, Lutz Merbold, Mirco Migliavacca, Leonardo Montagnani, Walter Oechel, Marian Pavelka, Matthias Peichl, Serge Rambal, Antonio Raschi, Russell L. Scott, Francesco P. Vaccari, Eva van Gorsel, Andrej Varlagin, Georg Wohlfahrt, and Miguel D. Mahecha
Biogeosciences, 15, 1293–1318, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-15-1293-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-15-1293-2018, 2018
Short summary
Short summary
Our work systematically quantifies extreme heat and drought event impacts on gross primary productivity (GPP) and ecosystem respiration globally across a wide range of ecosystems. We show that heat extremes typically increased mainly respiration whereas drought decreased both fluxes. Combined heat and drought extremes had opposing effects offsetting each other for respiration, but there were also strong reductions in GPP and hence the strongest reductions in the ecosystems carbon sink capacity.
Andreas Marx, Rohini Kumar, Stephan Thober, Oldrich Rakovec, Niko Wanders, Matthias Zink, Eric F. Wood, Ming Pan, Justin Sheffield, and Luis Samaniego
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 22, 1017–1032, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-22-1017-2018, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-22-1017-2018, 2018
Short summary
Short summary
Hydrological low flows are affected under different levels of future global warming (i.e. 1.5, 2, and 3 K). The multi-model ensemble results show that the change signal amplifies with increasing warming levels. Low flows decrease in the Mediterranean, while they increase in the Alpine and Northern regions. The changes in low flows are significant for regions with relatively large change signals and under higher levels of warming. Adaptation should make use of change and uncertainty information.
Miguel D. Mahecha, Fabian Gans, Sebastian Sippel, Jonathan F. Donges, Thomas Kaminski, Stefan Metzger, Mirco Migliavacca, Dario Papale, Anja Rammig, and Jakob Zscheischler
Biogeosciences, 14, 4255–4277, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-14-4255-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-14-4255-2017, 2017
Short summary
Short summary
We investigate the likelihood of ecological in situ networks to detect and monitor the impact of extreme events in the terrestrial biosphere.
Luis Samaniego, Rohini Kumar, Stephan Thober, Oldrich Rakovec, Matthias Zink, Niko Wanders, Stephanie Eisner, Hannes Müller Schmied, Edwin H. Sutanudjaja, Kirsten Warrach-Sagi, and Sabine Attinger
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 21, 4323–4346, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-21-4323-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-21-4323-2017, 2017
Short summary
Short summary
We inspect the state-of-the-art of several land surface (LSMs) and hydrologic models (HMs) and show that most do not have consistent and realistic parameter fields for land surface geophysical properties. We propose to use the multiscale parameter regionalization (MPR) technique to solve, at least partly, the scaling problem in LSMs/HMs. A general model protocol is presented to describe how MPR can be applied to a specific model.
Jakob Zscheischler, Miguel D. Mahecha, Valerio Avitabile, Leonardo Calle, Nuno Carvalhais, Philippe Ciais, Fabian Gans, Nicolas Gruber, Jens Hartmann, Martin Herold, Kazuhito Ichii, Martin Jung, Peter Landschützer, Goulven G. Laruelle, Ronny Lauerwald, Dario Papale, Philippe Peylin, Benjamin Poulter, Deepak Ray, Pierre Regnier, Christian Rödenbeck, Rosa M. Roman-Cuesta, Christopher Schwalm, Gianluca Tramontana, Alexandra Tyukavina, Riccardo Valentini, Guido van der Werf, Tristram O. West, Julie E. Wolf, and Markus Reichstein
Biogeosciences, 14, 3685–3703, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-14-3685-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-14-3685-2017, 2017
Short summary
Short summary
Here we synthesize a wide range of global spatiotemporal observational data on carbon exchanges between the Earth surface and the atmosphere. A key challenge was to consistently combining observational products of terrestrial and aquatic surfaces. Our primary goal is to identify today’s key uncertainties and observational shortcomings that would need to be addressed in future measurement campaigns or expansions of in situ observatories.
Jakob Zscheischler, Rene Orth, and Sonia I. Seneviratne
Biogeosciences, 14, 3309–3320, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-14-3309-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-14-3309-2017, 2017
Short summary
Short summary
We use newly established methods to compute bivariate return periods of temperature and precipitation and relate those to crop yield variability in Europe. Most often, crop yields are lower when it is hot and dry and higher when it is cold and wet. The variability in crop yields along a specific climate gradient can be captured well by return periods aligned with these gradients. This study provides new possibilities for investigating the relationship between crop yield variability and climate.
Emanuele Bevacqua, Douglas Maraun, Ingrid Hobæk Haff, Martin Widmann, and Mathieu Vrac
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 21, 2701–2723, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-21-2701-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-21-2701-2017, 2017
Short summary
Short summary
We develop a conceptual model to quantify the risk of compound events (CEs), i.e. extreme impacts to society which are driven by statistically dependent climatic variables. Based on this model we study compound floods, i.e. joint storm surge and high river level, in Ravenna (Italy). The model includes meteorological predictors which (1) provide insight into the physical processes underlying CEs, as well as into the temporal variability, and (2) allow us to statistically downscale CEs.
Sebastian Sippel, Jakob Zscheischler, Miguel D. Mahecha, Rene Orth, Markus Reichstein, Martha Vogel, and Sonia I. Seneviratne
Earth Syst. Dynam., 8, 387–403, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-8-387-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-8-387-2017, 2017
Short summary
Short summary
The present study (1) evaluates land–atmosphere coupling in the CMIP5 multi-model ensemble against an ensemble of benchmarking datasets and (2) refines the model ensemble using a land–atmosphere coupling diagnostic as constraint. Our study demonstrates that a considerable fraction of coupled climate models overemphasize warm-season
moisture-limitedclimate regimes in midlatitude regions. This leads to biases in daily-scale temperature extremes, which are alleviated in a constrained ensemble.
Sebastian Sippel, Jakob Zscheischler, Martin Heimann, Holger Lange, Miguel D. Mahecha, Geert Jan van Oldenborgh, Friederike E. L. Otto, and Markus Reichstein
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 21, 441–458, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-21-441-2017, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-21-441-2017, 2017
Short summary
Short summary
The paper re-investigates the question whether observed precipitation extremes and annual totals have been increasing in the world's dry regions over the last 60 years. Despite recently postulated increasing trends, we demonstrate that large uncertainties prevail due to (1) the choice of dryness definition and (2) statistical data processing. In fact, we find only minor (and only some significant) increases if (1) dryness is based on aridity and (2) statistical artefacts are accounted for.
Bjorn-Gustaf J. Brooks, Ankur R. Desai, Britton B. Stephens, Anna M. Michalak, and Jakob Zscheischler
Biogeosciences Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-2016-223, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-2016-223, 2016
Manuscript not accepted for further review
Short summary
Short summary
CO2 is the primary greenhouse gas, and its abundance in the atmosphere tends to increase during disturbances like drought. This paper demonstrates how CO2 measurements are combined with models to determine not only how strongly different locations influence CO2 measurement stations, but also the capacity of those measurement stations to detect drought effects. Understanding detection sensitivity will help assess what kinds of changes and turnings points can be monitored using atmospheric CO2.
