ALBERT

Description: Regional and local patterns in depth to water table, hydrochemistry and peat properties of bogs and their laggs in coastal British Columbia Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 3421-3435, 2013 Author(s): S. A. Howie and H. J. van Meerveld In restoration planning for damaged raised bogs, the lagg at the bog margin is often not given considerable weight and is sometimes disregarded entirely. However, the lagg is critical for the proper functioning of the bog, as it supports the water mound in the bog. In order to include the lagg in a restoration plan for a raised bog, it is necessary to understand the hydrological characteristics and functions of this rarely studied transition zone. We studied 13 coastal British Columbia (BC) bogs and identified two different gradients in depth to water table, hydrochemistry and peat properties: (1) a local bog expanse–bog margin gradient, and (2) a regional gradient related to climate and proximity to the ocean. Depth to water table generally increased across the transition from bog expanse to bog margin. In the bog expanse, pH was above 4.2 in the Pacific Oceanic wetland region (cooler and wetter climate) and below 4.3 in the Pacific Temperate wetland region (warmer and drier climate). Both pH and pH-corrected electrical conductivity increased significantly across the transition from bog expanse to bog margin, though not in all cases. Na + and Mg 2+ concentrations were generally highest in exposed, oceanic bogs and lower in inland bogs. Ash content in peat samples increased across the bog expanse–bog margin transition, and appears to be a useful abiotic indicator of the location of the bog margin. The observed variation in the hydrological and hydrochemical gradients across the bog expanse–bog margin transition highlights both local and regional diversity of bogs and their associated laggs.

Description: Imperfect scaling in distributions of radar-derived rainfall fields Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 11385-11422, 2013 Author(s): M. J. van den Berg, L. Delobbe, and N. E. C. Verhoest Fine scale rainfall observations for modeling exercises are often not available, but rather coarser data derived from a variety of sources are used. Effectively using these data sources in models often requires the probability distribution of the data at the applicable scale. Although numerous models for scaling distributions exist, these are often based on theoretical developments, rather than on data. In this study, we develop a model based on the α-stable distribution of rainfall fields, and tested on 5 min radar data from a Belgian weather radar. We use these data to estimate functions that describe parameters of the distribution over various scales. Moreover, we study how the mean of the distribution and the intermittency change with scale, and validate and design functions to describe the shape parameter of the distribution. This information was combined into an effective model of the distribution. Finally, the model was fitted to data from numerous storms, and the resulting parameters were compared to investigate the change in scaling behavior through time.

Description: Spatially resolved information on karst conduit flow from in-cave dye-tracing Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 11311-11335, 2013 Author(s): U. Lauber, W. Ufrecht, and N. Goldscheider Artificial tracers are powerful tools to investigate karst systems. Tracers are commonly injected into sinking streams or dolines, while springs serve as monitoring sites. The obtained flow and transport parameters represent mixed information from the vadose, epiphreatic and phreatic zones, i.e., the aquifer remains a black box. Accessible active caves constitute valuable but underexploited natural laboratories to gain detailed insights into the hydrologic functioning of the aquifer. Two multi-tracer tests in the catchment of a major karst spring (Blautopf, Germany) with injections and monitoring in two associated water caves aimed at obtaining spatially and temporally resolved information on groundwater flow in different compartments of the system. Two tracers were injected in the caves to characterize the hydraulic connections between them and with the spring. Two injections at the land surface, far from the spring, aimed at resolving the aquifer's internal drainage structure. Tracer breakthrough curves were monitored by field fluorimeters in caves and at the spring. Results demonstrate the dendritic drainage structure of the aquifer. It was possible to obtain relevant flow and transport parameters for different sections of this system. The highest mean flow velocities (275 m h −1 ) were observed in the near-spring epiphreatic section (open-channel flow), while velocities in the phreatic zone (pressurized flow) were one order of magnitude lower. Determined conduit water volumes confirm results of water balances and hydrograph analyses. In conclusion, experiments and monitoring in caves can deliver spatially resolved information on karst aquifer heterogeneity and dynamics that cannot be obtained by traditional investigative methods.

Description: On the lack of robustness of hydrologic models regarding water balance simulation – a diagnostic approach on 20 mountainous catchments using three models of increasing complexity Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 11337-11383, 2013 Author(s): L. Coron, V. Andréassian, C. Perrin, M. Bourqui, and F. Hendrickx This paper investigates the robustness of rainfall–runoff models when their parameters are transferred in time. More specifically, we studied their ability to simulate water balance on periods with different hydroclimatic characteristics. The testing procedure consisted in a series of parameter transfers between 10-yr periods and the systematic analysis of mean-volume errors. This procedure was applied to three conceptual models of different structural complexity over 20 mountainous catchments in southern France. The results showed that robustness problems are common. Errors on 10-yr-mean flows were significant for all three models and calibration periods, even when the entire record was used for calibration. Various graphical and numerical tools were used to show strong similarities between the shapes of mean flow biases calculated on a 10-yr-long sliding window when various parameter sets are used. Unexpected behavioural similarities were observed between the three models tested, considering their large differences in structural complexity. While the actual causes for robustness problems in these models remain unclear, this work stresses the limited transferability in time of the water balance adjustments made through parameter optimization. Although absolute differences between simulations obtained with different calibrated parameter sets were sometimes substantial, relative differences in simulated mean flows between time periods remained similar regardless of the calibrated parameter sets.

Description: Bayesian networks modelling in support to cross-cutting analysis of water supply and sanitation in developing countries Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 3397-3419, 2013 Author(s): C. Dondeynaz, J. López Puga, and C. Carmona Moreno Despite the efforts made towards the Millennium Development Goals targets during the last decade, improved access to water supply or basic sanitation still remains unavailable for millions of people across the world. This paper proposes a set of models that use 25 key variables and country profiles from the WatSan4Dev data set involving water supply and sanitation (Dondeynaz et al., 2012). This paper suggests the use of Bayesian network modelling methods because they are more easily adapted to deal with non-normal distributions, and integrate a qualitative approach for data analysis. They also offer the advantage of integrating preliminary knowledge into the probabilistic models. The statistical performance of the proposed models ranges between 20 and 5% error rates, which are very satisfactory taking into account the strong heterogeneity of variables. Probabilistic scenarios run from the models allow an assessment of the relationships between human development, external support, governance aspects, economic activities and water supply and sanitation (WSS) access. According to models proposed in this paper, gaining a strong poverty reduction will require the WSS access to reach 75–76% through: (1) the management of ongoing urbanisation processes to avoid slums development; and (2) the improvement of health care, for instance for children. Improving governance, such as institutional efficiency, capacities to make and apply rules, or control of corruption is positively associated with WSS sustainable development. The first condition for an increment of the HDP (human development and poverty) remains of course an improvement of the economic conditions with higher household incomes. Moreover, a significant country commitment to the environment, associated with civil society freedom of expression constitutes a favourable setting for sustainable WSS services delivery. Intensive agriculture using irrigation practises also appears as a mean for sustainable WSS thanks to multi-uses and complementarities. With a WSS sector organised at national level, irrigation practices can support the structuring and efficiency of the agriculture sector. It may then induce rural development in areas where WSS access often is set back compared to urban areas 1 . External financial support, called Official Development Assistance (ODA CI), plays a role in WSS improvement but comes last in the sensitivity analyses of models. An overall 47% of the Official Development Assistance goes first to poor countries, and is associated to governance aspects: (1) political stability and (2) country commitment to the environment and civil society degree of freedom. These governance aspects constitute a good framework for aid implementation in recipient countries. Modelling is run with the five groups of countries as defined in Dondeynaz et al. (2012). Models for profile 4 (essential external support) and profile 5 (primary material consumption) are specifically detailed and analysed in this paper. For countries in profile 4, fighting against water scarcity and progressing desertification should be the priority. However, for countries in profile 5, efforts should first concentrate on consolidation of political stability while supporting diversification of the economic activities. Nevertheless, for both profiles, reduction of poverty should remain the first priority as previously indicated. 1 JMP statistics, 2004 http://www.wssinfo.org/data-estimates/table/ , last access: 22 July 2013.

Description: Technical Note: A comparison of model and empirical measures of catchment-scale effective energy and mass transfer Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 3389-3395, 2013 Author(s): C. Rasmussen and E. L. Gallo Recent work suggests that a coupled effective energy and mass transfer (EEMT) term, which includes the energy associated with effective precipitation and primary production, may serve as a robust prediction parameter of critical zone structure and function. However, the models used to estimate EEMT have been solely based on long-term climatological data with little validation using direct empirical measures of energy, water, and carbon balances. Here we compare catchment-scale EEMT estimates generated using two distinct approaches: (1) EEMT modeled using the established methodology based on estimates of monthly effective precipitation and net primary production derived from climatological data, and (2) empirical catchment-scale EEMT estimated using data from 86 catchments of the Model Parameter Estimation Experiment (MOPEX) and MOD17A3 annual net primary production (NPP) product derived from Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS). Results indicated positive and significant linear correspondence ( R 2 = 0.75; P 〈 0.001) between model and empirical measures with an average root mean square error (RMSE) of 4.86 MJ m −2 yr −1 . Modeled EEMT values were consistently greater than empirical measures of EEMT. Empirical catchment estimates of the energy associated with effective precipitation ( E PPT ) were calculated using a mass balance approach that accounts for water losses to quick surface runoff not accounted for in the climatologically modeled E PPT . Similarly, local controls on primary production such as solar radiation and nutrient limitation were not explicitly included in the climatologically based estimates of energy associated with primary production ( E BIO ), whereas these were captured in the remotely sensed MODIS NPP data. These differences likely explain the greater estimate of modeled EEMT relative to the empirical measures. There was significant positive correlation between catchment aridity and the fraction of EEMT partitioned into E BIO ( F BIO ), with an increase in F BIO as a fraction of the total as aridity increases and percentage of catchment woody plant cover decreases. In summary, the data indicated strong correspondence between model and empirical measures of EEMT with limited bias that agree well with other empirical measures of catchment energy and water partitioning and plant cover.

Description: Antecedent flow conditions and nitrate concentrations in the Mississippi River Basin Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 11451-11484, 2013 Author(s): J. C. Murphy, R. M. Hirsch, and L. A. Sprague The influence of antecedent flow conditions on nitrate concentrations was explored at eight sites in the Mississippi River Basin, USA. Antecedent moisture conditions have been shown to influence nutrient export from small, relatively homogenous basins, but this influence has not been observed at a regional or continental scale. Antecedent flow conditions were quantified as the ratio between the mean daily flow of the previous year and the mean daily flow from the period of record ( Q ratio), and the Q ratio was statistically related to nitrate anomalies (the unexplained variability in nitrate concentration after filtering out season, long-term trend, and contemporaneous flow effects) at each site. Nitrate anomaly and Q ratio were negatively related at three of the four major tributary sites and upstream in the Mississippi River, indicating that when the previous year was drier than average, at these sites, nitrate concentrations were higher than expected. The strength of these relationships increased when data were subdivided by contemporaneous flow conditions. Five of the eight sites had significant negative relationships ( p ≤ 0.05) at high or moderately high contemporaneous flows, suggesting nitrate that accumulates in these basins during a drought is flushed during subsequent storm events. At half of the sites, when flow during the previous year was 50% drier than average, nitrate concentration can be from 9 and 27% higher than nitrate concentrations that follow a year with average daily flow. Conversely, nitrate concentration can be from 8 and 21% lower than expected when the previous year was 50% wetter than average. These relationships between nitrate concentration and Q ratio serve as the basis for future studies that can better define specific hydrologic processes occurring during and after a drought, which influence nitrate concentration, such as the duration or magnitude of low flows, and the timing of low and high flows.

Description: Contribution of snow and glacier melt to discharge for highly glacierised catchments in Norway Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 11485-11517, 2013 Author(s): M. Engelhardt, T. V. Schuler, and L. M. Andreassen Glacierised catchments significantly alter the streamflow regime due to snow and glacier meltwater contribution to discharge. In this study, we modelled the mass balance and discharge rates for three highly glacierised catchments (〉50% glacier cover) in western Norway over the period 1961–2012. The spatial pattern of the catchments follows a gradient in climate continentality from west to east. The model uses gridded temperature and precipitation values from seNorge ( http://senorge.no ) as input which are available at a daily resolution. It accounts for accumulation of snow, transformation of snow to firn and ice, evaporation and melt. The model was calibrated for each catchment based on measurements of seasonal glacier mass-balances and daily discharge rates. For validation, daily melt rates were compared with measurements from sonic rangers located in the ablation zones of two of the glaciers and an uncertainty analysis was performed for the third catchment. The discharge contributions from snowmelt, glacier melt and rain were analysed with respect to spatial variations and temporal evolution. The model simulations reveal an increase of the relative contribution from glacier melt for the three catchments from less than 10% in the early 1990s to 15–30% in the late 2000s. The decline in precipitation by 10–20% in the same period was therefore overcompensated resulting in an increase of the annual discharge by 5–20%. Annual discharge sums and annual glacier melt are strongest correlated with annual and winter precipitation at the most maritime glacier and, with increased climate continentality, variations in both glacier melt contribution and annual discharge are becoming stronger correlated with variations in summer temperatures.

Description: Contribution of directly connected and isolated impervious areas to urban drainage network hydrographs Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 3473-3483, 2013 Author(s): Y. Seo, N.-J. Choi, and A. R. Schmidt This paper addresses the mass balance error observed in runoff hydrographs in urban watersheds by introducing assumptions regarding the contribution of infiltrated rainfall from pervious areas and isolated impervious area (IIA) to the runoff hydrograph. Rainfall infiltrating into pervious areas has been assumed not to contribute to the runoff hydrograph until Hortonian excess rainfall occurs. However, mass balance analysis in an urban watershed indicates that rainfall infiltrated to pervious areas can contribute directly to the runoff hydrograph, thereby offering an explanation for the long hydrograph tail commonly observed in runoff from urban storm sewers. In this study, a hydrologic analysis based on the width function is introduced, with two types of width functions obtained from both pervious and impervious areas, respectively. The width function can be regarded as the direct interpretation of the network response. These two width functions are derived to obtain distinct response functions for directly connected impervious areas (DCIA), IIA, and pervious areas. The results show significant improvement in the estimation of runoff hydrographs and suggest the need to consider the flow contribution from pervious areas to the runoff hydrograph. It also implies that additional contribution from flow paths through joints and cracks in sewer pipes needs to be taken into account to improve the estimation of runoff hydrographs in urban catchments.

Description: Bias correction can modify climate model-simulated precipitation changes without adverse affect on the ensemble mean Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 11585-11611, 2013 Author(s): E. P. Maurer and D. W. Pierce When applied to remove climate model biases in precipitation, quantile mapping can in some settings modify the simulated trends. This has important implications when the precipitation will be used to drive an impacts model that is sensitive to changes in precipitation. We use daily precipitation output from 12 general circulation models (GCMs) over the conterminous United States interpolated to a common 1° grid, and gridded observations aggregated to the same scale, to compare precipitation differences before and after quantile mapping bias correction. The change in seasonal mean (winter, DJF, and summer, JJA) precipitation between different 30-yr historical periods is compared to examine (1) the consensus among GCMs as to whether the bias correction tends to amplify or diminish their simulated precipitation trends, and (2) whether the modification of the change in precipitation tends to improve or degrade the correspondence to observed changes in precipitation for the same periods. In some cases, for a particular GCM, the trend modification can be as large as the original simulated change, though the areas where this occurs varies among GCMs so the ensemble median shows smaller trend modification. In specific locations and seasons the trend modification by quantile mapping improves correspondence with observed trends, and in others it degrades it. In the majority of the domain the ensemble median is for little effect on the correspondence of simulated precipitation trends with observed. This highlights the need to use an ensemble of GCMs rather than relying on a small number of models to estimate impacts.

Description: The effect of training image and secondary data integration with multiple-point geostatistics in groundwater modeling Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 11829-11860, 2013 Author(s): X. He, T. O. Sonnenborg, F. Jørgensen, and K. H. Jensen Multiple-point geostatistic simulation (MPS) has recently become popular in stochastic hydrogeology, primarily because of its capability to derive multivariate distributions from the training image (TI). However, its application in three dimensional simulations has been constrained by the difficulty of constructing 3-D TI. The object-based TiGenerator may be a useful tool in this regard; yet the sensitivity of model predictions to the training image has not been documented. Another issue in MPS is the integration of multiple geophysical data. The best way to retrieve and incorporate information from high resolution geophysical data is still under discussion. This work shows that TI from TiGenerator delivers acceptable results when used for groundwater modeling, although the TI directly converted from high resolution geophysical data leads to better simulation. The model results also indicate that soft conditioning in MPS is a convenient and efficient way of integrating secondary data such as 3-D airborne electromagnetic data, but over conditioning has to be avoided.