O. Rakovec, A. H. Weerts, J. Sumihar, and R. Uijlenhoet
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 19, 2911–2924, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-2911-2015, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-2911-2015, 2015
Short summary
Short summary
This is the first analysis of the asynchronous ensemble Kalman filter in hydrological forecasting. The results of discharge assimilation into a hydrological model for the catchment show that including past predictions and observations in the filter improves model forecasts. Additionally, we show that elimination of the strongly non-linear relation between soil moisture and assimilated discharge observations from the model update becomes beneficial for improved operational forecasting.
T. Alberti, F. Lepreti, A. Vecchio, E. Bevacqua, V. Capparelli, and V. Carbone
Clim. Past, 10, 1751–1762, https://doi.org/10.5194/cp-10-1751-2014, https://doi.org/10.5194/cp-10-1751-2014, 2014
J. Zscheischler, M. Reichstein, S. Harmeling, A. Rammig, E. Tomelleri, and M. D. Mahecha
Biogeosciences, 11, 2909–2924, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-11-2909-2014, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-11-2909-2014, 2014
J. v. Buttlar, J. Zscheischler, and M. D. Mahecha
Nonlin. Processes Geophys., 21, 203–215, https://doi.org/10.5194/npg-21-203-2014, https://doi.org/10.5194/npg-21-203-2014, 2014
Related subject area
Subject: Hydrometeorology | Techniques and Approaches: Modelling approaches
High-resolution land surface modelling over Africa: the role of uncertain soil properties in combination with forcing temporal resolution
Investigating the global and regional response of drought to idealized deforestation using multiple global climate models
Distribution, trends, and drivers of flash droughts in the United Kingdom
Are dependencies of extreme rainfall on humidity more reliable in convection-permitting climate models?
Leveraging a radar-based disdrometer network to develop a probabilistic precipitation phase model in eastern Canada
Assessment of seasonal soil moisture forecasts over the Central Mediterranean
Do land models miss key soil hydrological processes controlling soil moisture memory?
Observation-driven model for calculating water-harvesting potential from advective fog in (semi-)arid coastal regions
Review of gridded climate products and their use in hydrological analyses reveals overlaps, gaps, and the need for a more objective approach to selecting model forcing datasets
Downscaling the probability of heavy rainfall over the Nordic countries
Modelling convective cell life cycles with a copula-based approach
Downscaling precipitation over High-mountain Asia using multi-fidelity Gaussian processes: improved estimates from ERA5
Mapping soil moisture across the UK: assimilating cosmic-ray neutron sensors, remotely sensed indices, rainfall radar and catchment water balance data in a Bayesian hierarchical model
Assessing rainfall radar errors with an inverse stochastic modelling framework
Towards a Robust Hydrologic Data Assimilation System for Hurricane-induced River Flow Forecasting
Enhanced hydrological modelling with the WRF-Hydro lake/reservoir module at Convection-Permitting scale: a case study of the Tana River basin in East Africa
Multi-objective calibration and evaluation of the ORCHIDEE land surface model over France at high resolution
Spatiotemporal responses of runoff to climate change in the southern Tibetan Plateau
Skilful probabilistic predictions of UK floods months ahead using machine learning models trained on multimodel ensemble climate forecasts
FROSTBYTE: a reproducible data-driven workflow for probabilistic seasonal streamflow forecasting in snow-fed river basins across North America
On the combined use of rain gauges and GPM IMERG satellite rainfall products for hydrological modelling: impact assessment of the cellular-automata-based methodology in the Tanaro River basin in Italy
140-year daily ensemble streamflow reconstructions over 661 catchments in France
Deep learning based sub-seasonal precipitation and streamflow forecasting over the source region of the Yangtze River
The agricultural expansion in South America's Dry Chaco: regional hydroclimate effects
Machine-learning-constrained projection of bivariate hydrological drought magnitudes and socioeconomic risks over China
Improving runoff simulation in the Western United States with Noah-MP and VIC models
Spatial variability in the seasonal precipitation lapse rates in complex topographical regions – application in France
Assessing downscaling methods to simulate hydrologically relevant weather scenarios from a global atmospheric reanalysis: case study of the upper Rhône River (1902–2009)
Global total precipitable water variations and trends over the period 1958–2021
Assessing decadal- to centennial-scale nonstationary variability in meteorological drought trends
Identification of compound drought and heatwave events on a daily scale and across four seasons
Implementation of global soil databases in NOAH-MP model and the effects on simulated mean and extreme soil hydrothermal changes
Potential for historically unprecedented Australian droughts from natural variability and climate change
Enhanced Evaluation of Sub-daily and Daily Extreme Precipitation in Norway from Convection-Permitting Models at Regional and Local Scales
Flood risk assessment for Indian sub-continental river basins
Key ingredients in regional climate modelling for improving the representation of typhoon tracks and intensities
Divergent future drought projections in UK river flows and groundwater levels
Predicting extreme sub-hourly precipitation intensification based on temperature shifts
Hydroclimatic processes as the primary drivers of the Early Khvalynian transgression of the Caspian Sea: new developments
Accounting for hydroclimatic properties in flood frequency analysis procedures
Understanding the influence of “hot” models in climate impact studies: a hydrological perspective
A semi-parametric hourly space–time weather generator
A principal-component-based strategy for regionalisation of precipitation intensity–duration–frequency (IDF) statistics
Accounting for precipitation asymmetry in a multiplicative random cascade disaggregation model
Seasonal soil moisture and crop yield prediction with fifth-generation seasonal forecasting system (SEAS5) long-range meteorological forecasts in a land surface modelling approach
A genetic particle filter scheme for univariate snow cover assimilation into Noah-MP model across snow climates
Investigating the response of land–atmosphere interactions and feedbacks to spatial representation of irrigation in a coupled modeling framework
Validation of precipitation reanalysis products for rainfall-runoff modelling in Slovenia
Statistical post-processing of precipitation forecasts using circulation classifications and spatiotemporal deep neural networks
Sensitivity of the pseudo-global warming method under flood conditions: a case study from the northeastern US
Bamidele Oloruntoba, Stefan Kollet, Carsten Montzka, Harry Vereecken, and Harrie-Jan Hendricks Franssen
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 1659–1683, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-1659-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-1659-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
We studied how soil and weather data affect land model simulations over Africa. By combining soil data processed in different ways with weather data of varying time intervals, we found that weather inputs had a greater impact on water processes than soil data type. However, the way soil data were processed became crucial when paired with high-frequency weather inputs, showing that detailed weather data can improve local and regional predictions of how water moves and interacts with the land.
Yan Li, Bo Huang, Chunping Tan, Xia Zhang, Francesco Cherubini, and Henning W. Rust
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 1637–1658, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-1637-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-1637-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
Deforestation has a significant impact on climate, yet its effects on drought remain less understood. This study investigates how deforestation affects drought across various climate zones and timescales. Findings indicate that deforestation leads to drier conditions in tropical regions and wetter conditions in arid areas, with minimal effects in temperate zones. Long-term drought is more affected than short-term drought, offering valuable insights into vegetation–climate interactions.
Iván Noguera, Jamie Hannaford, and Maliko Tanguy
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 1295–1317, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-1295-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-1295-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
The study provides a detailed characterisation of flash drought in the UK for 1969–2021. The spatio-temporal distribution and trends of flash droughts are highly variable, with important regional and seasonal contrasts. In the UK, flash drought development responds primarily to precipitation variability, while the atmospheric evaporative demand plays a secondary role. We also found that the North Atlantic Oscillation is the main circulation pattern controlling flash drought development.
Geert Lenderink, Nikolina Ban, Erwan Brisson, Ségolène Berthou, Virginia Edith Cortés-Hernández, Elizabeth Kendon, Hayley J. Fowler, and Hylke de Vries
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 1201–1220, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-1201-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-1201-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
Future extreme rainfall events are influenced by changes in both absolute and relative humidity. The impact of increasing absolute humidity is reasonably well understood, but the role of relative humidity decreases over land remains largely unknown. Using hourly observations from France and the Netherlands, we find that lower relative humidity generally leads to more intense rainfall extremes. This relation is only captured well in recently developed convection-permitting climate models.
Alexis Bédard-Therrien, François Anctil, Julie M. Thériault, Olivier Chalifour, Fanny Payette, Alexandre Vidal, and Daniel F. Nadeau
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 1135–1158, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-1135-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-1135-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
Precipitation data from an automated observational network in eastern Canada showed a temperature interval where rain and snow could coexist. Random forest models were developed to classify the precipitation phase using meteorological data to evaluate operational applications. The models demonstrated significantly improved phase classification and reduced error compared to benchmark operational models. However, accurate prediction of mixed-phase precipitation remains challenging.
Lorenzo Silvestri, Miriam Saraceni, Bruno Brunone, Silvia Meniconi, Giulia Passadore, and Paolina Bongioannini Cerlini
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 925–946, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-925-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-925-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
This work demonstrates that seasonal forecasts of soil moisture are a valuable resource for groundwater management in the areas of the Central Mediterranean where longer memory timescales are found. In particular, they show significant correlation coefficients and forecast skill for the deepest soil moisture at 289 cm depth. Wet and dry events can be predicted 6 months in advance, and, in general, dry events are better captured than wet events.
Mohammad A. Farmani, Ali Behrangi, Aniket Gupta, Ahmad Tavakoly, Matthew Geheran, and Guo-Yue Niu
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 547–566, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-547-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-547-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
Soil moisture memory (SMM) shows how long soil stays moist after rain, impacting climate and ecosystems. Current models often overestimate SMM, causing inaccuracies in evaporation predictions. We enhanced a land model, Noah-MP, to include better water flow and ponding processes, and we tested it against satellite and field data. This improved model reduced overestimations and enhanced short-term predictions, helping create more accurate climate and weather forecasts.
Felipe Lobos-Roco, Jordi Vilà-Guerau de Arellano, and Camilo del Río
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 109–125, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-109-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-109-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
Water resources are fundamental for the social, economic, and natural development of (semi-)arid regions. Precipitation decreases due to climate change obligate us to find new water resources. Fog harvesting (FH) emerges as a complementary resource in regions where it is abundant but untapped. This research proposes a model to estimate FH potential in coastal (semi-)arid regions. This model could have broader applicability worldwide in regions where FH could be a viable water source.
Kyle R. Mankin, Sushant Mehan, Timothy R. Green, and David M. Barnard
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 85–108, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-85-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-85-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
We assess 63 gridded ground (G), satellite (S), and reanalysis (R) climate datasets. Higher-density station data and less-hilly terrain improved climate data. In mountainous and humid regions, dataset types performed similarly; however, R outperformed G when underlying data had low station density. G outperformed S or R datasets, although better streamflow modeling did not always follow. Hydrologic analyses need datasets that better represent climate variable dependencies and complex topography.
Rasmus E. Benestad, Kajsa M. Parding, and Andreas Dobler
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 45–65, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-45-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-45-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
We present a new method to calculate the chance of heavy downpour and the maximum rainfall expected over a 25-year period. It is designed to analyse global climate models' reproduction of past and future climates. For the Nordic countries, it projects a wetter climate in the future with increased intensity but not necessarily more wet days. The analysis also shows that rainfall intensity is sensitive to future greenhouse gas emissions, while the number of wet days appears to be less affected.
Chien-Yu Tseng, Li-Pen Wang, and Christian Onof
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 29, 1–25, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-1-2025, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-29-1-2025, 2025
Short summary
Short summary
This study presents a new algorithm to model convective storms. We used advanced tracking methods to analyse 165 storm events in Birmingham (UK) and reconstruct storm cell life cycles. We found that cell properties like intensity and size are interrelated and vary over time. The new algorithm, based on vine copulas, accurately simulates these properties and their evolution. It also integrates an exponential shape function for realistic rainfall patterns, enhancing its hydrological applicability.
Kenza Tazi, Andrew Orr, Javier Hernandez-González, Scott Hosking, and Richard E. Turner
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 4903–4925, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4903-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4903-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
This work aims to improve the understanding of precipitation patterns in High-mountain Asia, a crucial water source for around 1.9 billion people. Through a novel machine learning method, we generate high-resolution precipitation predictions, including the likelihoods of floods and droughts. Compared to state-of-the-art methods, our method is simpler to implement and more suitable for small datasets. The method also shows accuracy comparable to or better than existing benchmark datasets.
Peter E. Levy and the COSMOS-UK team
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 4819–4836, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4819-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4819-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Having accurate up-to-date maps of soil moisture is important for many purposes. However, current modelled and remotely sensed maps are rather coarse and not very accurate. Here, we demonstrate a simple but accurate approach that is closely linked to direct measurements of soil moisture at a network sites across the UK, to the water balance (precipitation minus drainage and evaporation) measured at a large number of catchments (1212) and to remotely sensed satellite estimates.
Amy C. Green, Chris Kilsby, and András Bárdossy
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 4539–4558, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4539-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4539-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Weather radar is a crucial tool in rainfall estimation, but radar rainfall estimates are subject to many error sources, with the true rainfall field unknown. A flexible model for simulating errors relating to the radar rainfall estimation process is implemented, inverting standard processing methods. This flexible and efficient model performs well in generating realistic weather radar images visually for a large range of event types.
Peyman Abbaszadeh, Keyhan Gavahi, and Hamid Moradkhani
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2024-209, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2024-209, 2024
Revised manuscript accepted for HESS
Short summary
Short summary
The Hybrid Ensemble and Variational Data Assimilation framework for Environmental System (HEAVEN) enhances flood predictions by refining hydrologic models through improved data integration and uncertainty management. Tested in three Southeastern U.S. watersheds during hurricanes, HEAVEN assimilates real-time USGS streamflow data, boosting forecast accuracy.
Ling Zhang, Lu Li, Zhongshi Zhang, Joël Arnault, Stefan Sobolowski, Anthony Musili Mwanthi, Pratik Kad, Mohammed Abdullahi Hassan, Tanja Portele, and Harald Kunstmann
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2024-278, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2024-278, 2024
Revised manuscript accepted for HESS
Short summary
Short summary
To address challenges related to unreliable hydrological simulations, we present an enhanced hydrological simulation with a refined climate model and a more comprehensive hydrological model. The model with the two parts outperforms that without, especially in migrating bias in peak flow and dry-season flow. Our findings highlight the enhanced hydrological simulation capability with the refined climate and lake module contributing 24 % and 76 % improvement, respectively.