Description: Multi-decadal river flows variations in France Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 11861-11900, 2013 Author(s): J. Boé and F. Habets In this article, multi-decadal variations in French hydroclimate are investigated, with a specific focus on river flows. Based on long observed series, it is shown that river flows in France generally exhibit large multi-decadal variations on the historical period, especially in spring. Differences of means between two 21 yr periods of the 20th century as large as 40% are indeed found for many gauging stations. Multi-decadal spring river flows variations are associated with variations in spring precipitation and temperature. These multi-decadal variations in precipitation are themselves found to be driven by large-scale atmospheric circulation, more precisely by a multi-decadal oscillation in a sea level pressure dipole between western Europe and the East Atlantic. It is suggested that the Atlantic Multidecadal Variability, the main mode of decadal variability in the North Atlantic/Europe sector, controls those variations in large-scale circulation and is therefore the main ultimate driver of multi-decadal variations in spring river flows. Multi-decadal variations in river flows in other seasons, and in particular summer, are also noted. As they are not associated with significant surface climate anomalies (i.e. temperature, precipitation) in summer, other mechanisms are investigated based on hydrological simulations. The impact of climate variations in spring on summer soil moisture, and the impact of soil moisture in summer on the runoff to precipitation ratio, could potentially play a role in multi-decadal summer river flows variations. The large amplitude of the multi-decadal variations in French river flows suggests that internal variability may play a very important role in the evolution of river flows during the next decades, potentially temporarily limiting, reversing or seriously aggravating the long-term impacts of anthropogenic climate change.

Description: An original interpretation of the wet edge of the surface temperature–albedo space to estimate crop evapotranspiration (SEB-1S), and its validation over an irrigated area in northwestern Mexico Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 3623-3637, 2013 Author(s): O. Merlin The space defined by the pair surface temperature ( T ) and surface albedo (α), and the space defined by the pair T and fractional green vegetation cover ( f vg ) have been extensively used to estimate evaporative fraction (EF) from solar/thermal remote sensing data. In both space-based approaches, evapotranspiration (ET) is estimated as remotely sensed EF times the available energy. For a given data point in the T -α space or in the T - f vg space, EF is derived as the ratio of the distance separating the point from the line identified as the dry edge to the distance separating the dry edge and the line identified as the wet edge. The dry and wet edges are classically defined as the upper and lower limit of the spaces, respectively. When investigating side by side the T -α and the T - f vg spaces, one observes that the range covered by T values on the (classically determined) wet edge is different for both spaces. In addition, when extending the wet and dry lines of the T -α space, both lines cross at α ≈ 0.4 although the wet and dry edges of the T - f vg space never cross for 0 ≤ f vg 〈 1. In this paper, a new ET (EF) model (SEB-1S) is derived by revisiting the classical physical interpretation of the T -α space to make its wet edge consistent with that of the T - f vg space. SEB-1S is tested over a 16 km by 10 km irrigated area in northwestern Mexico during the 2007–2008 agricultural season. The classical T -α space-based model is implemented as benchmark to evaluate the performance of SEB-1S. Input data are composed of ASTER (Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection radiometer) thermal infrared, Formosat-2 shortwave, and station-based meteorological data. The fluxes simulated by SEB-1S and the classical T -α space-based model are compared on seven ASTER overpass dates with the in situ measurements collected at six locations within the study domain. The ET simulated by SEB-1S is significantly more accurate and robust than that predicted by the classical T -α space-based model. The correlation coefficient and slope of the linear regression between simulated and observed ET is improved from 0.82 to 0.93, and from 0.63 to 0.90, respectively. Moreover, constraining the wet edge using air temperature data improves the slope of the linear regression between simulated and observed ET.

Description: Teleconnection analysis of runoff and soil moisture over the Pearl River basin in South China Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 11943-11982, 2013 Author(s): J. Niu, J. Chen, and B. Sivakumar This study explores the teleconnection of two climatic patterns, namely the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and the Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD), with hydrological processes over the Pearl River basin in South China. The Variable Infiltration Capacity (VIC) model is used to simulate the daily hydrological processes over the basin for the study period 1952–2000, and then, using the simulation results, the time series of the monthly runoff and soil moisture anomalies for its ten sub-basins are aggregated. Wavelet analysis is performed to explore the variability properties of these time series at 49 timescales ranging from 2 months to 9 yr. Use of wavelet coherence and rank correlation method reveals that the dominant variabilities of the time series of runoff and soil moisture are basically correlated with IOD. The influences of ENSO on the terrestrial hydrological processes are mainly found in the eastern sub-basins. The teleconnections between climatic patterns and hydrological variability also serve as a reference basis for inferences on the occurrence of extreme hydrological events (e.g. floods and droughts).

Description: On an improved sub-regional water resources management representation for integration into earth system models Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 3605-3622, 2013 Author(s): N. Voisin, H. Li, D. Ward, M. Huang, M. Wigmosta, and L. R. Leung Human influence on the hydrologic cycle includes regulation and storage, consumptive use and overall redistribution of water resources in space and time. Representing these processes is essential for applications of earth system models in hydrologic and climate predictions, as well as impact studies at regional to global scales. Emerging large-scale research reservoir models use generic operating rules that are flexible for coupling with earth system models. Those generic operating rules have been successful in reproducing the overall regulated flow at large basin scales. This study investigates the uncertainties of the reservoir models from different implementations of the generic operating rules using the complex multi-objective Columbia River Regulation System in northwestern United States as an example to understand their effects on not only regulated flow but also reservoir storage and fraction of the demand that is met. Numerical experiments are designed to test new generic operating rules that combine storage and releases targets for multi-purpose reservoirs and to compare the use of reservoir usage priorities and predictors (withdrawals vs. consumptive demands, as well as natural vs. regulated mean flow) for configuring operating rules. Overall the best performing implementation is with combined priorities rules (flood control storage targets and irrigation release targets) set up with mean annual natural flow and mean monthly withdrawals. The options of not accounting for groundwater withdrawals, or on the contrary, of assuming that all remaining demand is met through groundwater extractions, are discussed.

Description: On selection of the optimal data time interval for real-time hydrological forecasting Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 3639-3659, 2013 Author(s): J. Liu and D. Han With the advancement in modern telemetry and communication technologies, hydrological data can be collected with an increasingly higher sampling rate. An important issue deserving attention from the hydrological community is which suitable time interval of the model input data should be chosen in hydrological forecasting. Such a problem has long been recognised in the control engineering community but is a largely ignored topic in operational applications of hydrological forecasting. In this study, the intrinsic properties of rainfall–runoff data with different time intervals are first investigated from the perspectives of the sampling theorem and the information loss using the discrete wavelet transform tool. It is found that rainfall signals with very high sampling rates may not always improve the accuracy of rainfall–runoff modelling due to the catchment low-pass-filtering effect. To further investigate the impact of a data time interval in real-time forecasting, a real-time forecasting system is constructed by incorporating the probability distributed model (PDM) with a real-time updating scheme, the autoregressive moving-average (ARMA) model. Case studies are then carried out on four UK catchments with different concentration times for real-time flow forecasting using data with different time intervals of 15, 30, 45, 60, 90 and 120 min. A positive relation is found between the forecast lead time and the optimal choice of the data time interval, which is also highly dependent on the catchment concentration time. Finally, based on the conclusions from the case studies, a hypothetical pattern is proposed in three-dimensional coordinates to describe the general impact of the data time interval and to provide implications of the selection of the optimal time interval in real-time hydrological forecasting. Although nowadays most operational hydrological systems still have low data sampling rates (daily or hourly), the future is that higher sampling rates will become more widespread, and there is an urgent need for hydrologists both in academia and in the field to realise the significance of the data time interval issue. It is important that more case studies in different catchments with various hydrological forecasting systems are explored in the future to further verify and improve the proposed hypothetical pattern.

Description: Benchmark products for land evapotranspiration: LandFlux-EVAL multi-data set synthesis Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 3707-3720, 2013 Author(s): B. Mueller, M. Hirschi, C. Jimenez, P. Ciais, P. A. Dirmeyer, A. J. Dolman, J. B. Fisher, M. Jung, F. Ludwig, F. Maignan, D. G. Miralles, M. F. McCabe, M. Reichstein, J. Sheffield, K. Wang, E. F. Wood, Y. Zhang, and S. I. Seneviratne Land evapotranspiration (ET) estimates are available from several global data sets. Here, monthly global land ET synthesis products, merged from these individual data sets over the time periods 1989–1995 (7 yr) and 1989–2005 (17 yr), are presented. The merged synthesis products over the shorter period are based on a total of 40 distinct data sets while those over the longer period are based on a total of 14 data sets. In the individual data sets, ET is derived from satellite and/or in situ observations (diagnostic data sets) or calculated via land-surface models (LSMs) driven with observations-based forcing or output from atmospheric reanalyses. Statistics for four merged synthesis products are provided, one including all data sets and three including only data sets from one category each (diagnostic, LSMs, and reanalyses). The multi-annual variations of ET in the merged synthesis products display realistic responses. They are also consistent with previous findings of a global increase in ET between 1989 and 1997 (0.13 mm yr −2 in our merged product) followed by a significant decrease in this trend (−0.18 mm yr −2 ), although these trends are relatively small compared to the uncertainty of absolute ET values. The global mean ET from the merged synthesis products (based on all data sets) is 493 mm yr −1 (1.35 mm d −1 ) for both the 1989–1995 and 1989–2005 products, which is relatively low compared to previously published estimates. We estimate global runoff (precipitation minus ET) to 263 mm yr −1 (34 406 km 3 yr −1 ) for a total land area of 130 922 000 km 2 . Precipitation, being an important driving factor and input to most simulated ET data sets, presents uncertainties between single data sets as large as those in the ET estimates. In order to reduce uncertainties in current ET products, improving the accuracy of the input variables, especially precipitation, as well as the parameterizations of ET, are crucial.

Description: Spatial patterns in timing of the diurnal temperature cycle Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 3695-3706, 2013 Author(s): T. R. H. Holmes, W. T. Crow, and C. Hain This paper investigates the structural difference in timing of the diurnal temperature cycle (DTC) over land resulting from choice of measuring device or model framework. It is shown that the timing can be reliably estimated from temporally sparse observations acquired from a constellation of low Earth-orbiting satellites given record lengths of at least three months. Based on a year of data, the spatial patterns of mean DTC timing are compared between temperature estimates from microwave Ka-band, geostationary thermal infrared (TIR), and numerical weather prediction model output from the Global Modeling and Assimilation Office (GMAO). It is found that the spatial patterns can be explained by vegetation effects, sensing depth differences and more speculatively the orientation of orographic relief features. In absolute terms, the GMAO model puts the peak of the DTC on average at 12:50 local solar time, 23 min before TIR with a peak temperature at 13:13 (both averaged over Africa and Europe). Since TIR is the shallowest observation of the land surface, this small difference represents a structural error that possibly affects the model's ability to assimilate observations that are closely tied to the DTC. The equivalent average timing for Ka-band is 13:44, which is influenced by the effect of increased sensing depth in desert areas. For non-desert areas, the Ka-band observations lag the TIR observations by only 15 min, which is in agreement with their respective theoretical sensing depth. The results of this comparison provide insights into the structural differences between temperature measurements and models, and can be used as a first step to account for these differences in a coherent way.

Description: Integrated hydrological modeling of the North China Plain and implications for sustainable water management Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 3759-3778, 2013 Author(s): H. Qin, G. Cao, M. Kristensen, J. C. Refsgaard, M. O. Rasmussen, X. He, J. Liu, Y. Shu, and C. Zheng Groundwater overdraft has caused fast water level decline in the North China Plain (NCP) since the 1980s. Although many hydrological models have been developed for the NCP in the past few decades, most of them deal only with the groundwater component or only at local scales. In the present study, a coupled surface water–groundwater model using the MIKE SHE code has been developed for the entire alluvial plain of the NCP. All the major processes in the land phase of the hydrological cycle are considered in the integrated modeling approach. The most important parameters of the model are first identified by a sensitivity analysis process and then calibrated for the period 2000–2005. The calibrated model is validated for the period 2006–2008 against daily observations of groundwater heads. The simulation results compare well with the observations where acceptable values of root mean square error (RMSE) (most values lie below 4 m) and correlation coefficient ( R ) (0.36–0.97) are obtained. The simulated evapotranspiration (ET) is then compared with the remote sensing (RS)-based ET data to further validate the model simulation. The comparison result with a R 2 value of 0.93 between the monthly averaged values of simulated actual evapotranspiration (AET) and RS AET for the entire NCP shows a good performance of the model. The water balance results indicate that more than 70% of water leaving the flow system is attributed to the ET component, of which about 0.25% is taken from the saturated zone (SZ); about 29% comes from pumping, including irrigation pumping and non-irrigation pumping (net pumping). Sustainable water management analysis of the NCP is conducted using the simulation results obtained from the integrated model. An effective approach to improve water use efficiency in the NCP is by reducing the actual ET, e.g. by introducing water-saving technologies and changes in cropping.

Description: Simulation of a persistent medium-term precipitation event over the western Iberian Peninsula Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 3741-3758, 2013 Author(s): S. C. Pereira, A. C. Carvalho, J. Ferreira, J. P. Nunes, J. J. Keizer, and A. Rocha This study evaluated the performance of the WRF-ARW (Weather Research and Forecasting with Advanced Research) weather prediction model in simulating the spatial and temporal patterns of an extreme rainfall period over a complex orographic region in north-central Portugal. The analysis was performed during the rainy season and, more specifically, the month of December 2009. In this period, the region of interest was under the influence of a sequential passage of low-pressure systems associated with frontal surfaces. These synoptic weather patterns were responsible for long periods of rainfall, resulting in a high monthly precipitation. The WRF model results during the study period were furthermore evaluated with the specific objective to complement gaps in the precipitation recordings of a reference meteorological station (located in Pousadas), the data of which are fundamental for hydrological studies in nearby experimental catchments. Three distinct WRF model runs were forced with initial fields and boundary conditions obtained from a global domain model: (1) a reference experiment with no nudging (RunRef); (2) observational nudging for a specific location, i.e. the above-mentioned Pousadas reference station (RunObsN); and (3) nudging to the analysed field (RunGridN). Model performance was evaluated, using several statistical parameters, against a dataset of 27 rainfall stations that were grouped by elevation. The three model runs had similar performances, even though RunGridN resulted in a slight improvement. Regarding the other two experiments, this improvement justifies its use for complementing the surface measurements at the Pousadas reference station. Overall model accuracy, expressed in root mean square error (RMSE), of the three runs was comparable for the stations of the different elevations classes. Even so, it was slightly better for stations in the lowlands than the highlands. Furthermore, model predictions tended to be less accurate for stations located in rough terrain and deep valleys.

Description: Investigating the spatio-temporal variability in groundwater and surface water interactions: a multi-technique approach Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 3437-3453, 2013 Author(s): N. P. Unland, I. Cartwright, M. S. Andersen, G. C. Rau, J. Reed, B. S. Gilfedder, A. P. Atkinson, and H. Hofmann The interaction between groundwater and surface water along the Tambo and Nicholson rivers, southeast Australia, was investigated using 222 Rn, Cl, differential flow gauging, head gradients, electrical conductivity (EC) and temperature profiles. Head gradients, temperature profiles, Cl concentrations and 222 Rn activities all indicate higher groundwater fluxes to the Tambo River in areas of increased topographic variation where the potential to form large groundwater–surface water gradients is greater. Groundwater discharge to the Tambo River calculated by Cl mass balance was significantly lower (1.48 × 10 4 to 1.41 × 10 3 m 3 day −1 ) than discharge estimated by 222 Rn mass balance (5.35 × 10 5 to 9.56 × 10 3 m 3 day −1 ) and differential flow gauging (5.41 × 10 5 to 6.30 × 10 3 m 3 day −1 ) due to bank return waters. While groundwater sampling from the bank of the Tambo River was intended to account for changes in groundwater chemistry associated with bank infiltration, variations in bank infiltration between sample sites remain unaccounted for, limiting the use of Cl as an effective tracer. Groundwater discharge to both the Tambo and Nicholson rivers was the highest under high-flow conditions in the days to weeks following significant rainfall, indicating that the rivers are well connected to a groundwater system that is responsive to rainfall. Groundwater constituted the lowest proportion of river discharge during times of increased rainfall that followed dry periods, while groundwater constituted the highest proportion of river discharge under baseflow conditions (21.4% of the Tambo in April 2010 and 18.9% of the Nicholson in September 2010).

Description: Hydrological functions of sinkholes and characteristics of point recharge in groundwater basins Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 11423-11449, 2013 Author(s): N. Somaratne, K. Smettem, J. Lawson, K. Nguyen, and J. Frizenschaf Karstic limestone aquifers are hydrologically and hydrochemically extremely heterogeneous and point source recharge via sinkholes and fissures is a common feature. We studied three groundwater systems in karstic settings dominated by point source recharge in order to assess the relative contributions to total recharge from point sources using chloride and δ 18 O relations. Preferential groundwater flows were observed through an inter-connected network of highly conductive zones with groundwater mixing along flow paths. Measurements of salinity and chloride indicated that fresh water pockets exist at point recharge locations. A measurable fresh water plume develops only when a large quantity of surface water enters the aquifer as a point recharge source. The difference in chloride concentrations in diffuse and point recharge zones decreases as aquifer saturated thickness increases and the plumes become diluted through mixing. The chloride concentration in point recharge fluxes crossing the watertable plane can remain at or near surface runoff chloride concentrations, rather than in equilibrium with groundwater chloride. In such circumstances the conventional chloride mass balance method that assumes equilibrium of recharge water chloride with groundwater requires modification to include both point and diffuse recharge mechanisms.