Peng Huang, Agnès Ducharne, Lucia Rinchiuso, Jan Polcher, Laure Baratgin, Vladislav Bastrikov, and Eric Sauquet
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 4455–4476, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4455-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4455-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
We conducted a high-resolution hydrological simulation from 1959 to 2020 across France. We used a simple trial-and-error calibration to reduce the biases of the simulated water budget compared to observations. The selected simulation satisfactorily reproduces water fluxes, including their spatial contrasts and temporal trends. This work offers a reliable historical overview of water resources and a robust configuration for climate change impact analysis at the nationwide scale of France.
He Sun, Tandong Yao, Fengge Su, Wei Yang, and Deliang Chen
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 4361–4381, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4361-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4361-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Our findings show that runoff in the Yarlung Zangbo (YZ) basin is primarily driven by rainfall, with the largest glacier runoff contribution in the downstream sub-basin. Annual runoff increased in the upper stream but decreased downstream due to varying precipitation patterns. It is expected to rise throughout the 21st century, mainly driven by increased rainfall.
Simon Moulds, Louise Slater, Louise Arnal, and Andrew Wood
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.31223/X5X405, https://doi.org/10.31223/X5X405, 2024
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 four 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 four months ahead in many locations, although in general the skill declines with increasing lead time.
Louise Arnal, Martyn P. Clark, Alain Pietroniro, Vincent Vionnet, David R. Casson, Paul H. Whitfield, Vincent Fortin, Andrew W. Wood, Wouter J. M. Knoben, Brandi W. Newton, and Colleen Walford
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 4127–4155, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4127-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-4127-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Forecasting river flow months in advance is crucial for water sectors and society. In North America, snowmelt is a key driver of flow. This study presents a statistical workflow using snow data to forecast flow months ahead in North American snow-fed rivers. Variations in the river flow predictability across the continent are evident, raising concerns about future predictability in a changing (snow) climate. The reproducible workflow hosted on GitHub supports collaborative and open science.
Annalina Lombardi, Barbara Tomassetti, Valentina Colaiuda, Ludovico Di Antonio, Paolo Tuccella, Mario Montopoli, Giovanni Ravazzani, Frank Silvio Marzano, Raffaele Lidori, and Giulia Panegrossi
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 3777–3797, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3777-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3777-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
The accurate estimation of precipitation and its spatial variability within a watershed is crucial for reliable discharge simulations. The study is the first detailed analysis of the potential usage of the cellular automata technique to merge different rainfall data inputs to hydrological models. This work shows an improvement in the performance of hydrological simulations when satellite and rain gauge data are merged.
Alexandre Devers, Jean-Philippe Vidal, Claire Lauvernet, Olivier Vannier, and Laurie Caillouet
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 3457–3474, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3457-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3457-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Daily streamflow series for 661 near-natural French catchments are reconstructed over 1871–2012 using two ensemble datasets: HydRE and HydREM. They include uncertainties coming from climate forcings, streamflow measurement, and hydrological model error (for HydrREM). Comparisons with other hydrological reconstructions and independent/dependent observations show the added value of the two reconstructions in terms of quality, uncertainty estimation, and representation of extremes.
Ningpeng Dong, Haoran Hao, Mingxiang Yang, Jianhui Wei, Shiqin Xu, and Harald Kunstmann
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2024-212, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2024-212, 2024
Revised manuscript accepted for HESS
Short summary
Short summary
Hydrometeorological forecasting is crucial for managing water resources and mitigating extreme weather impacts, yet current long-term forecast products are often embedded with uncertainties. We develop a deep learning based modelling framework to improve 30-day rainfall and streamflow forecasts by combining advanced neural networks and outputs from physical models. With the forecast error reduced by up to 32%, the framework has the potential to enhance water management and disaster preparedness.
María Agostina Bracalenti, Omar V. Müller, Miguel A. Lovino, and Ernesto Hugo Berbery
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 3281–3303, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3281-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3281-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
The Gran Chaco is a large, dry forest in South America that has been heavily deforested, particularly in the dry Chaco subregion. This deforestation, mainly driven by the expansion of the agricultural frontier, has changed the land's characteristics, affecting the local and regional climate. The study reveals that deforestation has resulted in reduced precipitation, soil moisture, and runoff, and if intensive agriculture continues, it could make summers in this arid region even drier and hotter.
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.
Lu Su, Dennis P. Lettenmaier, Ming Pan, and Benjamin Bass
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 3079–3097, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3079-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-3079-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
We fine-tuned the variable infiltration capacity (VIC) and Noah-MP models across 263 river basins in the Western US. We developed transfer relationships to similar basins and extended the fine-tuned parameters to ungauged basins. Both models performed best in humid areas, and the skills improved post-calibration. VIC outperforms Noah-MP in all but interior dry basins following regionalization. VIC simulates annual mean streamflow and high flow well, while Noah-MP performs better for low flows.
Valentin Dura, Guillaume Evin, Anne-Catherine Favre, and David Penot
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 2579–2601, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2579-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2579-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
The increase in precipitation as a function of elevation is poorly understood in areas with complex topography. In this article, the reproduction of these orographic gradients is assessed with several precipitation products. The best product is a simulation from a convection-permitting regional climate model. The corresponding seasonal gradients vary significantly in space, with higher values for the first topographical barriers exposed to the dominant air mass circulations.
Caroline Legrand, Benoît Hingray, Bruno Wilhelm, and Martin Ménégoz
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 2139–2166, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2139-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2139-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Climate change is expected to increase flood hazard worldwide. The evolution is typically estimated from multi-model chains, where regional hydrological scenarios are simulated from weather scenarios derived from coarse-resolution atmospheric outputs of climate models. We show that two such chains are able to reproduce, from an atmospheric reanalysis, the 1902–2009 discharge variations and floods of the upper Rhône alpine river, provided that the weather scenarios are bias-corrected.
Nenghan Wan, Xiaomao Lin, Roger A. Pielke Sr., Xubin Zeng, and Amanda M. Nelson
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 2123–2137, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2123-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2123-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Global warming occurs at a rate of 0.21 K per decade, resulting in about 9.5 % K−1 of water vapor response to temperature from 1993 to 2021. Terrestrial areas experienced greater warming than the ocean, with a ratio of 2 : 1. The total precipitable water change in response to surface temperature changes showed a variation around 6 % K−1–8 % K−1 in the 15–55° N latitude band. Further studies are needed to identify the mechanisms leading to different water vapor responses.
Kyungmin Sung, Max C. A. Torbenson, and James H. Stagge
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 2047–2063, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2047-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2047-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
This study examines centuries of nonstationary trends in meteorological drought and pluvial climatology. A novel approach merges tree-ring proxy data (North American Seasonal Precipitation Atlas – NASPA) with instrumental precipitation datasets by temporally downscaling proxy data, correcting biases, and analyzing shared trends in normal and extreme precipitation anomalies. We identify regions experiencing recent unprecedented shifts towards drier or wetter conditions and shifts in seasonality.
Baoying Shan, Niko E. C. Verhoest, and Bernard De Baets
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 2065–2080, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2065-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-2065-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
This study developed a convenient and new method to identify the occurrence of droughts, heatwaves, and co-occurring droughts and heatwaves (CDHW) across four seasons. Using this method, we could establish the start and/or end dates of drought (or heatwave) events. We found an increase in the frequency of heatwaves and CDHW events in Belgium caused by climate change. We also found that different months have different chances of CDHW events.
Kazeem Ishola, Gerald Mills, Ankur Sati, Benjamin Obe, Matthias Demuzere, Deepak Upreti, Gourav Misra, Paul Lewis, Daire Walsh, Tim McCarthy, and Rowan Fealy
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2023-304, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2023-304, 2024
Revised manuscript accepted for HESS
Short summary
Short summary
The global soil information contributes to uncertainty in many models that monitor soil hydrothermal changes. Using the NOAH-MP model with two different global soil information, we show under-represented soil properties in wet loam soil, leading to dry bias in soil moisture. The dry bias is higher and drought categories are more severe in SOILGRIDS. We conclude that models should consider using detailed regionally-derived soil information, to reduce model uncertainties.
Georgina M. Falster, Nicky M. Wright, Nerilie J. Abram, Anna M. Ukkola, and Benjamin J. Henley
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 1383–1401, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-1383-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-1383-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Multi-year droughts have severe environmental and economic impacts, but the instrumental record is too short to characterise multi-year drought variability. We assessed the nature of Australian multi-year droughts using simulations of the past millennium from 11 climate models. We show that multi-decadal
megadroughtsare a natural feature of the Australian hydroclimate. Human-caused climate change is also driving a tendency towards longer droughts in eastern and southwestern Australia.
Kun Xie, Lu Li, Hua Chen, Stephanie Mayer, Andreas Dobler, Chong-Yu Xu, and Ozan Mert Gokturk
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2024-68, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2024-68, 2024
Revised manuscript accepted for HESS
Short summary
Short summary
We compared extreme precipitations in Norway from convection-permitting models at 3 km resolution (HCLIM3) and regional climate model at 12 km (HCLIM12) and show that the HCLIM3 is more accurate than HCLIM12 in predicting the intense rainfalls that can lead to floods, especially at local scales. This is more clear in hourly extremes than daily. Our research suggests using more detailed climate models could improve forecasts, helping the local society brace for the impacts of extreme weather.
Urmin Vegad, Yadu Pokhrel, and Vimal Mishra
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 1107–1126, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-1107-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-1107-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
A large population is affected by floods, which leave their footprints through human mortality, migration, and damage to agriculture and infrastructure, during almost every summer monsoon season in India. Despite the massive damage of floods, sub-basin level flood risk assessment is still in its infancy and needs to be improved. Using hydrological and hydrodynamic models, we reconstructed sub-basin level observed floods for the 1901–2020 period.
Qi Sun, Patrick Olschewski, Jianhui Wei, Zhan Tian, Laixiang Sun, Harald Kunstmann, and Patrick Laux
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 761–780, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-761-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-761-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Tropical cyclones (TCs) often cause high economic loss due to heavy winds and rainfall, particularly in densely populated regions such as the Pearl River Delta (China). This study provides a reference to set up regional climate models for TC simulations. They contribute to a better TC process understanding and assess the potential changes and risks of TCs in the future. This lays the foundation for hydrodynamical modelling, from which the cities' disaster management and defence could benefit.
Simon Parry, Jonathan D. Mackay, Thomas Chitson, Jamie Hannaford, Eugene Magee, Maliko Tanguy, Victoria A. Bell, Katie Facer-Childs, Alison Kay, Rosanna Lane, Robert J. Moore, Stephen Turner, and John Wallbank
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 417–440, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-417-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-417-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
We studied drought in a dataset of possible future river flows and groundwater levels in the UK and found different outcomes for these two sources of water. Throughout the UK, river flows are likely to be lower in future, with droughts more prolonged and severe. However, whilst these changes are also found in some boreholes, in others, higher levels and less severe drought are indicated for the future. This has implications for the future balance between surface water and groundwater below.
Francesco Marra, Marika Koukoula, Antonio Canale, and Nadav Peleg
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 375–389, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-375-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-375-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
We present a new physical-based method for estimating extreme sub-hourly precipitation return levels (i.e., intensity–duration–frequency, IDF, curves), which are critical for the estimation of future floods. The proposed model, named TENAX, incorporates temperature as a covariate in a physically consistent manner. It has only a few parameters and can be easily set for any climate station given sub-hourly precipitation and temperature data are available.
Alexander Gelfan, Andrey Panin, Andrey Kalugin, Polina Morozova, Vladimir Semenov, Alexey Sidorchuk, Vadim Ukraintsev, and Konstantin Ushakov
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 241–259, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-241-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-241-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Paleogeographical data show that 17–13 ka BP, the Caspian Sea level was 80 m above the current level. There are large disagreements on the genesis of this “Great” Khvalynian transgression of the sea, and we tried to shed light on this issue. Using climate and hydrological models as well as the paleo-reconstructions, we proved that the transgression could be initiated solely by hydroclimatic factors within the deglaciation period in the absence of the glacial meltwater effect.
Joeri B. Reinders and Samuel E. Munoz
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 28, 217–227, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-217-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-217-2024, 2024
Short summary
Short summary
Flooding presents a major hazard for people and infrastructure along waterways; however, it is challenging to study the likelihood of a flood magnitude occurring regionally due to a lack of long discharge records. We show that hydroclimatic variables like Köppen climate regions and precipitation intensity explain part of the variance in flood frequency distributions and thus reduce the uncertainty of flood probability estimates. This gives water managers a tool to locally improve flood analysis.
Mehrad Rahimpour Asenjan, Francois Brissette, Jean-Luc Martel, and Richard Arsenault
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 4355–4367, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-4355-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-4355-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
Climate models are central to climate change impact studies. Some models project a future deemed too hot by many. We looked at how including hot models may skew the result of impact studies. Applied to hydrology, this study shows that hot models do not systematically produce hydrological outliers.
Ross Pidoto and Uwe Haberlandt
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 3957–3975, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-3957-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-3957-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
Long continuous time series of meteorological variables (i.e. rainfall, temperature) are required for the modelling of floods. Observed time series are generally too short or not available. Weather generators are models that reproduce observed weather time series. This study extends an existing station-based rainfall model into space by enforcing observed spatial rainfall characteristics. To model other variables (i.e. temperature) the model is then coupled to a simple resampling approach.
Kajsa Maria Parding, Rasmus Emil Benestad, Anita Verpe Dyrrdal, and Julia Lutz
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 3719–3732, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-3719-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-3719-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
Intensity–duration–frequency (IDF) curves describe the likelihood of extreme rainfall and are used in hydrology and engineering, for example, for flood forecasting and water management. We develop a model to estimate IDF curves from daily meteorological observations, which are more widely available than the observations on finer timescales (minutes to hours) that are needed for IDF calculations. The method is applied to all data at once, making it efficient and robust to individual errors.