Description: Resolving structural errors in a spatially distributed hydrologic model using ensemble Kalman filter state updates Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 3455-3472, 2013 Author(s): J. H. Spaaks and W. Bouten In hydrological modeling, model structures are developed in an iterative cycle as more and different types of measurements become available and our understanding of the hillslope or watershed improves. However, with increasing complexity of the model, it becomes more and more difficult to detect which parts of the model are deficient, or which processes should also be incorporated into the model during the next development step. In this study, we first compare two methods (the Shuffled Complex Evolution Metropolis algorithm (SCEM-UA) and the Simultaneous parameter Optimization and Data Assimilation algorithm (SODA)) to calibrate a purposely deficient 3-D hillslope-scale model to error-free, artificially generated measurements. We use a multi-objective approach based on distributed pressure head at the soil–bedrock interface and hillslope-scale discharge and water balance. For these idealized circumstances, SODA's usefulness as a diagnostic methodology is demonstrated by its ability to identify the timing and location of processes that are missing in the model. We show that SODA's state updates provide information that could readily be incorporated into an improved model structure, and that this type of information cannot be gained from parameter estimation methods such as SCEM-UA. We then expand on the SODA result by performing yet another calibration, in which we investigate whether SODA's state updating patterns are still capable of providing insight into model structure deficiencies when there are fewer measurements, which are moreover subject to measurement noise. We conclude that SODA can help guide the discussion between experimentalists and modelers by providing accurate and detailed information on how to improve spatially distributed hydrologic models.

Description: Climate information based streamflow and rainfall forecasts for Huai River Basin using Hierarchical Bayesian Modeling Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 11559-11584, 2013 Author(s): X. Chen, Z. Hao, N. Devineni, and U. Lall A Hierarchal Bayesian model for forecasting regional summer rainfall and streamflow season-ahead using exogenous climate variables for East Central China is presented. The model provides estimates of the posterior forecasted probability distribution for 12 rainfall and 2 streamflow stations considering parameter uncertainty, and cross-site correlation. The model has a multilevel structure with regression coefficients modeled from a common multivariate normal distribution results in partial-pooling of information across multiple stations and better representation of parameter and posterior distribution uncertainty. Covariance structure of the residuals across stations is explicitly modeled. Model performance is tested under leave-10-out cross-validation. Frequentist and Bayesian performance metrics used include Receiver Operating Characteristic, Reduction of Error, Coefficient of Efficiency, Rank Probability Skill Scores, and coverage by posterior credible intervals. The ability of the model to reliably forecast regional summer rainfall and streamflow season-ahead offers potential for developing adaptive water risk management strategies.

Description: Spatial and seasonal variations in evapotranspiration over Canada's landmass Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 3561-3575, 2013 Author(s): S. Wang, Y. Yang, Y. Luo, and A. Rivera A 30 yr (1979–2008) dataset of actual evapotranspiration (ET) at 1 km resolution was generated over Canada's landmass by integrating remote sensing land surface data and gridded climate data using the EALCO model run at a 30 min time step. This long-term high-resolution dataset was used to characterize the spatiotemporal variations in ET across Canada. The results show that annual ET varied from 600 mm yr −1 over several regions in the south to less than 100 mm yr −1 in the northern Arctic. Nationally, ET in summer (i.e., June to August) comprised 65% of the annual total amount. ET in the cold season remained mostly below 10 mm month −1 over the country. Negative monthly ET was obtained over the Arctic region in winter, indicating EALCO simulated a larger amount of condensation than ET. Overall, the mean ET over the entire Canadian landmass for the 30 yr was 239 mm yr −1 , or 44% of its corresponding precipitation. Comparisons of available ET studies in Canada revealed large uncertainties in ET estimates associated with using different approaches. The scarcity of ET measurements for the diverse ecosystems in Canada remains a significant challenge for reducing the uncertainties; this gap needs to be addressed in future studies to improve capabilities in climate/weather modeling and water resource management.

Description: A spatial bootstrap technique for parameter estimation of rainfall annual maxima distribution Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 11755-11794, 2013 Author(s): F. Uboldi, A. N. Sulis, C. Lussana, M. Cislaghi, and M. Russo Estimation of extreme event distributions and depth-duration-frequency (DDF) curves is achieved at any target site by repeated sampling among all available raingauge data in the surrounding area. The estimate is computed over a gridded domain in Northern Italy, using precipitation time series from 1929 to 2011, including data from historical analog stations and from the present-day automatic observational network. The presented local regionalisation naturally overcomes traditional station-point methods, with their demand of long historical series and their sensitivity to very rare events occurring at very few stations, possibly causing unrealistic spatial gradients in DDF relations. At the same time, the presented approach allows for spatial dependence, necessary in a geographical domain such as Lombardy, complex for both its topography and its climatology. The bootstrap technique enables evaluating uncertainty maps for all estimated parameters and for rainfall depths at assigned return periods.

Description: Overview of the first HyMeX Special Observation Period over Italy: observations and model results Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 11643-11710, 2013 Author(s): R. Ferretti, E. Pichelli, S. Gentile, I. Maiello, D. Cimini, S. Davolio, M. M. Miglietta, G. Panegrossi, L. Baldini, F. Pasi, F. S. Marzano, A. Zinzi, S. Mariani, M. Casaioli, G. Bartolini, N. Loglisci, A. Montani, C. Marsigli, A. Manzato, A. Pucillo, M. E. Ferrario, V. Colaiuda, and R. Rotunno During the first Hymex campaign (5 September–6 November 2012) referred to as Special Observation Period (SOP-1), dedicated to heavy precipitation events and flash floods in Western Mediterranean, three Italian hydro-meteorological monitoring sites were activated: Liguria-Tuscany, North-Eastern Italy and Central Italy. The extraordinary deployment of advanced instrumentation, including instrumented aircrafts, and the use of several different operational weather forecast models has allowed an unprecedented monitoring and analysis of high impact weather events around the Italian hydro-meteorological sites. This activity has seen the strict collaboration between the Italian scientific and operational communities. In this paper, an overview of the Italian organization during the SOP-1 is provided, and selected Intensive Observation Periods (IOPs) are described. A significant event for each Italian target area is chosen for this analysis: IOP2 (12–13 September 2012) in North-Eastern Italy, IOP13 (15–16 October 2012) in Central Italy and IOP19 (3–5 November 2012) in Liguria and Tuscany. For each IOP the meteorological characteristics, together with special observations and weather forecasts, are analyzed with the aim of highlighting strengths and weaknesses of the forecast modeling systems. Moreover, using one of the three events, the usefulness of different operational chains is highlighted.

Description: Correcting basin-scale snowfall in a mountainous basin using a distributed snowmelt model and remote sensing data Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 11711-11753, 2013 Author(s): M. Shrestha, L. Wang, T. Koike, H. Tsutsui, Y. Xue, and Y. Hirabayashi Adequate estimation of the spatial distribution of snowfall is critical in hydrologic modeling. However, this is a well-known problem in estimating basin-scale snowfall, especially in mountainous basins with data scarcity. This study focuses on correction and estimation of this spatial distribution, which considers topographic effects within the basin. A method is proposed that optimizes an altitude-based snowfall correction factor ( C fsnow ). This is done through multi-objective calibration of a spatially distributed, multilayer energy and water balance-based snowmelt model (WEB-DHM-S) with observed discharge and remotely sensed snow cover data from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS). The Shuffled Complex Evolution – University of Arizona automatic search algorithm is used to obtain the optimal value of C fsnow for minimum cumulative error in discharge and snow cover simulations. Discharge error is quantified by Nash–Sutcliffe efficiency and relative volume deviation, and snow cover error was estimated by pixel-by-pixel analysis. The study region is the heavily snow-fed Yagisawa Basin of the Upper Tone River in northeast Japan. First, the system was applied to one snow season (2002–2003), obtaining an optimized C fsnow of 0.0007 m −1 . For validation purposes, the optimized C fsnow was implemented to correct snowfall in 2004, 2002 and 2001. Overall, the system was effective, implying improvements in correlation of simulated vs. observed discharge and snow cover. The 4 yr mean of basin-average snowfall for the corrected spatial snowfall distribution was 1160 mm (780 mm before correction). Execution of sensitivity runs against other model input and parameters indicated that C fsnow could be affected by uncertainty in shortwave radiation and setting of the threshold air temperature parameter. Our approach is suitable to correct snowfall and estimate its distribution in poorly-gauged basins, where elevation dependence of snowfall amount is strong.

Description: Attribution of hydrologic forecast uncertainty within scalable forecast windows Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 11795-11828, 2013 Author(s): L. Yang, F. Tian, Y. Sun, X. Yuan, and H. Hu Hindcasts based on the Extended Streamflow Prediction (ESP) approach are carried out in a typical rainfall-dominated basin in China, aiming to examine the roles of initial condition (IC), future atmospheric forcing (FC) and hydrologic model uncertainty (MU) in the streamflow forecast skill. The combined effects of IC and FC are explored within the framework of a forecast window. By implementing virtual numerical simulations without the consideration of MU, it is found that the dominance of IC could last up to 90 days in dry season, while its impact gives way to FC for lead times exceeding 30 days in the wet season. The combined effects of IC and FC on the forecast skill are further investigated by proposing a dimensionless parameter ( β ) that represents the ratio of the total amount of initial water storage and the incoming rainfall. The forecast skill increases exponentially with β , and varies greatly in different forecast windows. Moreover, the influence of MU on forecast skill is examined by focusing on the uncertainty of model parameters. Two different hydrologic model calibration strategies are carried out. The results indicate that the uncertainty of model parameters exhibits a more significant influence on the forecast skill in the dry season than in the wet season. The ESP approach is more skillful in monthly streamflow forecast during the transition period from wet to dry than otherwise. For the transition period from dry to wet, the low skill of the forecasts could be attributed to the combined effects of IC and FC, but less to the biases in the hydrologic model parameters. For the forecasting in dry season, the usefulness of the ESP approach is heavily dependent on the strategy of the model calibration.

Description: Post-processing rainfall forecasts from numerical weather prediction models for short-term streamflow forecasting Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 3587-3603, 2013 Author(s): D. E. Robertson, D. L. Shrestha, and Q. J. Wang Sub-daily ensemble rainfall forecasts that are bias free and reliably quantify forecast uncertainty are critical for flood and short-term ensemble streamflow forecasting. Post-processing of rainfall predictions from numerical weather prediction models is typically required to provide rainfall forecasts with these properties. In this paper, a new approach to generate ensemble rainfall forecasts by post-processing raw numerical weather prediction (NWP) rainfall predictions is introduced. The approach uses a simplified version of the Bayesian joint probability modelling approach to produce forecast probability distributions for individual locations and forecast lead times. Ensemble forecasts with appropriate spatial and temporal correlations are then generated by linking samples from the forecast probability distributions using the Schaake shuffle. The new approach is evaluated by applying it to post-process predictions from the ACCESS-R numerical weather prediction model at rain gauge locations in the Ovens catchment in southern Australia. The joint distribution of NWP predicted and observed rainfall is shown to be well described by the assumed log-sinh transformed bivariate normal distribution. Ensemble forecasts produced using the approach are shown to be more skilful than the raw NWP predictions both for individual forecast lead times and for cumulative totals throughout all forecast lead times. Skill increases result from the correction of not only the mean bias, but also biases conditional on the magnitude of the NWP rainfall prediction. The post-processed forecast ensembles are demonstrated to successfully discriminate between events and non-events for both small and large rainfall occurrences, and reliably quantify the forecast uncertainty. Future work will assess the efficacy of the post-processing method for a wider range of climatic conditions and also investigate the benefits of using post-processed rainfall forecasts for flood and short-term streamflow forecasting.

Description: A conceptual model of check dam hydraulics for gully control Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 11901-11941, 2013 Author(s): C. Castillo, R. Pérez, and J. A. Gómez There is little information in scientific literature regarding the modifications induced by check dam systems in flow regimes in restored gully reaches, despite it being a crucial issue for the design of conservation measures. Here, we develop a conceptual model to classify flow regimes in straight rectangular channels for initial and dam-filling conditions as well as a method of estimating efficiency in order to provide guidelines for optimal design. The model integrates several previous mathematical approaches for assessing the main processes involved (hydraulic jump HJ, impact flow, gradually varied flows). Its performance was compared with the simulations obtained from IBER, a bi-dimensional hydrodynamic model. The impact of check dam spacing (defined by the geometric factor of influence c ) on efficiency was explored. Eleven main classifications of flow regimes were identified depending on the element and level of influence. The model produced similar results when compared with IBER, but led to higher estimations of HJ and impact lengths. Total influence guaranteed maximum efficiency and HJ control defining the location of the optimal c . Geometric total influence ( c = 1) was a valid criterion for the different stages of the structures in a wide range of situations provided that hydraulic roughness conditions remained high within the gully, e.g. through revegetation. Our total influence criterion involved shorter spacing than that habitually recommended in technical manuals for restoration, but was in line with those values found in spontaneous and stable step-pools systems, which might serve as a reference for man-made interventions.

Description: Comparison of climate change signals in CMIP3 and CMIP5 multi-model ensembles and implications for Central Asian glaciers Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 3661-3677, 2013 Author(s): A. F. Lutz, W. W. Immerzeel, A. Gobiet, F. Pellicciotti, and M. F. P. Bierkens Central Asian water resources largely depend on melt water generated in the Pamir and Tien Shan mountain ranges. To estimate future water availability in this region, it is necessary to use climate projections to estimate the future glacier extent and volume. In this study, we evaluate the impact of uncertainty in climate change projections on the future glacier extent in the Amu and Syr Darya river basins. To this end we use the latest climate change projections generated for the upcoming IPCC report (CMIP5) and, for comparison, projections used in the fourth IPCC assessment (CMIP3). With these projections we force a regionalized glacier mass balance model, and estimate changes in the basins' glacier extent as a function of the glacier size distribution in the basins and projected temperature and precipitation. This glacier mass balance model is specifically developed for implementation in large scale hydrological models, where the spatial resolution does not allow for simulating individual glaciers and data scarcity is an issue. Although the CMIP5 ensemble results in greater regional warming than the CMIP3 ensemble and the range in projections for temperature as well as precipitation is wider for the CMIP5 than for the CMIP3, the spread in projections of future glacier extent in Central Asia is similar for both ensembles. This is because differences in temperature rise are small during periods of maximum melt (July–September) while differences in precipitation change are small during the period of maximum accumulation (October–February). However, the model uncertainty due to parameter uncertainty is high, and has roughly the same importance as uncertainty in the climate projections. Uncertainty about the size of the decline in glacier extent remains large, making estimates of future Central Asian glacier evolution and downstream water availability uncertain.

Description: Prediction of dissolved reactive phosphorus losses from small agricultural catchments: calibration and validation of a parsimonious model Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 3679-3693, 2013 Author(s): C. Hahn, V. Prasuhn, C. Stamm, P. Lazzarotto, M. W. H. Evangelou, and R. Schulin Eutrophication of surface waters due to diffuse phosphorus (P) losses continues to be a severe water quality problem worldwide, causing the loss of ecosystem functions of the respective water bodies. Phosphorus in runoff often originates from a small fraction of a catchment only. Targeting mitigation measures to these critical source areas (CSAs) is expected to be most efficient and cost-effective, but requires suitable tools. Here we investigated the capability of the parsimonious Rainfall-Runoff-Phosphorus (RRP) model to identify CSAs in grassland-dominated catchments based on readily available soil and topographic data. After simultaneous calibration on runoff data from four small hilly catchments on the Swiss Plateau, the model was validated on a different catchment in the same region without further calibration. The RRP model adequately simulated the discharge and dissolved reactive P (DRP) export from the validation catchment. Sensitivity analysis showed that the model predictions were robust with respect to the classification of soils into "poorly drained" and "well drained", based on the available soil map. Comparing spatial hydrological model predictions with field data from the validation catchment provided further evidence that the assumptions underlying the model are valid and that the model adequately accounts for the dominant P export processes in the target region. Thus, the parsimonious RRP model is a valuable tool that can be used to determine CSAs. Despite the considerable predictive uncertainty regarding the spatial extent of CSAs, the RRP can provide guidance for the implementation of mitigation measures. The model helps to identify those parts of a catchment where high DRP losses are expected or can be excluded with high confidence. Legacy P was predicted to be the dominant source for DRP losses and thus, in combination with hydrologic active areas, a high risk for water quality.