Kaltrina Maloku, Benoit Hingray, and Guillaume Evin
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 3643–3661, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-3643-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-3643-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
High-resolution precipitation data, needed for many applications in hydrology, are typically rare. Such data can be simulated from daily precipitation with stochastic disaggregation. In this work, multiplicative random cascades are used to disaggregate time series of 40 min precipitation from daily precipitation for 81 Swiss stations. We show that very relevant statistics of precipitation are obtained when precipitation asymmetry is accounted for in a continuous way in the cascade generator.
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.
Yuanhong You, Chunlin Huang, Zuo Wang, Jinliang Hou, Ying Zhang, and Peipei Xu
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 2919–2933, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-2919-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-2919-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
This study aims to investigate the performance of a genetic particle filter which was used as a snow data assimilation scheme across different snow climates. The results demonstrated that the genetic algorithm can effectively solve the problem of particle degeneration and impoverishment in a particle filter algorithm. The system has revealed a low sensitivity to the particle number in point-scale application of the ground snow depth measurement.
Patricia Lawston-Parker, Joseph A. Santanello Jr., and Nathaniel W. Chaney
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 2787–2805, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-2787-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-2787-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
Irrigation has been shown to impact weather and climate, but it has only recently been considered in prediction models. Prescribing where (globally) irrigation takes place is important to accurately simulate its impacts on temperature, humidity, and precipitation. Here, we evaluated three different irrigation maps in a weather model and found that the extent and intensity of irrigated areas and their boundaries are important drivers of weather impacts resulting from human practices.
Marcos Julien Alexopoulos, Hannes Müller-Thomy, Patrick Nistahl, Mojca Šraj, and Nejc Bezak
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 2559–2578, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-2559-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-2559-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
For rainfall-runoff simulation of a certain area, hydrological models are used, which requires precipitation data and temperature data as input. Since these are often not available as observations, we have tested simulation results from atmospheric models. ERA5-Land and COSMO-REA6 were tested for Slovenian catchments. Both lead to good simulations results. Their usage enables the use of rainfall-runoff simulation in unobserved catchments as a requisite for, e.g., flood protection measures.
Tuantuan Zhang, Zhongmin Liang, Wentao Li, Jun Wang, Yiming Hu, and Binquan Li
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 1945–1960, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-1945-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-1945-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
We use circulation classifications and spatiotemporal deep neural networks to correct raw daily forecast precipitation by combining large-scale circulation patterns with local spatiotemporal information. We find that the method not only captures the westward and northward movement of the western Pacific subtropical high but also shows substantially higher bias-correction capabilities than existing standard methods in terms of spatial scale, timescale, and intensity.
Zeyu Xue, Paul Ullrich, and Lai-Yung Ruby Leung
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 1909–1927, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-1909-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-1909-2023, 2023
Short summary
Short summary
We examine the sensitivity and robustness of conclusions drawn from the PGW method over the NEUS by conducting multiple PGW experiments and varying the perturbation spatial scales and choice of perturbed meteorological variables to provide a guideline for this increasingly popular regional modeling method. Overall, we recommend PGW experiments be performed with perturbations to temperature or the combination of temperature and wind at the gridpoint scale, depending on the research question.
Cited articles
Alfieri, L., Burek, P., Dutra, E., Krzeminski, B., Muraro, D., Thielen, J., and Pappenberger, F.: GloFAS – global ensemble streamflow forecasting and flood early warning, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 17, 1161–1175, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-17-1161-2013, 2013. a
Archer, C. L. and Caldeira, K.: Historical trends in the jet streams, Geophys. Res. Lett., 35, L08803, https://doi.org/10.1029/2008GL033614, 2008. a
Berghuijs, W. R., Harrigan, S., Molnar, P., Slater, L. J., and Kirchner, J. W.: The relative importance of different flood-generating mechanisms across Europe, Water Resour. Res., 55, 4582–4593, 2019b. a
Bertola, M., Viglione, A., Vorogushyn, S., Lun, D., Merz, B., and Blöschl, G.: Do small and large floods have the same drivers of change? A regional attribution analysis in Europe, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 25, 1347–1364, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-1347-2021, 2021. a
Bevacqua, E., Vousdoukas, M. I., Zappa, G., Hodges, K., Shepherd, T. G., Maraun, D., Mentaschi, L., and Feyen, L.: More meteorological events that drive compound coastal flooding are projected under climate change, Communications Earth & Environment, 1, 47, https://doi.org/10.1038/s43247-020-00044-z, 2020a. a, b
Bevacqua, E., Zappa, G., and Shepherd, T. G.: Shorter cyclone clusters modulate changes in European wintertime precipitation extremes, Environ. Res. Lett., 15, 124005, https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/abbde7, 2020b. a
Bevacqua, E., Suarez-Gutierrez, L., Jézéquel, A., Lehner, F., Vrac, M., Yiou, P., and Zscheischler, J.: Advancing research on compound weather and climate events via large ensemble model simulations, Nat. Commun., 14, 2145, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-023-37847-5, 2023. a, b
Blöschl, G., Nester, T., Komma, J., Parajka, J., and Perdigão, R. A. P.: The June 2013 flood in the Upper Danube Basin, and comparisons with the 2002, 1954 and 1899 floods, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 17, 5197–5212, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-17-5197-2013, 2013. a
Blöschl, G., Hall, J., Parajka, J., Perdigão, R. A. P., Merz, B., Arheimer, B., Aronica, G. T., Bilibashi, A., Bonacci, O., Borga, M., Čanjevac, I., Castellarin, A., Chirico, G. B., Claps, P., Fiala, K., Frolova, N., Gorbachova, L., Gül, A., Hannaford, J., Harrigan, S., Kireeva, M., Kiss, A., Kjeldsen, T. R., Kohnová, S., Koskela, J. J., Ledvinka, O., Macdonald, N., Mavrova-Guirguinova, M., Mediero, L., Merz, R., Molnar, P., Montanari, A., Murphy, C., Osuch, M., Ovcharuk, V., Radevski, I., Rogger, M., Salinas, J. L., Sauquet, E., Šraj, M., Szolgay, J., Viglione, A., Volpi, E., Wilson, D., Zaimi, K., and Živković, N.: Changing climate shifts timing of European floods, Science, 357, 588–590, https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aan2506, 2017. a, b
Blöschl, G., Hall, J., Viglione, A., Perdigão, R. A. P., Parajka, J., Merz, B., Lun, D., Arheimer, B., Aronica, G. T., Bilibashi, A., Boháč, M., Bonacci, O., Borga, M., Čanjevac, I., Castellarin, A., Chirico, G. B., Claps, P., Frolova, N., Ganora, D., Gorbachova, L., Gül, A., Hannaford, J., Harrigan, S., Kireeva, M., Kiss, A., Kjeldsen, T. R., Kohnová, S., Koskela, J. J., Ledvinka, O., Macdonald, N., Mavrova-Guirguinova, M., Mediero, L., Merz, R., Molnar, P., Montanari, A., Murphy, C., Osuch, M., Ovcharuk, V., Radevski, I., Salinas, J. L., Sauquet, E., Šraj, M., Szolgay, J., Volpi, E., Wilson, D., Zaimi, K., and Živković, N.: Changing climate both increases and decreases European river floods, Nature, 573, 108–111, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-019-1495-6, 2019. a, b, c, d, e
Blöschl, G., Kiss, A., Viglione, A., Barriendos, M., Böhm, O., Brázdil, R., Coeur, D., Demarée, G., Llasat, M. C., Macdonald, N., Retsö, D., Roald, L., Schmocker-Fackel, P., Amorim, I., Bělínová, M., Benito, G., Bertolin, C., Camuffo, D., Cornel, D., Doktor, R., Elleder, L., Enzi, S., Garcia, J. C., Glaser, R., Hall, J., Haslinger, K., Hofstätter, M., Komma, J., Limanówka, D., Lun, D., Panin, A., Parajka, J., Petrić, H., Rodrigo, F. S., Rohr, C., Schönbein, J., Schulte, L., Silva, L. P., Toonen, W. H. J., Valent, P., Waser, J., and Wetter, O.: Current European flood-rich period exceptional compared with past 500 years, Nature, 583, 560–566, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-020-2478-3, 2020. a
Brunner, M. I., Gilleland, E., Wood, A., Swain, D. L., and Clark, M.: Spatial dependence of floods shaped by spatiotemporal variations in meteorological and land-surface processes, Geophys. Res. Lett., 47, e2020GL088000, https://doi.org/10.1029/2020GL088000, 2020. a
Cannon, A. J., Sobie, S. R., and Murdock, T. Q.: Bias correction of GCM precipitation by quantile mapping: how well do methods preserve changes in quantiles and extremes?, J. Climate, 28, 6938–6959, 2015. a
Center for International Earth Science Information Network – CIESIN – Columbia University: Gridded Population of the World, Version 4 (GPWv4): Population Count, Revision 11 [data set], https://doi.org/10.7927/H4JW8BX5, 2018. a, b
De Luca, P., Hillier, J. K., Wilby, R. L., Quinn, N. W., and Harrigan, S.: Extreme multi-basin flooding linked with extra-tropical cyclones, Environ. Res. Lett., 12, 114009, https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/aa868e, 2017. a
ECA & D: E-OBS gridded dataset, ECA & D [data set], https://www.ecad.eu/download/ensembles/download.php (last access: 1 November 2021), 2022. a
Federal Institute of Hydrology: Global Runoff Database, Global Runoff Data Centre [data set], https://portal.grdc.bafg.de/applications/public.html?publicuser=PublicUser (last access:1 November 2021), 2022. a
Fang, B. and Lu, M.: Heatwave and blocking in the Northeastern Asia: Occurrence, variability, and association, J. Geophys. Res.-Atmos., 125, e2019JD031627, https://doi.org/10.1029/2019JD031627, 2020. a, b, c
François, B. and Vrac, M.: Time of emergence of compound events: contribution of univariate and dependence properties, Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci., 23, 21–44, https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-23-21-2023, 2023. a, b
Grimaldi, S., Salamon, P., Disperati, J., Zsoter, E., Russo, C., Ramos, A., Carton De Wiart, C., Barnard, C., Hansford, E., Gomes, G., and Prudhomme, C.: River discharge and related historical data from the Global Flood Awareness System. v4.0, European Commission, Joint Research Centre (JRC) [data set], https://cds.climate.copernicus.eu/cdsapp#!/dataset/cems-glofas-historical (last access: 20 September 2023), 2022. a, b
Gudmundsson, L., Boulange, J., Do, H. X., Gosling, S. N., Grillakis, M. G., Koutroulis, A. G., Leonard, M., Liu, J., Schmied, H. M., Papadimitriou, L., Pokhrel, Y., Seneviratne, S. I., Satoh, Y., Thiery, W., Westra, S., Zhang, X., and Zhao, F.: Globally observed trends in mean and extreme river flow attributed to climate change, Science, 371, 1159–1162, https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aba3996, 2021. a
Hall, J. and Blöschl, G.: Spatial patterns and characteristics of flood seasonality in Europe, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 22, 3883–3901, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-22-3883-2018, 2018. a
Hargreaves, G. H. and Samani, Z. A.: Reference crop evapotranspiration from temperature, Appl. Eng. Agric., 1, 96–99, 1985. a
Hersbach, H., Bell, B., Berrisford, P., Biavati, G., Horányi, A., Muñoz Sabater, J., Nicolas, J., Peubey, C., Radu, R., Rozum, I., Schepers, D., Simmons, A., Soci, C., Dee, D., and Thépaut, J-N.: ERA5 hourly data on single levels from 1940 to present, Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) Climate Data Store (CDS) [data set], https://doi.org/10.24381/cds.adbb2d47, 2023. a, b
Jiang, S., Tarasova, L., Yu, G., and Zscheischler, J.: Compounding effects in flood drivers challenge estimates of extreme river floods, Science Advances, 10, eadl4005, https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.adl4005, 2024. a, b
Kundzewicz, Z. W., Pińskwar, I., and Brakenridge, G. R.: Large floods in Europe, 1985–2009, Hydrolog. Sci. J., 58, 1–7, 2013. a
Lehner, B., Verdin, K., and Jarvis, A.: New global hydrography derived from spaceborne elevation data, Eos T. Am. Geophys. Un., 89, 93–94, 2008. a
Liu, J. and Zhang, Y.: Multi-temporal clustering of continental floods and associated atmospheric circulations, J. Hydrol., 555, 744–759, 2017. a
Lun, D., Fischer, S., Viglione, A., and Blöschl, G.: Detecting flood-rich and flood-poor periods in annual peak discharges across Europe, Water Resour. Res., 56, e2019WR026575, https://doi.org/10.1029/2019WR026575, 2020. a
Luo, M., Lau, N.-C., Liu, Z., Wu, S., and Wang, X.: An observational investigation of spatiotemporally contiguous heatwaves in China from a 3D perspective, Geophys. Res. Lett., 49, e2022GL097714, https://doi.org/10.1029/2022GL097714, 2022. a
Merz, B., Nguyen, V. D., and Vorogushyn, S.: Temporal clustering of floods in Germany: Do flood-rich and flood-poor periods exist?, J. Hydrol., 541, 824–838, 2016. a
Nash, J. E. and Sutcliffe, J. V.: River flow forecasting through conceptual models part I–A discussion of principles, J. Hydrol., 10, 282–290, 1970. a
Niu, G.-Y., Yang, Z.-L., Mitchell, K. E., Chen, F., Ek, M. B., Barlage, M., Kumar, A., Manning, K., Niyogi, D., Rosero, E., Tewari, M., and Xia, Y.: The community Noah land surface model with multiparameterization options (Noah-MP): 1. Model description and evaluation with local-scale measurements, J. Geophys. Res.-Atmos., 116, D12109, https://doi.org/10.1029/2010JD015139, 2011. a