Description: Senstitivity of water balance components to environmental changes in a mountainous watershed: uncertainty assessment based on models comparison Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 11983-12026, 2013 Author(s): E. Morán-Tejeda, J. Zabalza, K. Rahman, A. Gago-Silva, J. I. López-Moreno, S. Vicente-Serrano, A. Lehmann, C. L. Tague, and M. Beniston This paper evaluates the response of stream flow and other components of the water balance to changes in climate and land-use in a Pyrenean watershed. It further provides a measure of uncertainty in water resources forecasts by comparing the performance of two hydrological models: Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) and Regional Hydro-Ecological Simulation System (RHESSys). Regional Climate Model outputs for the 2021–2050 time-frame, and hypothetical (but plausible) land-use scenarios considering re-vegetation and wildfire processes were used as inputs to the models. Results indicate an overall decrease in river flows when the scenarios are considered, except for the post-fire vegetation scenario, in which stream flows are simulated to increase. However the magnitude of these projections varies between the two models used, as SWAT tends to produce larger hydrological changes under climate change scenarios, and RHESSys shows more sensitivity to changes in land-cover. The final prediction will therefore depend largely on the combination of the land-use and climate scenarios, and on the model utilized.

Description: High-resolution Med-CORDEX regional climate model simulations for hydrological impact studies: a first evaluation of the ALADIN-Climate model in Morocco Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 3721-3739, 2013 Author(s): Y. Tramblay, D. Ruelland, S. Somot, R. Bouaicha, and E. Servat In the framework of the international CORDEX program, new regional climate model (RCM) simulations at high spatial resolutions are becoming available for the Mediterranean region (Med-CORDEX initiative). This study provides the first evaluation for hydrological impact studies of one of these high-resolution simulations in a 1800 km 2 catchment located in North Morocco. Different approaches are compared to analyze the climate change impacts on the hydrology of this catchment using a high-resolution RCM (ALADIN-Climate) from the Med-CORDEX initiative at two different spatial resolutions (50 and 12 km) and for two different Radiative Concentration Pathway scenarios (RCP4.5 and RCP8.5). The main issues addressed in the present study are: (i) what is the impact of increased RCM resolution on present-climate hydrological simulations and on future projections? (ii) Are the bias-correction of the RCM model and the parameters of the hydrological model stationary and transferable to different climatic conditions? (iii) What is the climate and hydrological change signal based on the new Radiative Concentration Pathways scenarios (RCP4.5 and RCP8.5)? Results indicate that high resolution simulations at 12 km better reproduce the seasonal patterns, the seasonal distributions and the extreme events of precipitation. The parameters of the hydrological model, calibrated to reproduce runoff at the monthly time step over the 1984–2010 period, do not show a strong variability between dry and wet calibration periods in a differential split-sample test. However the bias correction of precipitation by quantile-matching does not give satisfactory results in validation using the same differential split-sample testing method. Therefore a quantile-perturbation method that does not rely on any stationarity assumption and produces ensembles of perturbed series of precipitation was introduced. The climate change signal under scenarios 4.5 and 8.5 indicates a decrease of respectively −30 to −57% in surface runoff for the mid-term (2041–2062), when for the same period the projections for precipitation are ranging between −15 and −19% and for temperature between +1.3 and +1.9 °C.

Description: Hydrologic impact of climate change on Murray Hotham catchment of Western Australia: a projection of rainfall-runoff for future water resources planning Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 12027-12076, 2013 Author(s): S. A. Islam, M. A. Bari, and A. H. M. F. Anwar Reduction of rainfall and runoff in recent years across South West Western Australia (SWWA) has drawn attention about climate change impact on water resources and its availability in this region. In this paper, hydrologic impact of climate change on Murray Hotham catchment in SWWA is investigated using multi-model ensemble approach. The Land Use Change Incorporated Catchment (LUCICAT) model was used for hydrologic modelling. Model calibration was performed using (5 km) grid rainfall data from Australian Water Availability Project (AWAP). Downscaled and bias corrected rainfall data from 11 General Circulation Models (GCMs) for Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) emission scenarios A2 and B1 was used in LUCICAT model to derive rainfall and runoff scenarios for 2046–2065 (mid this century) and 2081–2100 (late this century). The results of climate scenarios were compared with observed past (1961–1980) climate. The mean annual rainfall averaged over the catchment during recent time (1981–2000) was reduced by 2.3% with respect to observed past (1961–1980) and resulting runoff reduction was found 14%. Compared to the past, the mean annual rainfall reductions, averaged over 11 ensembles and over the period for the catchment for A2 scenario are 13.6 and 23.6% for mid and late this century respectively while the corresponding runoff reductions are 36 and 74%. For B1 scenario, the rainfall reductions were 11.9 and 11.6% for mid and late this century and corresponding runoff reductions were 31 and 38%. Spatial distribution of rainfall and runoff changes showed that the rate of changes were higher in high rainfall part compared to the low rainfall part. Temporal distribution of rainfall and runoff indicate that high rainfall in the catchment reduced significantly and further reductions are projected resulting significant runoff reductions. A catchment scenario map has been developed through plotting decadal runoff reduction against corresponding rainfall reduction at four gauging stations for observed and projected period. This could be useful for planning future water resources in the catchment. Projection of rainfall and runoff made based on the GCMs varied significantly for the time periods and emission scenarios. Hence, considerable uncertainty involved in this study though ensemble mean was used to explain the findings.

Description: Upscaling of evapotranspiration fluxes from instantaneous to daytime scales for thermal remote sensing applications Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 7325-7350, 2013 Author(s): C. Cammalleri, M. C. Anderson, and W. P. Kustas Four upscaling methods for estimating daytime evapotranspiration (ET) from single time-of-day snapshots, as commonly retrieved using remote sensing, were compared. These methods are based on the assumption of self-preservation of the ratio between ET and a given reference variable over the daytime hours. The analysis was performed using eddy covariance data collected at 12 AmeriFlux towers, sampling a fairly wide range in climatic and land cover conditions. The choice of energy budget closure method significantly impacted performance using different scaling methodologies. Therefore, a statistical evaluation approach was adopted to better account for the inherent uncertainty in ET fluxes using eddy covariance technique. Overall, this approach suggests that at-surface solar radiation is the most robust reference variable amongst those tested, due to high accuracy of upscaled fluxes and absence of systematic biases. Top-of-atmosphere irradiance was also tested and proved to be reliable under near clear-sky conditions, but tended to overestimate the observed daytime ET during cloudy days. Use of reference ET as a scaling flux did not perform as well as the solar radiation method, but similarly had errors with little seasonal dependency. Finally, the commonly-used evaporative fraction method yielded satisfactory results only in summer months, July and August, and tended to underestimate the observations in the fall/winter seasons from November to January at the flux sites studied.

Description: Errors in climate model daily precipitation and temperature output: time invariance and implications for bias correction Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 2147-2159, 2013 Author(s): E. P. Maurer, T. Das, and D. R. Cayan When correcting for biases in general circulation model (GCM) output, for example when statistically downscaling for regional and local impacts studies, a common assumption is that the GCM biases can be characterized by comparing model simulations and observations for a historical period. We demonstrate some complications in this assumption, with GCM biases varying between mean and extreme values and for different sets of historical years. Daily precipitation and maximum and minimum temperature from late 20th century simulations by four GCMs over the United States were compared to gridded observations. Using random years from the historical record we select a "base" set and a 10 yr independent "projected" set. We compare differences in biases between these sets at median and extreme percentiles. On average a base set with as few as 4 randomly-selected years is often adequate to characterize the biases in daily GCM precipitation and temperature, at both median and extreme values; 12 yr provided higher confidence that bias correction would be successful. This suggests that some of the GCM bias is time invariant. When characterizing bias with a set of consecutive years, the set must be long enough to accommodate regional low frequency variability, since the bias also exhibits this variability. Newer climate models included in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change fifth assessment will allow extending this study for a longer observational period and to finer scales.

Description: Characterization of groundwater dynamics in landslides in varved clays Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 2171-2183, 2013 Author(s): J. E. van der Spek, T. A. Bogaard, and M. Bakker Groundwater dynamics may play a significant role in landslides. A detailed model is developed of the groundwater dynamics in landslides in varved clays in the Trièves area in the French Alps. The varved clays consist of a sequence of alternating silt and clay layers, covered by a colluvium layer and intersected by fissures. The hydraulic conductivity of the clay layers is negligible compared to the silt layers. It is conceptualized that fissures form a hydraulic connection between the colluvium and the varved clays. Groundwater recharge flows through the colluvium into the fissures, where water is exchanged horizontally between the fissure and the silt layers of the varved clays. Groundwater flow in the colluvium is simulated with the Boussinesq equation, while flow in the silt layers of the varved clays is simulated with the Richards equation. Longitudinal outflow from the fissure is simulated with a linear-reservoir model. Scattered data of relatively short monitoring periods is available for several landslides in the region. A good similarity between observed and simulated heads is obtained, especially when considering the lack of important physical parameters such as the fissure width and the distance between the monitoring point and the fissure. A simulation for the period 1959–2004 showed some correlation between peaks in the simulated heads and the recorded occurrence of landslides, while the bottom of the varved clays remained saturated during the entire simulation period.

Description: Assessing the hydrological effect of the check dams in the Loess Plateau, China, by model simulations Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 2185-2193, 2013 Author(s): Y. D. Xu, B. J. Fu, and C. S. He Check dams are commonly used for soil conservation. In the Loess Plateau of China, check dams have been widely constructed as the principal means to retain floodwater and intercept soil sediments since the 1970s. For instance, there are more than 6572 check dams in the Yanhe watershed with an area of 7725 km 2 in the Loess Plateau. However, little research has been done to quantify the hydrological effects of the check dams. In this research, the SWAT model (Soil and Water Assessment Tool) was applied to simulate the runoff and sediment in the Yanhe watershed. We treated the 1950s to 1960s as the reference period since there were very few check dams during the period. The model was firstly calibrated and validated in the reference period. The calibrated model was then used in the later periods to simulate the hydrological effects of the check dams. The results showed that the check dams had a regulation effect on runoff and a retention effect on sediment. From 1984 to 1987, the runoff in rainy season (from May to October) decreased by 1.54 m 3 s −1 (14.7%) to 3.13 m 3 s −1 (25.9%) due to the check dams; while in dry season (from November to the following April), runoff increased by 1.46 m 3 s −1 (60.5%) to 1.95 m 3 s −1 (101.2%); the sediment in rainy season decreased by 2.49 × 10 6 ton (34.6%) to 4.35 × 10 6 ton (48.0%). From 2006 to 2008, the runoff in rainy season decreased by 0.79 m 3 s −1 (15.5%) to 1.75 m 3 s −1 (28.9%), and the runoff in dry season increased by 0.51 m 3 s −1 (20.1%) to 0.97 m 3 s −1 (46.4%); the sediment in rainy season decreased by 2.03 × 10 6 ton (79.4%) to 3.12 × 10 6 ton (85.5%). Construction of the large number of check dams in the Loess Plateau has enhanced the region's capacity to control the runoff and sediment. In the Yanhe watershed, the annual runoff was reduced by less than 14.3% due to the check dams; and the sediment in rainy season was blocked by up to 85.5%. Thus, check dams are effective measures for soil erosion control in the Loess Plateau.

Description: Global isoscapes for δ 18 O and δ 2 H in precipitation: improved prediction using regionalized climatic regression models Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 7351-7393, 2013 Author(s): S. Terzer, L. I. Wassenaar, L. J. Araguás-Araguás, and P. K. Aggarwal A Regionalized Climatic Water Isotope Prediction (RCWIP) approach, based on the Global Network for Isotopes in Precipitation (GNIP), was demonstrated for the purposes of predicting point- and large-scale spatiotemporal patterns of the stable isotope compositions of water (δ 2 H, δ 18 O) in precipitation around the world. Unlike earlier global domain and fixed regressor models, RCWIP pre-defined thirty-six climatic cluster domains, and tested all model combinations from an array of climatic and spatial regressor variables to obtain the best predictive approach to each cluster domain, as indicated by RMSE and variogram analysis. Fuzzy membership fractions were thereafter used as the weights to seamlessly amalgamate results of the optimized climatic zone prediction models into a single predictive mapping product, such as global or regional amount-weighted mean annual, mean monthly or growing-season δ 18 O/δ 2 H in precipitation. Comparative tests revealed the RCWIP approach outperformed classical global-fixed regression-interpolation based models more than 67% of the time, and significantly improved upon predictive accuracy and precision. All RCWIP isotope mapping products are available as gridded GeoTIFF files from the IAEA website ( www.iaea.org/water ) and are for use in hydrology, climatology, food authenticity, ecology, and forensics.

Description: Water displacement by sewer infrastructure in the Grote Nete catchment, Belgium, and its hydrological regime effects Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 7425-7467, 2013 Author(s): D. Vrebos, T. Vansteenkiste, J. Staes, P. Willems, and P. Meire Urbanization and especially impervious areas, in combination with wastewater treatment infrastructure, can exert several pressures on the hydrological cycle. These pressures were studied for the Grote Nete catchment in Belgium (8.18% impervious area and 3.89% effective impervious area), based on a combination of empirical and model-based approaches. The effective impervious area, combined with the extent of the wastewater collection regions which do not coincide with the natural catchment boundaries, was used as an indicator for the urbanization pressure. Our study revealed changes in the total upstream areas of the subcatchments between −16% and +3%, and in upstream impervious areas between −99% and +64%. These changes lead to important inter-catchment water transfers. Based on simulations with a physically-based and spatially-distributed hydrological catchment model, profound impacts of effective impervious area on infiltration and runoff were found. The model results show that the changes in impervious areas and related water displacements in and between catchments due to the installation of the wastewater treatment infrastructure severely impacted low flows, peak flows and seasonal trends. They moreover show that it is difficult, but of utmost importance, to incorporate these pressures and artificial processes in an accurate way during the development of hydrological models for urbanized catchments.

Description: Virtual water trade and development in Africa Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 7291-7324, 2013 Author(s): M. Konar and K. Caylor A debate has long existed on the relationships between human population, natural resources, and development. Recent research has expanded this debate to include the impacts of trade; specifically, virtual water trade, or the water footprint of traded commodities. We conduct an empirical analysis of the relationships between virtual water trade, population, and development in Africa. We find that increases in virtual water imports do not lead to increases in population growth nor do they diminish human welfare. We establish a new index of virtual water trade openness and show that levels of undernourishment tend to fall with increased values of virtual water trade openness. Countries with small dam storage capacity obtain a higher fraction of their agricultural water requirements from external sources, which may indicate implicit "infrastructure sharing" across nations. Globally, increased crop exports tends to correlate with increased crop water use efficiency, though this relationship does not hold for Africa. However, internal African trade is much more efficient in terms of embodied water resources than any other region in the world. Thus, internal African trade patterns may be compensating for poor internal production systems.

Description: An interdisciplinary swat ecohydrological model to define catchment-scale hydrologic partitioning Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 7235-7290, 2013 Author(s): C. L. Shope, G. R. Maharjan, J. Tenhunen, B. Seo, K. Kim, J. Riley, S. Arnhold, T. Koellner, Y. S. Ok, S. Peiffer, B. Kim, J.-H. Park, and B. Huwe Land use and climate change have long been implicated in modifying ecosystem services, such as water quality and water yield, biodiversity, and agricultural production. To account for future effects on ecosystem services, the integration of physical, biological, economic, and social data over several scales must be implemented to assess the effects on natural resource availability and use. Our objective is to assess the capability of the SWAT model to capture short-duration monsoonal rainfall-runoff processes in complex mountainous terrain under rapid, event-driven processes in a monsoonal environment. To accomplish this, we developed a unique quality-control gap-filling algorithm for interpolation of high frequency meteorological data. We used a novel multi-location, multi-optimization calibration technique to improve estimations of catchment-wide hydrologic partitioning. We calibrated the interdisciplinary model to a combination of statistical, hydrologic, and plant growth metrics. In addition, we used multiple locations of different drainage area, aspect, elevation, and geologic substrata distributed throughout the catchment. Results indicate scale-dependent sensitivity of hydrologic partitioning and substantial influence of engineered features. While our model accurately reproduced observed discharge variability, the addition of hydrologic and plant growth objective functions identified the importance of culverts in catchment-wide flow distribution. The results of this study provide a valuable resource to describe landscape controls and their implication on discharge, sediment transport, and nutrient loading. This study also shows the challenges of applying the SWAT model to complex terrain and extreme environments. By incorporating anthropogenic features into modeling scenarios, we can greatly enhance our understanding of the hydroecological impacts on ecosystem services.

Description: Determining spatial variability of dry spells: a Markov-based method, applied to the Makanya catchment, Tanzania Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 2161-2170, 2013 Author(s): B. M. C. Fischer, M. L. Mul, and H. H. G. Savenije With a growing world population and a trend towards more resource-intensive diets, pressure on land and water resources for food production will continue to increase in the coming decades. Large parts of the world rely on rainfed agriculture for their food security. In Africa, 90% of the food production is from rainfed agriculture, generally with low yields and a high risk of crop failure. One of the main reasons for crop failure is the occurrence of dry spells during the growing season. Key indicators are the critical dry spell duration and the probability of dry spell occurrence. In this paper a new Markov-based framework is presented to spatially map the length of dry spells for fixed probabilities of non-exceedance. The framework makes use of spatially varying Markov coefficients that are correlated to readily available spatial information such as elevation and distance to the sea. The dry spell map thus obtained is compared to the spatially variable critical dry spell duration, based on soil properties and crop water requirements, to assess the probability of crop failure in different locations. The results show that in the Makanya catchment the length of dry spell occurrence is highly variable in space, even over relatively short distances. In certain areas the probability of crop failure reaches levels that make rainfed agricultural unsustainable, even close to areas where currently rainfed agriculture is successfully being practised. This method can be used to identify regions that are vulnerable to dry spells and, subsequently, to develop strategies for supplementary irrigation or rainwater harvesting.

Description: Technical note: Method of Morris effectively reduces the computational demands of global sensitivity analysis for distributed watershed models Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 4275-4299, 2013 Author(s): J. D. Herman, J. B. Kollat, P. M. Reed, and T. Wagener The increase in spatially distributed hydrologic modeling warrants a corresponding increase in diagnostic methods capable of analyzing complex models with large numbers of parameters. Sobol ' sensitivity analysis has proven to be a valuable tool for diagnostic analyses of hydrologic models. However, for many spatially distributed models, the Sobol ' method requires a prohibitive number of model evaluations to reliably decompose output variance across the full set of parameters. We investigate the potential of the method of Morris, a screening-based sensitivity approach, to provide results sufficiently similar to those of the Sobol ' method at a greatly reduced computational expense. The methods are benchmarked on the Hydrology Laboratory Research Distributed Hydrologic Model (HL-RDHM) model over a six-month period in the Blue River Watershed, Oklahoma, USA. The Sobol ' method required over six million model evaluations to ensure reliable sensitivity indices, corresponding to more than 30 000 computing hours and roughly 180 gigabytes of storage space. We find that the method of Morris is able to correctly identify sensitive and insensitive parameters with 300 times fewer model evaluations, requiring only 100 computing hours and 1 gigabyte of storage space. Method of Morris proves to be a promising diagnostic approach for global sensitivity analysis of highly parameterized, spatially distributed hydrologic models.

Description: Estimating actual, potential, reference crop and pan evaporation using standard meteorological data: a pragmatic synthesis Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 1331-1363, 2013 Author(s): T. A. McMahon, M. C. Peel, L. Lowe, R. Srikanthan, and T. R. McVicar This guide to estimating daily and monthly actual, potential, reference crop and pan evaporation covers topics that are of interest to researchers, consulting hydrologists and practicing engineers. Topics include estimating actual evaporation from deep lakes and from farm dams and for catchment water balance studies, estimating potential evaporation as input to rainfall-runoff models, and reference crop evapotranspiration for small irrigation areas, and for irrigation within large irrigation districts. Inspiration for this guide arose in response to the authors' experiences in reviewing research papers and consulting reports where estimation of the actual evaporation component in catchment and water balance studies was often inadequately handled. Practical guides using consistent terminology that cover both theory and practice are not readily available. Here we provide such a guide, which is divided into three parts. The first part provides background theory and an outline of the conceptual models of potential evaporation of Penman, Penman–Monteith and Priestley–Taylor, as well as discussions of reference crop evapotranspiration and Class-A pan evaporation. The last two sub-sections in this first part include techniques to estimate actual evaporation from (i) open-surface water and (ii) landscapes and catchments (Morton and the advection-aridity models). The second part addresses topics confronting a practicing hydrologist, e.g. estimating actual evaporation for deep lakes, shallow lakes and farm dams, lakes covered with vegetation, catchments, irrigation areas and bare soil. The third part addresses six related issues: (i) automatic (hard wired) calculation of evaporation estimates in commercial weather stations, (ii) evaporation estimates without wind data, (iii) at-site meteorological data, (iv) dealing with evaporation in a climate change environment, (v) 24 h versus day-light hour estimation of meteorological variables, and (vi) uncertainty in evaporation estimates. This paper is supported by a Supplement that includes 21 sections enhancing the material in the text, worked examples of many procedures discussed in the paper, a program listing (Fortran 90) of Morton's WREVAP evaporation models along with tables of monthly Class-A pan coefficients for 68 locations across Australia and other information.

Description: Socio-hydrology: conceptualising human-flood interactions Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 4515-4536, 2013 Author(s): G. Di Baldassarre, A. Viglione, G. Carr, L. Kuil, J. L. Salinas, and G. Blöschl Over history, humankind has tended to settle near streams because of the role of rivers as transportation corridors and the fertility of riparian areas. However, human settlements in floodplains have been threatened by the risk of flooding. Possible responses have been to resettle away and/or modify the river system by building flood control structures. This has led to a complex web of interactions and feedback mechanisms between hydrological and social processes in settled floodplains. This paper is an attempt to conceptualise these interplays for hypothetical human-flood systems. We develop a simple, dynamic model to represent the interactions and feedback loops between hydrological and social processes. The model is then used to explore the dynamics of the human-flood system and the effect of changing individual characteristics, including external forcing such as technological development. The results show that the conceptual model is able to reproduce reciprocal effects between floods and people as well as the emergence of typical patterns. For instance, when levees are built or raised to protect floodplain areas, their presence not only reduces the frequency of flooding, but also exacerbates high water levels. Then, because of this exacerbation, higher flood protection levels are required by the society. As a result, more and more flooding events are avoided, but rare and catastrophic events take place.

Description: Integration of remote sensing, RUSLE and GIS to model potential soil loss and sediment yield (SY) Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 4567-4596, 2013 Author(s): H. Kamaludin, T. Lihan, Z. Ali Rahman, M. A. Mustapha, W. M. R. Idris, and S. A. Rahim Land use activities within a basin serve as one of the contributing factors which cause deterioration of river water quality through its potential effect on erosion. Sediment yield in the form of suspended solid in the river water body which is transported to the coastal area occurs as a sign of lowering of the water quality. Hence, the aim of this study was to determine potential soil loss using the Revised Universal Soil Loss Equation (RUSLE) model and the sediment yield, in the Geographical Information Systems (GIS) environment within selected sub-catchments of Pahang River Basin. RUSLE was used to estimate potential soil losses and sediment yield by utilizing information on rainfall erosivity ( R ) using interpolation of rainfall data, soil erodibility ( K ) using field measurement and soil map, vegetation cover ( C ) using satellite images, topography (LS) using DEM and conservation practices ( P ) using satellite images. The results indicated that the rate of potential soil loss in these sub-catchments ranged from very low to extremely high. The area covered by very low to low potential soil loss was about 99%, whereas moderate to extremely high soil loss potential covered only about 1% of the study area. Sediment yield represented only 1% of the potential soil loss. The sediment yield (SY) value in Pahang River turned out to be higher closer to the river mouth because of the topographic character, climate, vegetation type and density, and land use within the drainage basin.

Description: Probability distributions for explaining hydrological losses in South Australian catchments Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 4597-4626, 2013 Author(s): S. H. P. W. Gamage, G. A. Hewa, and S. Beecham The wide variability of hydrological losses in catchments is due to multiple variables that affect the rainfall-runoff process. Accurate estimation of hydrological losses is required for making vital decisions in design applications that are based on design rainfall models and rainfall-runoff models. Using representative single values of losses, despite their wide variability, is common practice, especially in Australian studies. This practice leads to issues such as over or under estimation of design floods. Probability distributions can be used as a better representation of losses. In particular, using joint probability approaches (JPA), probability distributions can be incorporated into hydrological loss parameters in design models. However, lack of understanding of loss distributions limits the benefit of using JPA. The aim of this paper is to identify a probability distribution function that can successfully describe hydrological losses in South Australian (SA) catchments. This paper describes suitable parametric and non-parametric distributions that can successfully describe observed loss data. The goodness-of-fit of the fitted distributions and quantification of the errors associated with quantile estimation are also discussed a two-parameter Gamma distribution was identified as one that successfully described initial loss (IL) data of the selected catchments. Also, a non-parametric standardised distribution of losses that describes both IL and continuing loss (CL) data were identified. The results obtained for the non-parametric methods were compared with similar studies carried out in other parts of Australia and a remarkable degree of consistency was observed. The results will be helpful in improving design flood applications.

Description: Corrigendum to "Calibration of aerodynamic roughness over the Tibetan Plateau with Ensemble Kalman Filter analysed heat flux" published in Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 16, 4291–4302, 2012 Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 1309-1310, 2013 Author(s): J. H. Lee, J. Timmermans, Z. Su, and M. Mancini No abstract available.

Description: Technical Note: Using wavelet analyses on water depth time series to detect glacial influence in high-mountain hydrosystems Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 4369-4395, 2013 Author(s): S. Cauvy-Fraunié, T. Condom, A. Rabatel, M. Villacis, D. Jacobsen, and O. Dangles Worldwide, the rapid shrinking of glaciers in response to ongoing climate change is currently modifying the glacial meltwater contribution to hydrosystems in glacierized catchments. Assessing the contribution of glacier run-off to stream discharge is therefore of critical importance to evaluate potential impact of glacier retreat on water quality and aquatic biota. This task has challenged both glacier hydrologists and ecologists over the last 20 yr due to both structural and functional complexity of the glacier-stream system interface. Here we propose a new methodological approach based on wavelet analyses on water depth time series to determine the glacial influence in glacierized catchments. We performed water depth measurement using water pressure loggers over ten months in 15 stream sites in two glacier-fed catchments in the Ecuadorian Andes (〉 4000 m). We determined the global wavelet spectrum of each time series and defined the Wavelet Glacier Signal (WGS) as the ratio between the global wavelet power spectrum value at a 24 h-scale and its corresponding significance value. To test the relevance of the WGS we compared it with the percentage of the glacier cover in the catchments, a metric of glacier influence often used in the literature. We then tested whether one month data could be sufficient to reliably determine the glacial influence. As expected we found that the WGS of glacier-fed streams decreased downstream with the increasing of non-glacial tributaries. We also found that the WGS and the percentage of the glacier cover in the catchment were significantly positively correlated and that one month data was sufficient to identify and compare the glacial influence between two sites, provided that the water level time series were acquired over the same period. Furthermore, we found that our method permits to detect glacial signal in supposedly non-glacial sites, thereby evidencing glacial meltwater infiltrations. While we specifically focused on the tropical Andes in this paper, our approach to determine glacier influence would be applicable to temperate and arctic glacierized catchments. The WGS therefore appears as a powerful and cost effective tool to better understand the hydrological links between glaciers and hydrosystems and assess the consequences of rapid glacier melting.

Description: Spatio-temporal heterogeneity of riparian soil morphology in a restored floodplain Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 4337-4367, 2013 Author(s): B. Fournier, C. Guenat, G. Bullinger-Weber, and E. A. D. Mitchell Floodplains have been intensively altered in industrialized countries, but are now increasingly being restored and it is therefore important to assess the effect of these restoration projects on the aquatic and terrestrial components of ecosystems. Soils are a functionally crucial component of terrestrial ecosystems but are generally overlooked in floodplain restoration assessment. We studied the spatio-temporal heterogeneity of soil morphology in a restored (riverbed widening) river reach along River Thur (Switzerland) using three criteria (soil diversity, dynamism and typicality) and their associated indicators. We hypothesized that these criteria would correctly discriminate the post-restoration changes in soil morphology within the study site, and that these changes correspond to patterns of vascular plant diversity. Soil diversity and dynamism increased five years after the restoration, but typical soils of braided rivers were still missing. Soil typicality and dynamism correlated to vegetation changes. These results suggest a limited success of the project in agreement with evaluations carried out at the same site using other, more resource demanding methods (e.g. soil fauna, fish, ecosystem functioning). Soil morphology provides structural and functional information on floodplain ecosystems and allows predicting broad changes in plant diversity. The spatio-temporal heterogeneity of soil morphology represents a cost-efficient ecological indicator that could easily be integrated into rapid assessment protocols of floodplain and river restoration projects.

Description: Space-time kriging extension of precipitation variability at 12 km spacing from tree-ring chronologies and its implications for drought analysis Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 4301-4335, 2013 Author(s): F. Biondi Understanding and preparing for future hydroclimatic variability greatly benefits from long (i.e., multi-century) records at seasonal to annual time steps that have been gridded at km-scale spatial intervals over a geographic region. Kriging is a geostatistical technique commonly used for optimal interpolation of environmental data, and space-time geostatistical models can improve kriging estimates when long temporal sequences of observations exist at relatively few points on the landscape. Here I present how a network of 22 tree-ring chronologies from single-leaf pinyon ( Pinus monophylla ) in the central Great Basin of North America was used to extend hydroclimatic records both temporally and spatially. First, the Line of Organic Correlation (LOC) method was used to reconstruct October–May total precipitation anomalies at each tree-ring site, as these ecotonal environments at the lower forest border are typically moisture limited. Individual site reconstructions were then combined using a hierarchical model of spatio-temporal kriging that produced annual anomaly maps on a 12 × 12 km grid during the period in common among all chronologies (1650–1976). Hydro-climatic episodes were numerically identified and modeled using their duration, magnitude, and peak. Spatial patterns were more variable during wet years than during dry years, and the evolution of drought episodes over space and time could be visualized and quantified. The most remarkable episode in the entire reconstruction was the early 1900s pluvial, followed by the late 1800s drought. The 1930s "Dust Bowl" drought was among the top ten hydroclimatic episodes in the past few centuries. These results directly address the needs of water and natural resource managers with respect to planning for "worst case" scenarios of drought duration and magnitude at the watershed level. For instance, it is possible to analyze which geographical areas are more likely to be impacted by severe and sustained droughts at annual or multiannual timescales and at spatial resolutions commonly used by regional climate models.

Description: Structural break or long memory: an empirical survey on daily rainfall data sets across Malaysia Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 1311-1318, 2013 Author(s): F. Yusof, I. L. Kane, and Z. Yusop A short memory process that encounters occasional structural breaks in mean can show a slower rate of decay in the autocorrelation function and other properties of fractional integrated I (d) processes. In this paper we employed a procedure for estimating the fractional differencing parameter in semiparametric contexts proposed by Geweke and Porter-Hudak (1983) to analyse nine daily rainfall data sets across Malaysia. The results indicate that all the data sets exhibit long memory. Furthermore, an empirical fluctuation process using the ordinary least square (OLS)-based cumulative sum (CUSUM) test for the break date was applied. Break dates were detected in all data sets. The data sets were partitioned according to their respective break date, and a further test for long memory was applied for all subseries. Results show that all subseries follows the same pattern as the original series. The estimate of the fractional parameters d 1 and d 2 on the subseries obtained by splitting the original series at the break date confirms that there is a long memory in the data generating process (DGP). Therefore this evidence shows a true long memory not due to structural break.

Description: Snow glacier melt estimation in tropical Andean glaciers using artificial neural networks Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 1265-1280, 2013 Author(s): V. Moya Quiroga, A. Mano, Y. Asaoka, S. Kure, K. Udo, and J. Mendoza Snow and glacier melt (SGM) estimation plays an important role in water resources management. Although melting process can be modelled by energy balance methods, such studies require detailed data, which is rarely available. Hence, new and simpler approaches are needed for SGM estimations. The present study aims at developing an artificial neural networks (ANN) based technique for estimating the energy available for melt (EAM) and SGM rates using available and easy to obtain data such as temperature, short-wave radiation and relative humidity. Several ANN and multiple linear regression models (MLR) were developed to represent the energy fluxes and estimate the EAM. The models were trained using measured data from the Zongo glacier located in the outer tropics and validated against measured data from the Antizana glacier located in the inner tropics. It was found that ANN models provide a better generalisation when applied to other data sets. The performance of the models was improved by including Antizana data into the training set, as it was proved to provide better results than other techniques like the use of a prior logarithmic transformation. The final model was validated against measured data from the Alpine glaciers Argentière and Saint-Sorlin. Then, the models were applied for the estimation of SGM at Condoriri glacier. The estimated SGM was compared with SGM estimated by an enhanced temperature method and proved to have the same behaviour considering temperature sensibility. Moreover, the ANN models have the advantage of direct application, while the temperature method requires calibration of empirical coefficients.

Description: Optimising predictor domains for spatially coherent precipitation downscaling Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 4015-4061, 2013 Author(s): S. Radanovics, J.-P. Vidal, E. Sauquet, A. Ben Daoud, and G. Bontron Statistical downscaling is widely used to overcome the scale gap between predictors from Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP) models or General Circulation Models (GCMs) and predictands like local precipitation, required for example for medium-term operational forecasts or climate change impact studies. The predictors are considered over a given spatial domain which is rarely optimised with respect to the target predictand location. In this study the geopotential predictor domains used by an analogue downscaling method are optimised for 608 target zones covering France. An extended version of the growing rectangular domain algorithm provides an ensemble of five near-optimum domains for each target zone. All five near-optimum domains are consistently equally skillful based on the Continuous Rank Probability Score. Relevance maps calculated for selected target zones first reveal high skill geopotential regions with specific shapes for locations in south-eastern France compared to the rest of the country. In all cases, the optimised domains tend to include the most relevant area on the relevance maps. The domain centers of the optimised domains are mainly distributed following the geographical location of the target location, but there are apparent differences between the windward and the lee side of mountain ridges. Moreover, domains for target zones located in south-eastern France are centered more east and south than the ones for target locations on the same longitude. The size of the optimised domains tends to be larger in the southeastern part of the country, while domains with a very small meridional extent can be found in a east-west band around 47° N. Sensitivity tests on the archive length for the analogue method show a general robustness except for zones with high interannual variability like in the Cévennes area. Moreover, results appear to be rather unsensitive to the starting point of the optimisation algorithm except for zones located in the transition area north of the zones having optimized domains with a small meridional extent. This study paves the way for defining regions with homogeneous geopotential predictor domains for precipitation downscaling over France.