Paprotny, D., Morales-Nápoles, O., and Jonkman, S. N.: HANZE: a pan-European database of exposure to natural hazards and damaging historical floods since 1870, Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 10, 565–581, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-10-565-2018, 2018. a
Pohl, F., Rakovec, O., Rebmann, C., Hildebrandt, A., Boeing, F., Hermanns, F., Attinger, S., Samaniego, L., and Kumar, R.: Long-term daily hydrometeorological drought indices, soil moisture, and evapotranspiration for ICOS sites, Scientific Data, 10, 281, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41597-023-02192-1, 2023. a
Rakovec, O., Samaniego, L., Hari, V., Markonis, Y., Moravec, V., Thober, S., Hanel, M., and Kumar, R.: The 2018–2020 multi-year drought sets a new benchmark in Europe, Earths Future, 10, e2021EF002394, https://doi.org/10.1029/2021EF002394, 2022. a
Rakovec, O., Kumar, R., and Samaniego, L.: Mesoscale Hydrologic Model based historical streamflow simulation over Europe at
Rivoire, P., Martius, O., and Naveau, P.: A comparison of moderate and extreme ERA-5 daily precipitation with two observational data sets, Earth and Space Science, 8, e2020EA001633, https://doi.org/10.1029/2020EA001633, 2021. a
Samaniego, L., Kumar, R., and Attinger, S.: Multiscale parameter regionalization of a grid-based hydrologic model at the mesoscale, Water Resour. Res., 46, W05523, https://doi.org/10.1029/2008WR007327, 2010. a, b
Singh, H., Najafi, M. R., and Cannon, A. J.: Characterizing non-stationary compound extreme events in a changing climate based on large-ensemble climate simulations, Clim. Dynam., 56, 1389–1405, 2021. a
Sklar, A.: Random variables, joint distribution functions, and copulas, Kybernetika, 9, 449–460, 1973. a
Stadtherr, L., Coumou, D., Petoukhov, V., Petri, S., and Rahmstorf, S.: Record Balkan floods of 2014 linked to planetary wave resonance, Science Advances, 2, e1501428, https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.1501428, 2016. a
Stahl, K., Hisdal, H., Hannaford, J., Tallaksen, L. M., van Lanen, H. A. J., Sauquet, E., Demuth, S., Fendekova, M., and Jódar, J.: Streamflow trends in Europe: evidence from a dataset of near-natural catchments, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 14, 2367–2382, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-14-2367-2010, 2010. a
Stahl, K., Tallaksen, L. M., Hannaford, J., and van Lanen, H. A. J.: Filling the white space on maps of European runoff trends: estimates from a multi-model ensemble, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 16, 2035–2047, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-16-2035-2012, 2012. a, b
Sutanudjaja, E. H., van Beek, R., Wanders, N., Wada, Y., Bosmans, J. H. C., Drost, N., van der Ent, R. J., de Graaf, I. E. M., Hoch, J. M., de Jong, K., Karssenberg, D., López López, P., Peßenteiner, S., Schmitz, O., Straatsma, M. W., Vannametee, E., Wisser, D., and Bierkens, M. F. P.: PCR-GLOBWB 2: a 5 arcmin global hydrological and water resources model, Geosci. Model Dev., 11, 2429–2453, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-11-2429-2018, 2018. a
Tarasova, L., Lun, D., Merz, R., Blöschl, G., Basso, S., Bertola, M., Miniussi, A., Rakovec, O., Samaniego, L., Thober, S., and Kumar, R.: Shifts in flood generation processes exacerbate regional flood anomalies in Europe, Communications Earth & Environment, 4, 49, https://doi.org/10.1038/s43247-023-00714-8, 2023. a, b, c, d, e, f, g, h, i, j, k, l, m
Tradowsky, J. S., Philip, S. Y., Kreienkamp, F., Kew, S. F., Lorenz, P., Arrighi, J., Bettmann, T., Caluwaerts, S., Chan, S. C., De Cruz, L., de Vries, H., Demuth, N., Ferrone, A., Fischer, E. M., Fowler, H. J., Goergen, K., Heinrich, D., Henrichs, Y., Kaspar, F., Lenderink, G., Nilson, E., Otto, F. E. L., Ragone, F., Seneviratne, S. I., Singh, R. K., Skålevåg, A., Termonia, P., Thalheimer, L., van Aalst, M., Van den Bergh, J., Van de Vyver, H., Vannitsem, S., van Oldenborgh, G. J., Van Schaeybroeck, B., Vautard, R., Vonk, D., and Wanders, N.: Attribution of the heavy rainfall events leading to severe flooding in Western Europe during July 2021, Climatic Change, 176, 90, https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-023-03502-7, 2023. a
United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction: Global Assessment Report on Disaster Risk Reduction 2015: Making Development Sustainable: The Future of Disaster Risk Management, Tech. rep., United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR), https://www.undrr.org/publication/global-assessment-report-disaster-risk-reduction-2015 (last access: 25 March 2024), 2015. a
Vogel, M. M., Zscheischler, J., Fischer, E. M., and Seneviratne, S. I.: Development of future heatwaves for different hazard thresholds, J. Geophys. Res.-Atmos., 125, e2019JD032070, https://doi.org/10.1029/2019JD032070, 2020. a, b
Zolina, O.: Changes in intense precipitation in Europe, in: Changes in flood risk in Europe, edited by: Zbigniew, W., IAHS Press Special Publ., 97–119, https://doi.org/10.1201/b12348, 2012. a
Zscheischler, J. and Seneviratne, S.: Dependence of drivers affects risks associated with compound events, Science Advances, 3, e1700263, https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.1700263, 2017. a, b, c
Zscheischler, J., Mahecha, M. D., von Buttlar, J., Harmeling, S., Jung, M., Rammig, A., Randerson, J. T., Schölkopf, B., Seneviratne, S. I., Tomelleri, E., Zaehle, S., and Reichstein, M.: A few extreme events dominate global interannual variability in gross primary production, Environ. Res. Lett., 9, 035001, https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/9/3/035001, 2014. a, b
Zscheischler, J., Westra, S., van den Hurk, B. J. J. M., Seneviratne, S. I., Ward, P. J., Pitman, A., AghaKouchak, A., Bresch, D. N., Leonard, M., Wahl, T., and Zhang, X.: Future climate risk from compound events, Nat. Clim. Change, 8, 469–477, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-018-0156-3, 2018. a
Zscheischler, J., Martius, O., Westra, S., Bevacqua, E., Raymond, C., Horton, R. M., van den Hurk, B., AghaKouchak, A., Jézéquel, A., Mahecha, M. D., Maraun, D., Ramos, A. M., Ridder, N. N., Thiery, W., and Vignotto, E.: A typology of compound weather and climate events, Nature Reviews Earth & Environment, 1, 333–347, https://doi.org/10.1038/s43017-020-0060-z, 2020. a
Executive editor
The topic is of interest to a wide audience. The authors have developed a new approach to assess changes in the spatial extent of flooding.
The topic is of interest to a wide audience. The authors have developed a new approach to assess...
Short summary
We use grid-based runoff from a hydrological model to identify large spatiotemporally connected flood events in Europe, assess extent trends over the last 70 years, and attribute the trends to different drivers. Our findings reveal a general increase in flood extent, with regional variations driven by diverse factors. The study not only enables a thorough examination of flood events across multiple basins but also highlights the potential challenges arising from changing flood extents.
We use grid-based runoff from a hydrological model to identify large spatiotemporally connected...