Description: Assessment of shallow subsurface characterisation with non-invasive geophysical methods at the intermediate hill-slope scale Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 1297-1307, 2013 Author(s): S. Popp, D. Altdorff, and P. Dietrich Hill-slopes of several hectares in size represent a difficult scale for subsurface characterisation, as these landscape units are well beyond the scope of traditional point-scale techniques. By means of electromagnetic induction (EMI) and gamma-ray spectroscopy, spatially distributed soil proxy data were collected from a heterogeneous hill-slope site. Results of EMI mapping using the EM38DD showed that soil electrical conductivity (ECa) is highly variable at both temporal and spatial scales. Calibration of the integral ECa signal to a specific target like soil moisture is hampered by the ambiguous response of EMI to the clay-rich hill-slope underground. Gamma-ray results were obtained during a single survey, along with EMI measurements and selected soil sampling. In contrast to ECa, a noticeable correlation between Total Count and K emission data and soil-water content seemed to be present. Relevant proxy variables from both methods were used for k means clustering in order to distinguish between hill-slope areas with different soil conditions. As a result, we obtained a suitable partition of hill-slope that was comparable with a previously obtained zonation model based on ecological factors.

Description: Multivariate return periods in hydrology: a critical and practical review focusing on synthetic design hydrograph estimation Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 1281-1296, 2013 Author(s): B. Gräler, M. J. van den Berg, S. Vandenberghe, A. Petroselli, S. Grimaldi, B. De Baets, and N. E. C. Verhoest Most of the hydrological and hydraulic studies refer to the notion of a return period to quantify design variables. When dealing with multiple design variables, the well-known univariate statistical analysis is no longer satisfactory, and several issues challenge the practitioner. How should one incorporate the dependence between variables? How should a multivariate return period be defined and applied in order to yield a proper design event? In this study an overview of the state of the art for estimating multivariate design events is given and the different approaches are compared. The construction of multivariate distribution functions is done through the use of copulas, given their practicality in multivariate frequency analyses and their ability to model numerous types of dependence structures in a flexible way. A synthetic case study is used to generate a large data set of simulated discharges that is used for illustrating the effect of different modelling choices on the design events. Based on different uni- and multivariate approaches, the design hydrograph characteristics of a 3-D phenomenon composed of annual maximum peak discharge, its volume, and duration are derived. These approaches are based on regression analysis, bivariate conditional distributions, bivariate joint distributions and Kendall distribution functions, highlighting theoretical and practical issues of multivariate frequency analysis. Also an ensemble-based approach is presented. For a given design return period, the approach chosen clearly affects the calculated design event, and much attention should be given to the choice of the approach used as this depends on the real-world problem at hand.

Description: Opportunities and challenges for the use of scintillometer-based catchment-averaged evapotranspiration estimates as model forcing Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 3973-4013, 2013 Author(s): B. Samain and V. R. N. Pauwels To date, lumped rainfall-runoff models rely on rough estimates of catchment-averaged potential evapotranspiration (ET p ) rates as meteorological forcing. A model parameter converts this ET p input into actual evapotranspiration (ET act ) estimates. This paper examines the potential use of scintillometer-based ET act rates for rainfall-runoff modeling. It has been found that the reservoir-structure of the rainfall-runoff model functions as a low-pass filter for the ET p input. If the long-term volume of the ET p used in the model simulations is consistent with the data set used for calibration, a good match of the seasonal pattern, using temporally constant ET p data, is sufficient to obtain adequate discharge simulations. However, these results are then obtained with strongly erroneous evapotranspiration estimates. A better match of the diurnal cycle does not lead to better model results. Replacing the ET p inputs by scintillometer-based ET act estimates does not lead to better model predictions. Small underestimations of ET act under stable conditions, which occur at night and during the Winter, and which accumulate to significant amounts, are the cause of this problem. Consistent with other studies, the scintillometer-based ET act estimates can be considered reliable and realistic under unstable conditions. These values can thus be used as forcing for rainfall-runoff models.

Description: Temporal stability of soil moisture patterns measured by proximal ground-penetrating radar Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 4063-4097, 2013 Author(s): J. Minet, N. E. C. Verhoest, S. Lambot, and M. Vanclooster We analyzed the temporal stability of soil moisture patterns acquired using a proximal ground-penetrating radar (GPR) in a 2.5 ha agricultural field at five different dates over three weeks. The GPR system was mounted on a mobile platform, allowing for real-time mapping of soil moisture with a high spatial resolution (2–5 m). The spatio-temporal soil moisture patterns were in accordance with the meteorological data and with soil moisture measurements from soil core sampling. Time-stable areas showing the field-average moisture could be revealed by two methods: (1) by the computation of temporal stability indicators based on relative differences of soil moisture to the field-average and (2) by the spatial intersection of the areas showing the field-average. Locations where the mean relative difference was below 0.02 m 3 m −3 extended up to 10% of the field area whereas the intersection of areas showing the field-average within a tolerance of 0.02 m 3 m −3 covered 5% of the field area. Compared to most of the previous studies about temporal stability of soil moisture, time-stable areas and their spatial patterns could be revealed instead of single point locations, owing to the advanced GPR method for real-time mapping. It is believed that determining spatially coherent time-stable areas is more informative rather than determining time-stable points. Other acquisitions over larger time periods would be necessary to assert the robustness of the time-stable areas.

Description: Impacts of tropical cyclones on hydrochemistry of a subtropical forest Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 4537-4566, 2013 Author(s): C. T. Chang, S. P. Hamburg, J. L. Hwong, N. H. Lin, M. L. Hsueh, M. C. Chen, and T. C. Lin Tropical cyclones (typhoons/hurricanes) have major impacts on the biogeochemistry of forest ecosystems, but the stochastic nature and the long intervals between storms means that there are limited data on their effects. We characterized the impacts of 14 typhoons over six years on hydrochemistry of a subtropical forest plantation in Taiwan, a region experiencing frequent typhoons. Typhoons contributed 1/3 of annual rainfall on average, but ranged from 4% to 55%. The stochastic nature of annual typhoon related precipitation poses a challenge with respect to managing the impacts of these extreme events. This challenge is exacerbated by the fact that typhoon-related rainfall is not significantly correlated with wind velocity, the current focus of weather forecasts. Thus little advance warning is provided for the hydrological impacts of these storms. The typhoons we studied contributed approximately one third of the annual input and output of most nutrients (except nitrogen) during an average 9.5d yr −1 period, resulting in nutrient input/output rates an order of magnitude greater than during non-typhoon period. Nitrate output balanced input during the non-typhoon period, but during the typhoon period an average of 10 kg ha −1 yr −1 nitrate was lost. Streamwater chemistry exhibited similarly high variability during typhoon and non-typhoon periods and returned to pre-typhoon levels one to three weeks following each typhoon. The streamwater chemistry appears to be very resilient in response to typhoons, resulting in minimal loss of nutrients.

Description: Derivation of RCM-driven potential evapotranspiration for hydrological climate change impact analysis in Great Britain: a comparison of methods and associated uncertainty in future projections Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 1365-1377, 2013 Author(s): C. Prudhomme and J. Williamson Potential evapotranspiration (PET) is the water that would be lost by plants through evaporation and transpiration if water was not limited in the soil, and it is commonly used in conceptual hydrological modelling in the calculation of runoff production and hence river discharge. Future changes of PET are likely to be as important as changes in precipitation patterns in determining changes in river flows. However PET is not calculated routinely by climate models so it must be derived independently when the impact of climate change on river flow is to be assessed. This paper compares PET estimates from 12 equations of different complexity, driven by the Hadley Centre's HadRM3-Q0 model outputs representative of 1961–1990, with MORECS PET, a product used as reference PET in Great Britain. The results show that the FAO56 version of the Penman–Monteith equations reproduces best the spatial and seasonal variability of MORECS PET across GB when driven by HadRM3-Q0 estimates of relative humidity, total cloud, wind speed and linearly bias-corrected mean surface temperature. This suggests that potential biases in HadRM3-Q0 climate do not result in significant biases when the physically based FAO56 equations are used. Percentage changes in PET between the 1961–1990 and 2041–2070 time slices were also calculated for each of the 12 PET equations from HadRM3-Q0. Results show a large variation in the magnitude (and sometimes direction) of changes estimated from different PET equations, with Turc, Jensen–Haise and calibrated Blaney–Criddle methods systematically projecting the largest increases across GB for all months and Priestley–Taylor, Makkink, and Thornthwaite showing the smallest changes. We recommend the use of the FAO56 equation as, when driven by HadRM3-Q0 climate data, this best reproduces the reference MORECS PET across Great Britain for the reference period of 1961–1990. Further, the future changes of PET estimated by FAO56 are within the range of uncertainty defined by the ensemble of 12 PET equations. The changes show a clear northwest–southeast gradient of PET increase with largest (smallest) changes in the northwest in January (July and October) respectively. However, the range in magnitude of PET changes due to the choice of PET method shown in this study for Great Britain suggests that PET uncertainty is a challenge facing the assessment of climate change impact on hydrology mostly ignored up to now.

Description: Impact of long-term drainage on summer groundwater flow patterns in the Mer Bleue peatland, Ontario, Canada Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 3485-3498, 2013 Author(s): B. J. Kopp, J. H. Fleckenstein, N. T. Roulet, E. Humphreys, J. Talbot, and C. Blodau Long-term impacts of drier conditions on the hydrology of northern peatlands are poorly understood. We used long-term drainage near a historic drainage ditch, separating an area from the main peatland, as an analogue for long-term drying in a northern temperate bog. The objective was to identify the impact of drier conditions on ecohydrological processes and groundwater flow patterns in an area now forested and an area that maintained a bog-like character. Groundwater flow patterns alternated between mostly downward flow and occasionally upward flow in the bog area and were mostly upward-orientated in the forested area, which suggested that there the flow pattern had shifted from bog- to fen-like conditions. Flow patterns were in agreement with changes in post-drainage hydraulic conductivities, storage capacity of the peat and water table levels. Compared to the bog, hydraulic conductivities in the forested area were one to three orders of magnitude lower in the uppermost 0.75 m of peat (paired t test, p 〈 0.05). Bulk density had increased and the water table level was lower and more strongly fluctuating in the forested area. Our findings suggest hydraulic gradients and flow patterns have changed due to increased evapotranspiration and interception with the emergence of a tree cover. The smaller size of the now-forested area relative to the remaining bog area appeared to be important for the hydrological change. With the main Mer Bleue bog as hinterland, enhanced runoff to the drainage channel had little effect on hydrologic and vegetation patterns. In the cut-off, smaller, now forested area pervasive changes in vegetation and hydrologic processes occurred. The difference in response to local drainage raises questions about tipping points with respect to the impact of drying on peatland ecosystems that need to be addressed in future research.

Description: Hurricane impacts on a pair of coastal forested watersheds: implications of selective hurricane damage to forest structure and streamflow dynamics Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 11519-11557, 2013 Author(s): A. D. Jayakaran, T. M. Williams, H. Ssegane, D. M. Amatya, B. Song, and C. C. Trettin Hurricanes are infrequent but influential disruptors of ecosystem processes in the southeastern Atlantic and Gulf coasts. Every southeastern forested wetland has the potential to be struck by a tropical cyclone. We examined the impact of Hurricane Hugo on two paired coastal watersheds in South Carolina in terms of stream flow and vegetation dynamics, both before and after the hurricane's passage in 1989. The study objectives were to quantify the magnitude and timing of changes including a reversal in relative streamflow-difference between two paired watersheds, and to examine the selective impacts of a hurricane on the vegetative composition of the forest. We related these impacts to their potential contribution to change watershed hydrology through altered evapotranspiration processes. Using over thirty years of monthly rainfall and streamflow data we showed that there was a significant transformation in the hydrologic character of the two watersheds – a transformation that occurred soon after the hurricane's passage. We linked the change in the rainfall-runoff relationship to a catastrophic shift in forest vegetation due to selective hurricane damage. While both watersheds were located in the path of the hurricane, extant forest structure varied between the two watersheds as a function of experimental forest management techniques on the treatment watershed. We showed that the primary damage was to older pines, and to some extent larger hardwood trees. We believe that lowered vegetative water use impacted both watersheds with increased outflows on both watersheds due to loss of trees following hurricane impact. However, one watershed was able to recover to pre hurricane levels of canopy transpiration at a quicker rate due to the greater abundance of pine seedlings and saplings in that watershed.

Description: Potential and limitations of multidecadal satellite soil moisture observations for selected climate model evaluation studies Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 3523-3542, 2013 Author(s): A. Loew, T. Stacke, W. Dorigo, R. de Jeu, and S. Hagemann Soil moisture is an essential climate variable (ECV) of major importance for land–atmosphere interactions and global hydrology. An appropriate representation of soil moisture dynamics in global climate models is therefore important. Recently, a first multidecadal, observation-based soil moisture dataset has become available that provides information on soil moisture dynamics from satellite observations (ECVSM, essential climate variable soil moisture). The present study investigates the potential and limitations of this new dataset for several applications in climate model evaluation. We compare soil moisture data from satellite observations, reanalysis and simulations from a state-of-the-art land surface model and analyze relationships between soil moisture and precipitation anomalies in the different dataset. Other potential applications like model parameter optimization or model initialization are not investigated in the present study. In a detailed regional study, we show that ECVSM is capable to capture well the interannual and intraannual soil moisture and precipitation dynamics in the Sahelian region. Current deficits of the new dataset are critically discussed and summarized at the end of the paper to provide guidance for an appropriate usage of the ECVSM dataset for climate studies.

Description: Simultaneous estimation of model state variables and observation and forecast biases using a two-stage hybrid Kalman filter Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 3499-3521, 2013 Author(s): V. R. N. Pauwels, G. J. M. De Lannoy, H.-J. Hendricks Franssen, and H. Vereecken In this paper, we present a two-stage hybrid Kalman filter to estimate both observation and forecast bias in hydrologic models, in addition to state variables. The biases are estimated using the discrete Kalman filter, and the state variables using the ensemble Kalman filter. A key issue in this multi-component assimilation scheme is the exact partitioning of the difference between observation and forecasts into state, forecast bias and observation bias updates. Here, the error covariances of the forecast bias and the unbiased states are calculated as constant fractions of the biased state error covariance, and the observation bias error covariance is a function of the observation prediction error covariance. In a series of synthetic experiments, focusing on the assimilation of discharge into a rainfall-runoff model, it is shown that both static and dynamic observation and forecast biases can be successfully estimated. The results indicate a strong improvement in the estimation of the state variables and resulting discharge as opposed to the use of a bias-unaware ensemble Kalman filter. Furthermore, minimal code modification in existing data assimilation software is needed to implement the method. The results suggest that a better performance of data assimilation methods should be possible if both forecast and observation biases are taken into account.

Description: Land use change effects on runoff generation in a humid tropical montane cloud forest region Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 3543-3560, 2013 Author(s): L. E. Muñoz-Villers and J. J. McDonnell While tropical montane cloud forests (TMCF) provide critical hydrological services to downstream regions throughout much of the humid tropics, catchment hydrology and impacts associated with forest conversion in these ecosystems remain poorly understood. Here, we compare the annual, seasonal and event-scale streamflow patterns and runoff generation processes of three neighbouring headwater catchments in central Veracruz (eastern Mexico) with similar pedological and geological characteristics, but different land cover: old-growth TMCF, 20 yr-old naturally regenerating TMCF and a heavily grazed pasture. We used a 2 yr record of high resolution rainfall and stream flow data (2008–2010) in combination with stable isotope and chemical tracer data collected for a series of storms during a 6-week period of increasing antecedent wetness (wetting-up cycle). Our results showed that annual and seasonal streamflow patterns in the mature and secondary forest were similar. In contrast, the pasture showed a 10% higher mean annual streamflow, most likely because of a lower rainfall interception. During the wetting-up cycle, storm runoff ratios increased at all three catchments (from 11 to 54% for the mature forest, 7 to 52% for the secondary forest and 3 to 59% for the pasture). With the increasing antecedent wetness, hydrograph separation analysis showed progressive increases of pre-event water contributions to total stormflow (from 35 to 99% in the mature forest, 26 to 92% in the secondary forest and 64 to 97% in the pasture). At all three sites, rainfall-runoff responses were dominated by subsurface flow generation processes for the majority of storms. However, for the largest and most intense storm (typically occurring once every 2 yr), sampled under wet antecedent conditions, the event water contribution in the pasture (34% on average) was much higher than in the forests (5% on average), indicating that rainfall infiltration capacity of the pasture was exceeded. This result suggests that despite the high permeability of the volcanic soils and underlying substrate in this TMCF environment, the conversion of forest to pasture may lead to important changes in runoff generation processes during large and high intensity storms. On the other hand, our results also showed that 20 yr of natural regeneration may be enough to largely restore the original hydrological conditions of this TMCF.

Description: Recent evolution of China's virtual water trade: analysis of selected crops and considerations for policy Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 10, 11613-11641, 2013 Author(s): J. Shi, J. Liu, and L. Pinter China has dramatically increased its virtual water import unconsciously for recent years. Many studies have focused on the quantity of traded virtual water but very few go into analysing geographic distribution and the properties of China's virtual water trade network. This paper provides a calculation and analysis of the crop-related virtual water trade network of China based on 27 major primary crops between 1986 and 2009. The results show that China is a net importer of virtual water from water-abundant areas of North and South America, and a net virtual water exporter to water-stressed areas of Asia, Africa, and Europe. Virtual water import is far larger than virtual water export and in both import and export a small number of trade partners control the supply chain. Grain crops are the major contributors to virtual water trade, and among grain crops soybeans, mostly imported from the US, Brazil and Argentina are the most significant. As crop yield and crop water productivity in North and South America are generally higher than those in Asia and Africa, the effect of China's crop-related virtual water trade positively contributes to optimizing crop water use efficiency at the global scale. In order to mitigate water scarcity and secure the food supply, virtual water should be actively incorporated into national water management strategies. From the national perspective, China should reduce the export and increase the import of water-intensive crops. But the sources of virtual water import need to be further diversified to reduce supply chain risks and increase resilience.

Description: Using the nonlinear aquifer storage–discharge relationship to simulate the base flow of glacier- and snowmelt-dominated basins in northwest China Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 17, 3577-3586, 2013 Author(s): R. Gan and Y. Luo Base flow is an important component in hydrological modeling. This process is usually modeled by using the linear aquifer storage–discharge relation approach, although the outflow from groundwater aquifers is nonlinear. To identify the accuracy of base flow estimates in rivers dominated by snowmelt and/or glacier melt in arid and cold northwestern China, a nonlinear storage–discharge relationship for use in SWAT (Soil Water Assessment Tool) modeling was developed and applied to the Manas River basin in the Tian Shan Mountains. Linear reservoir models and a digital filter program were used for comparisons. Meanwhile, numerical analysis of recession curves from 78 river gauge stations revealed variation in the parameters of the nonlinear relationship. It was found that the nonlinear reservoir model can improve the streamflow simulation, especially for low-flow period. The higher Nash–Sutcliffe efficiency, logarithmic efficiency, and volumetric efficiency, and lower percent bias were obtained when compared to the one-linear reservoir approach. The parameter b of the aquifer storage–discharge function varied mostly between 0.0 and 0.1, which is much smaller than the suggested value of 0.5. The coefficient a of the function is related to catchment properties, primarily the basin and glacier areas.

Description: Technical Note: Reducing the spin-up time of integrated surface water–groundwater models Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 18, 5169-5179, 2014 Author(s): H. Ajami, J. P. Evans, M. F. McCabe, and S. Stisen One of the main challenges in the application of coupled or integrated hydrologic models is specifying a catchment's initial conditions in terms of soil moisture and depth-to-water table (DTWT) distributions. One approach to reducing uncertainty in model initialization is to run the model recursively using either a single year or multiple years of forcing data until the system equilibrates with respect to state and diagnostic variables. However, such "spin-up" approaches often require many years of simulations, making them computationally intensive. In this study, a new hybrid approach was developed to reduce the computational burden of the spin-up procedure by using a combination of model simulations and an empirical DTWT function. The methodology is examined across two distinct catchments located in a temperate region of Denmark and a semi-arid region of Australia. Our results illustrate that the hybrid approach reduced the spin-up period required for an integrated groundwater–surface water–land surface model (ParFlow.CLM) by up to 50%. To generalize results to different climate and catchment conditions, we outline a methodology that is applicable to other coupled or integrated modeling frameworks when initialization from an equilibrium state is required.

Description: Extending periodic eddy covariance latent heat fluxes through tree sapflow measurements to estimate long-term total evaporation in a peat swamp forest Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 11, 13607-13661, 2014 Author(s): A. D. Clulow, C. S. Everson, M. G. Mengistu, J. S. Price, A. Nickless, and G. P. W. Jewitt A combination of measurement and modelling was used to find a pragmatic solution to estimate the annual total evaporation (ET) from the rare and indigenous Nkazana Peat Swamp Forest (PSF) on the east coast of Southern Africa to improve the water balance estimates within the area. Total evaporation was measured during three window periods (between seven and nine days each) using an eddy covariance (EC) system on a telescopic mast above the forest canopy. Sapflow of an understory and an emergent tree was measured using a low maintenance heat pulse velocity system for an entire hydrological year (October 2009 to September 2010). An empirical model was derived, describing the relationship between the observed ET of the Nkazana PSF measured during two of the window periods ( R 2 = 0.92 and 0.90) which, overlapped with sapflow measurements, thereby providing hourly estimates of predicted ET of the Nkazana PSF for a year, totalling 1125 mm (while rainfall was 650 mm). In building the empirical model, it was found that including the understory tree sapflow provided no benefit to the model performance. In addition, the observed emergent tree sapflow relationship with observed ET between the two field campaigns was consistent and could be represented by a single empirical model ( R 2 = 0.90; RMSE = 0.08 mm). During the window periods of EC measurement, no single meteorological variable was found to describe the Nkazana PSF ET satisfactorily. However, in terms of evaporation models, the hourly FAO56 Penman–Monteith equation best described the observed ET from EC during the August 2009 ( R 2 = 0.75), November 2009 ( R 2 = 0.85) and March 2010 ( R 2 = 0.76) field campaigns, compared to the Priestley–Taylor model ( R 2 = 0.54, 0.74 and 0.62 during the respective field campaigns). From the empirical model of ET and the FAO56 Penman–Monteith equation, a monthly crop factor ( K c ) was derived for the Nkazana PSF providing a method of estimating long-term swamp forest ET from meteorological data. The monthly crop factor indicated two distinct periods. From February to May, it was between 1.2 and 1.4 compared with June to January, when the crop factor was 0.8 to 1.0. The derived monthly K c values were verified as accurate (to one significant digit) using historical data measured at the same site, also using EC, from a~previous study. The measurements provided insights into the microclimate within a subtropical peat swamp forest and the contrasting sapflow of emergent and understory trees. They showed that expensive, high maintenance equipment can be used during manageable window periods in conjunction with low maintenance systems, dedicated to individual trees, to derive a model to estimate long-term ET over remote heterogeneous forests. In addition, the contrast in ET and rainfall emphasises the reliance of the Nkazana PSF on groundwater.

Description: Dye tracing for investigating flow and transport properties of hydrocarbon-polluted Rabots glaciär, Kebnekaise, Sweden Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 11, 13711-13744, 2014 Author(s): C. C. Clason, C. Coch, J. Jarsjö, K. Brugger, P. Jansson, and G. Rosqvist Over 11 000 L of hydrocarbon pollution was deposited on the surface of Rabots glaciär on the Kebnekaise Massif, northern Sweden, following the crash of a Royal Norwegian Air Force aircraft in March 2012. An environmental monitoring programme was subsequently commissioned, including water, snow and ice sampling. The scientific programme further included a series of dye tracing experiments during the 2013 melt season, conducted to investigate flow pathways for pollutants through the glacier hydrological system, and to gain new insight to the internal hydrological system of Rabots glaciär. Results of dye tracing reveal a degree of homogeneity in the topology of the drainage system throughout July and August, with an increase in efficiency as the season progresses, as reflected by decreasing temporary storage and dispersivity. Early onset of melting likely led to formation of an efficient, discrete drainage system early in the melt season, subject to decreasing sinuosity and braiding as the season progressed. Analysis of turbidity-discharge hysteresis further supports the formation of discrete, efficient drainage, with clockwise diurnal hysteresis suggesting easy mobilisation of readily-available sediments in channels. Dye injection immediately downstream of the pollution source zone revealed prolonged storage of dye followed by fast, efficient release. Twinned with a low dye recovery, and supported by sporadic detection of hydrocarbons in the proglacial river, we suggest that meltwater, and thus pollutants in solution, may be released periodically from this zone of the glacier hydrological system. The here identified dynamics of dye storage, dispersion and breakthrough indicate that the ultimate fate and permanence of pollutants in the glacier system is likely to be governed by storage of pollutants in the firn layer and ice mass, or within the internal hydrological system, where it may refreeze. This shows that future studies on the fate of hydrocarbons in pristine, glaciated mountain environments should address the extent to which pollutants in solution act like water molecules or whether they are more susceptible to, for example, refreezing into the surrounding ice, becoming stuck in micro-fractures and pore spaces, or sorption onto subglacial sediments.

Description: Hydrogeology of an Alpine rockfall aquifer system and its role in flood attenuation and maintaining baseflow Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 18, 4437-4452, 2014 Author(s): U. Lauber, P. Kotyla, D. Morche, and N. Goldscheider The frequency and intensity of extreme hydrological events in Alpine regions is projected to increase with climate change. The goal of this study is to better understand the functioning of aquifers composed of complex alluvial and rockfall deposits in Alpine valleys and to quantify the role of these natural storage spaces in flood attenuation and baseflow maintenance. Geomorphological and hydrogeological mapping, tracer tests, and continuous flow measurements were conducted in the Reintal (German Alps), where runoff from a karst spring infiltrates a series of postglacial alluvial/rockfall aquifers. During high-flow conditions, groundwater velocities of 30 m h −1 were determined along 500 m; hydrograph analyses revealed short lag times (5 h) between discharge peaks upstream and downstream from the aquifer series; the maximum discharge ratio downstream (22) and the peak recession coefficient (0.196 d −1 ) are low compared with other Alpine catchments. During low-flow conditions, the underground flow path length increased to 2 km and groundwater velocities decreased to 13 m h −1 . Downstream hydrographs revealed a delayed discharge response after 101 h and peaks damped by a factor of 1.5. These results indicate that alluvial/rockfall aquifers might play an important role in the flow regime and attenuation of floods in Alpine regions.

Description: Observed groundwater temperature response to recent climate change Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 18, 4453-4466, 2014 Author(s): K. Menberg, P. Blum, B. L. Kurylyk, and P. Bayer Climate change is known to have a considerable influence on many components of the hydrological cycle. Yet, the implications for groundwater temperature, as an important driver for groundwater quality, thermal use and storage, are not yet comprehensively understood. Furthermore, few studies have examined the implications of climate-change-induced groundwater temperature rise for groundwater-dependent ecosystems. Here, we examine the coupling of atmospheric and groundwater warming by employing stochastic and deterministic models. Firstly, several decades of temperature time series are statistically analyzed with regard to climate regime shifts (CRSs) in the long-term mean. The observed increases in shallow groundwater temperatures can be associated with preceding positive shifts in regional surface air temperatures, which are in turn linked to global air temperature changes. The temperature data are also analyzed with an analytical solution to the conduction–advection heat transfer equation to investigate how subsurface heat transfer processes control the propagation of the surface temperature signals into the subsurface. In three of the four monitoring wells, the predicted groundwater temperature increases driven by the regime shifts at the surface boundary condition generally concur with the observed groundwater temperature trends. Due to complex interactions at the ground surface and the heat capacity of the unsaturated zone, the thermal signals from distinct changes in air temperature are damped and delayed in the subsurface, causing a more gradual increase in groundwater temperatures. These signals can have a significant impact on large-scale groundwater temperatures in shallow and economically important aquifers. These findings demonstrate that shallow groundwater temperatures have responded rapidly to recent climate change and thus provide insight into the vulnerability of aquifers and groundwater-dependent ecosystems to future climate change.

Description: Evaluation of the satellite-based Global Flood Detection System for measuring river discharge: influence of local factors Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 18, 4467-4484, 2014 Author(s): B. Revilla-Romero, J. Thielen, P. Salamon, T. De Groeve, and G. R. Brakenridge One of the main challenges for global hydrological modelling is the limited availability of observational data for calibration and model verification. This is particularly the case for real-time applications. This problem could potentially be overcome if discharge measurements based on satellite data were sufficiently accurate to substitute for ground-based measurements. The aim of this study is to test the potentials and constraints of the remote sensing signal of the Global Flood Detection System for converting the flood detection signal into river discharge values. The study uses data for 322 river measurement locations in Africa, Asia, Europe, North America and South America. Satellite discharge measurements were calibrated for these sites and a validation analysis with in situ discharge was performed. The locations with very good performance will be used in a future project where satellite discharge measurements are obtained on a daily basis to fill the gaps where real-time ground observations are not available. These include several international river locations in Africa: the Niger, Volta and Zambezi rivers. Analysis of the potential factors affecting the satellite signal was based on a classification decision tree (random forest) and showed that mean discharge, climatic region, land cover and upstream catchment area are the dominant variables which determine good or poor performance of the measure\-ment sites. In general terms, higher skill scores were obtained for locations with one or more of the following characteristics: a river width higher than 1km; a large floodplain area and in flooded forest, a potential flooded area greater than 40%; sparse vegetation, croplands or grasslands and closed to open and open forest; leaf area index 〉 2; tropical climatic area; and without hydraulic infrastructures. Also, locations where river ice cover is seasonally present obtained higher skill scores. This work provides guidance on the best locations and limitations for estimating discharge values from these daily satellite signals.

Description: Sampling frequency trade-offs in the assessment of mean transit times of tropical montane catchment waters under semi-steady-state conditions Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 11, 12443-12488, 2014 Author(s): E. Timbe, D. Windhorst, R. Celleri, L. Timbe, P. Crespo, H.-G. Frede, J. Feyen, and L. Breuer Stream and soil waters were collected on a weekly basis in a tropical montane cloud forest catchment for two years and analyzed for stable water isotopes in order to infer transit time distribution functions and to define the mean transit times. Depending on the water type (stream or soil water), lumped distribution functions such as Exponential-Piston flow, Linear-Piston flow and Gamma models using temporal isotopic variations of precipitation event samples as input, were fitted. Samples were aggregated to daily, weekly, biweekly, monthly and bimonthly time scales in order to check the sensitivity of temporal sampling on model predictions. The study reveals that the effect of decreasing sampling frequency depends on the water type. For soil waters with transit times in the order of weeks to months, there was a clear trend of over prediction. In contrast, the trend of prediction for stream waters, with a dampened isotopic signal and mean transit times in the order of 2 to 4 years, was less clear and depending on the type of model used. The trade-off to coarse data resolutions could potentially lead to misleading conclusions on how water actually moves through the catchment, while at the same time predictions can reach better fitting efficiencies, lesser uncertainties, errors and biases. For both water types an optimal sampling frequency seems to be one or at most two weeks. The results of our analyses provide information for the planning (in particular in terms of cost-benefit and time requirements) of future fieldwork in similar Andean or other catchments.

Description: Technical Note: On the Matt–Shuttleworth approach to estimate crop water requirements Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 18, 4341-4348, 2014 Author(s): J. P. Lhomme, N. Boudhina, and M. M. Masmoudi The Matt–Shuttleworth method provides a way to make a one-step estimate of crop water requirements with the Penman–Monteith equation by translating the crop coefficients, commonly available in United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) publications, into equivalent surface resistances. The methodology is based upon the theoretical relationship linking crop surface resistance to a crop coefficient and involves the simplifying assumption that the reference crop evapotranspiration (ET 0 ) is equal to the Priestley–Taylor estimate with a fixed coefficient of 1.26. This assumption, used to eliminate the dependence of surface resistance on certain weather variables, is questionable; numerical simulations show that it can lead to substantial differences between the true value of surface resistance and its estimate. Consequently, the basic relationship between surface resistance and crop coefficient, without any assumption, appears to be more appropriate for inferring crop surface resistance, despite the interference of weather variables.

Description: Variational assimilation of remotely sensed flood extents using a 2-D flood model Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 18, 4325-4339, 2014 Author(s): X. Lai, Q. Liang, H. Yesou, and S. Daillet A variational data assimilation (4D-Var) method is proposed to directly assimilate flood extents into a 2-D dynamic flood model to explore a novel way of utilizing the rich source of remotely sensed data available from satellite imagery for better analyzing or predicting flood routing processes. For this purpose, a new cost function is specially defined to effectively fuse the hydraulic information that is implicitly indicated in flood extents. The potential of using remotely sensed flood extents for improving the analysis of flood routing processes is demonstrated by applying the present new data assimilation approach to both idealized and realistic numerical experiments.

Description: Quantitative high-resolution observations of soil water dynamics in a complicated architecture with time-lapse Ground-Penetrating Radar Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 11, 12365-12404, 2014 Author(s): P. Klenk, S. Jaumann, and K. Roth High-resolution time-lapse Ground-Penetrating Radar (GPR) observations of advancing and retreating water tables can yield a wealth of information about near-surface water content dynamics. In this study, we present and analyze a series of imbibition, drainage and infiltration experiments which have been carried out at our artificial ASSESS test site and observed with surface based GPR. The test site features a complicated but known subsurface architecture constructed with three different kinds of sand. It allows studying soil water dynamics with GPR under a wide range of different conditions. Here, we assess in particular (i) the accurate determination of soil water dynamics averaged over the whole vertical extent by evaluating the bottom reflection and (ii) the feasibility of monitoring the dynamic shape of the capillary fringe reflection. The phenomenology of the GPR response of a dynamically changing capillary fringe is developed from a soil physical point of view. We then explain experimentally observed phenomena based on numerical simulations of both the water content dynamics and the expected GPR response.

Description: Translating aboveground cosmic-ray neutron intensity to high-frequency soil moisture profiles at sub-kilometer scale Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 18, 4363-4379, 2014 Author(s): R. Rosolem, T. Hoar, A. Arellano, J. L. Anderson, W. J. Shuttleworth, X. Zeng, and T. E. Franz Above-ground cosmic-ray neutron measurements provide an opportunity to infer soil moisture at the sub-kilometer scale. Initial efforts to assimilate those measurements have shown promise. This study expands such analysis by investigating (1) how the information from aboveground cosmic-ray neutrons can constrain the soil moisture at distinct depths simulated by a land surface model, and (2) how changes in data availability (in terms of retrieval frequency) impact the dynamics of simulated soil moisture profiles. We employ ensemble data assimilation techniques in a "nearly-identical twin" experiment applied at semi-arid shrubland, rainfed agricultural field, and mixed forest biomes in the USA. The performance of the Noah land surface model is compared with and without assimilation of observations at hourly intervals, as well as every 2 days. Synthetic observations of aboveground cosmic-ray neutrons better constrain the soil moisture simulated by Noah in root-zone soil layers (0–100cm), despite the limited measurement depth of the sensor (estimated to be 12–20cm). The ability of Noah to reproduce a "true" soil moisture profile is remarkably good, regardless of the frequency of observations at the semi-arid site. However, soil moisture profiles are better constrained when assimilating synthetic cosmic-ray neutron observations hourly rather than every 2 days at the cropland and mixed forest sites. This indicates potential benefits for hydrometeorological modeling when soil moisture measurements are available at a relatively high frequency. Moreover, differences in summertime meteorological forcing between the semi-arid site and the other two sites may indicate a possible controlling factor to soil moisture dynamics in addition to differences in soil and vegetation properties.

Description: Large-scale 3-D modeling by integration of resistivity models and borehole data through inversion Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 18, 4349-4362, 2014 Author(s): N. Foged, P. A. Marker, A. V. Christansen, P. Bauer-Gottwein, F. Jørgensen, A.-S. Høyer, and E. Auken We present an automatic method for parameterization of a 3-D model of the subsurface, integrating lithological information from boreholes with resistivity models through an inverse optimization, with the objective of further detailing of geological models, or as direct input into groundwater models. The parameter of interest is the clay fraction, expressed as the relative length of clay units in a depth interval. The clay fraction is obtained from lithological logs and the clay fraction from the resistivity is obtained by establishing a simple petrophysical relationship, a translator function, between resistivity and the clay fraction. Through inversion we use the lithological data and the resistivity data to determine the optimum spatially distributed translator function. Applying the translator function we get a 3-D clay fraction model, which holds information from the resistivity data set and the borehole data set in one variable. Finally, we use k -means clustering to generate a 3-D model of the subsurface structures. We apply the procedure to the Norsminde survey in Denmark, integrating approximately 700 boreholes and more than 100 000 resistivity models from an airborne survey in the parameterization of the 3-D model covering 156 km 2 . The final five-cluster 3-D model differentiates between clay materials and different high-resistivity materials from information held in the resistivity model and borehole observations, respectively.

Description: Simulating long-term past changes in the balance between water demand and availability and assessing their main drivers at the river basin management scale Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 11, 12315-12364, 2014 Author(s): J. Fabre, D. Ruelland, A. Dezetter, and B. Grouillet The aim of this study was to assess the balance between water demand and availability and its spatial and temporal variability from 1971 to 2009 in the Herault (2500 km 2 , France) and the Ebro (85 000 km 2 , Spain) catchments. Natural streamflow was evaluated using a conceptual hydrological model. The regulation of river flow was accounted for through a widely applicable demand-driven reservoir management model applied to the largest dam in the Herault basin and to 11 major dams in the Ebro basin. Urban water demand was estimated from population and monthly unit water consumption data. Water demand for irrigation was computed from irrigated area, crop and soil data, and climatic forcing. Finally, a series of indicators comparing water supply and water demand at strategic resource and demand nodes were computed at a 10 day time step. Variations in water stress in each catchment over the past 40 years were successfully modeled, taking into account climatic and anthropogenic pressures and changes in water management strategies over time. Observed changes in discharge were explained by separating human and hydro-climatic pressures on water resources: respectively 20 and 3% of the decrease in the Ebro and the Herault discharges were linked to human-induced changes. Although key areas of the Herault basin were shown to be highly sensitive to hydro-climatic variability, the balance between water uses and availability in the Ebro basin appears to be more critical, owing to high agricultural pressure on water resources. The proposed modeling framework is currently being used to assess water stress under climatic and socio-economic prospective scenarios. Further research will investigate the effectiveness of adaptation policies aimed at maintaining the balance between water use and availability.

Description: Time-series analysis of the long-term hydrologic impacts of afforestation in the Águeda watershed of North-Central Portugal Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 11, 12223-12256, 2014 Author(s): D. Hawtree, J. P. Nunes, J. J. Keizer, R. Jacinto, J. Santos, M. E. Rial-Rivas, A.-K. Boulet, F. Tavares-Wahren, and K.-H. Feger The north-central region of Portugal has undergone significant afforestation of the species Pinus pinaster and Eucalyptus globulus since the early 1900s; however, the long-term hydrologic impacts of this land cover change are not fully understood. To contribute to a better understanding of the potential hydrologic impacts of this land cover change, this study examines the temporal trends in 7 years of data from the Águeda watershed (part of the Vouga Basin) over the period of 1936 to 2010. Meteorological and hydrological records were analysed using a combined Thiel–Sen/Mann–Kendall trend testing approach, to assess the magnitude and significance of patterns in the observed data. These trend tests indicated that there had been no significant reduction in streamflow yield over either the entire test period, or during sub-record periods, despite the large-scale afforestation which had taken place. This lack of change is attributed to both the characteristics of the watershed and the nature of the land cover change. By contrast, a number of significant trends were found for baseflow index, which showed positive trends in the early data record (primarily during Pinus pinaster afforestation), followed by a reversal to negative trends later in the data record (primarily during Eucalyptus globulus afforestation). These changes are attributed to vegetation impacts on streamflow generating processes, both due to the species differences and to alterations in soil properties (i.e. promoting water repellency of the topsoil). These results highlight the importance of considering both vegetation types/dynamics and watershed characteristic when assessing hydrologic impacts, in particular with respect to soil properties.

Description: Reply to D. L. Peters' comment on "Streamflow input to Lake Athabasca, Canada" by Rasouli et al. (2013) Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 11, 12257-12270, 2014 Author(s): K. Rasouli, M. A. Hernández-Henríquez, and S. J. Déry This paper provides a reply to a comment from Peters (2014) on our recent effort focused on evaluating changes in streamflow input to Lake Athabasca, Canada. Lake Athabasca experienced a 21.2% decline in streamflow input between 1960 and 2010 that has led to a marked decline in its water levels in recent decades. A reassessment of trends in naturalized Lake Athabasca water levels shows insignificant changes from our previous findings reported in Rasouli et al. (2013), and hence our previous conclusions remain unchanged. The reply closes with recommendations for future research to minimize uncertainties in historical assessments of trends in Lake Athabasca water levels and to better project its future water levels driven by climate change and anthropogenic activities in the Athabasca Lake Basin.

Description: Is sinuosity a function of slope and bankfull discharge? – A case study of the meandering rivers in the Pannonian Basin Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 11, 12271-12290, 2014 Author(s): J. Petrovszki, G. Timár, and G. Molnár Pre-regulation channel sinuosities of the meandering rivers of the Pannonian Basin are analysed in order to define a mathematical model to estimate the influence of the bankfull discharge and the channel slope on them. As a primary database, data triplets of slope, discharge and sinuosity values were extracted from historical and modern datasets and pre-regulation historical topographic maps. Channel slope values were systematically modified to estimate figures valid before the river regulation works. The bankfull discharges were estimated from the average discharges using a robust yet complex method. The "classical" graphs of Leopold and Wolman (1957), Ackers and Charlton (1970b) and Schumm and Khan (1972) were compiled to a set up a theoretical surface, whose parameters are estimated by the real values of the above database, containing characteristics of the Pannonian Basin rivers. As a result it occurred that there is a two-dimensional function of the bankfull discharges, which provides a good estimation of the most probable sinuosity values of the rivers with the given slope and discharge characteristics. The average RMS error of this estimation is around 15% on this dataset and believed to be the effect of the non-analysed changes in the sediment discharge and size distribution.

Description: Technical Note: Field experiences using UV/VIS sensors for high-resolution monitoring of nitrate in groundwater Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 11, 12291-12314, 2014 Author(s): M. Huebsch, F. Grimmeisen, M. Zemann, O. Fenton, K. G. Richards, P. Jordan, A. Sawarieh, P. Blum, and N. Goldscheider Two different in-situ spectrophotometers are compared that were used in the field to determine nitrate-nitrogen (NO 3 -N) concentrations at two distinct spring discharge sites. One sensor was a double wavelength spectrophotometer (DWS) and the other a multiple wavelength spectrophotometer (MWS). The objective of the study was to review the hardware options, determine ease of calibration, accuracy, influence of additional substances and to assess positive and negative aspects of the two sensors as well as troubleshooting and trade-offs. Both sensors are sufficient to monitor highly time-resolved NO 3 -N concentrations in emergent groundwater. However, the chosen path length of the sensors had a significant influence on the sensitivity and the range of detectable NO 3 -N. The accuracy of the calculated NO 3 -N concentrations of the sensors can be affected, if the content of additional substances such as turbidity, organic matter, nitrite or hydrogen carbonate significantly varies after the sensors have been calibrated to a particular water matrix. The MWS offers more possibilities for calibration and error detection, but requires more expertise compared with the DWS.

Description: Regional parent flood frequency distributions in Europe – Part 2: Climate and scale controls Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 18, 4391-4401, 2014 Author(s): J. L. Salinas, A. Castellarin, S. Kohnová, and T. R. Kjeldsen This study aims to better understand the effect of catchment scale and climate on the statistical properties of regional flood frequency distributions. A database of L-moment ratios of annual maximum series (AMS) of peak discharges from Austria, Italy and Slovakia, involving a total of 813 catchments with more than 25 yr of record length is presented, together with mean annual precipitation (MAP) and basin area as catchment descriptors surrogates of climate and scale controls. A purely data-based investigation performed on the database shows that the generalized extreme value (GEV) distribution provides a better representation of the averaged sample L-moment ratios compared to the other distributions considered, for catchments with medium to higher values of MAP independently of catchment area, while the three-parameter lognormal distribution is probably a more appropriate choice for drier (lower MAP) intermediate-sized catchments, which presented higher skewness values. Sample L-moment ratios do not follow systematically any of the theoretical two-parameter distributions. In particular, the averaged values of L-coefficient of skewness (L-Cs) are always larger than Gumbel 's fixed L-Cs. The results presented in this paper contribute to the progress in defining a set of "process-driven" pan-European flood frequency distributions and to assess possible effects of environmental change on its properties.

Description: Quantification of hydrologic impacts of climate change in a Mediterranean basin in Sardinia, Italy, through high-resolution simulations Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 18, 5201-5217, 2014 Author(s): M. Piras, G. Mascaro, R. Deidda, and E. R. Vivoni Future climate projections robustly indicate that the Mediterranean region will experience a significant decrease of mean annual precipitation and an increase in temperature. These changes are expected to seriously affect the hydrologic regime, with a limitation of water availability and an intensification of hydrologic extremes, and to negatively impact local economies. In this study, we quantify the hydrologic impacts of climate change in the Rio Mannu basin (RMB), an agricultural watershed of 472.5 km 2 in Sardinia, Italy. To simulate the wide range of runoff generation mechanisms typical of Mediterranean basins, we adopted a physically based, distributed hydrologic model. The high-resolution forcings in reference and future conditions (30-year records for each period) were provided by four combinations of global and regional climate models, bias-corrected and downscaled in space and time (from ~25 km, 24 h to 5 km, 1 h) through statistical tools. The analysis of the hydrologic model outputs indicates that the RMB is expected to be severely impacted by future climate change. The range of simulations consistently predict (i) a significant diminution of mean annual runoff at the basin outlet, mainly due to a decreasing contribution of the runoff generation mechanisms depending on water available in the soil; (ii) modest variations in mean annual runoff and intensification of mean annual discharge maxima in flatter sub-basins with clay and loamy soils, likely due to a higher occurrence of infiltration excess runoff; (iii) reduction of soil water content and actual evapotranspiration in most areas of the basin; and (iv) a drop in the groundwater table. Results of this study are useful to support the adoption of adaptive strategies for management and planning of agricultural activities and water resources in the region.

Description: Complex networks, streamflow, and hydrometric monitoring system design Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 11, 13663-13710, 2014 Author(s): M. Halverson and S. Fleming Network theory is applied to an array of streamflow gauges located in the Coast Mountains of British Columbia and Yukon, Canada. The goal of the analysis is to assess whether insights from this branch of mathematical graph theory can be meaningfully applied to hydrometric data, and more specifically, whether it may help guide decisions concerning stream gauge placement so that the full complexity of the regional hydrology is efficiently captured. The streamflow data, when represented as a complex network, has a global clustering coefficient and average shortest path length consistent with small-world networks, which are a class of stable and efficient networks common in nature, but the results did not clearly suggest a scale-free network. Stability helps ensure that the network is robust to the loss of nodes; in the context of a streamflow network, stability is interpreted as insensitivity to station removal at random. Community structure is also evident in the streamflow network. A community detection algorithm identified 10 separate communities, each of which appears to be defined by the combination of its median seasonal flow regime (pluvial, nival, hybrid, or glacial, which in this region in turn mainly reflects basin elevation) and geographic proximity to other communities (reflecting shared or different daily meteorological forcing). Betweenness analyses additionally suggest a handful of key stations which serve as bridges between communities and might therefore be highly valued. We propose that an idealized sampling network should sample high-betweenness stations, as well as small-membership communities which are by definition rare or undersampled relative to other communities, while retaining some degree of redundancy to maintain network robustness.

Description: Assessing winter cover crop nutrient uptake efficiency using a water quality simulation model Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 18, 5239-5253, 2014 Author(s): I.-Y. Yeo, S. Lee, A. M. Sadeghi, P. C. Beeson, W. D. Hively, G. W. McCarty, and M. W. Lang Winter cover crops are an effective conservation management practice with potential to improve water quality. Throughout the Chesapeake Bay watershed (CBW), which is located in the mid-Atlantic US, winter cover crop use has been emphasized, and federal and state cost-share programs are available to farmers to subsidize the cost of cover crop establishment. The objective of this study was to assess the long-term effect of planting winter cover crops to improve water quality at the watershed scale (~ 50 km 2 ) and to identify critical source areas of high nitrate export. A physically based watershed simulation model, Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT), was calibrated and validated using water quality monitoring data to simulate hydrological processes and agricultural nutrient cycling over the period of 1990–2000. To accurately simulate winter cover crop biomass in relation to growing conditions, a new approach was developed to further calibrate plant growth parameters that control the leaf area development curve using multitemporal satellite-based measurements of species-specific winter cover crop performance. Multiple SWAT scenarios were developed to obtain baseline information on nitrate loading without winter cover crops and to investigate how nitrate loading could change under different winter cover crop planting scenarios, including different species, planting dates, and implementation areas. The simulation results indicate that winter cover crops have a negligible impact on the water budget but significantly reduce nitrate leaching to groundwater and delivery to the waterways. Without winter cover crops, annual nitrate loading from agricultural lands was approximately 14 kg ha −1 , but decreased to 4.6–10.1 kg ha −1 with cover crops resulting in a reduction rate of 27–67% at the watershed scale. Rye was the most effective species, with a potential to reduce nitrate leaching by up to 93% with early planting at the field scale. Early planting of cover crops (~ 30 days of additional growing days) was crucial, as it lowered nitrate export by an additional ~ 2 kg ha −1 when compared to late planting scenarios. The effectiveness of cover cropping increased with increasing extent of cover crop implementation. Agricultural fields with well-drained soils and those that were more frequently used to grow corn had a higher potential for nitrate leaching and export to the waterways. This study supports the effective implementation of cover crop programs, in part by helping to target critical pollution source areas for cover crop implementation.

Description: Derivation and evaluation of landslide-triggering thresholds by a Monte Carlo approach Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 18, 4913-4931, 2014 Author(s): D. J. Peres and A. Cancelliere Assessment of landslide-triggering rainfall thresholds is useful for early warning in prone areas. In this paper, it is shown how stochastic rainfall models and hydrological and slope stability physically based models can be advantageously combined in a Monte Carlo simulation framework to generate virtually unlimited-length synthetic rainfall and related slope stability factor of safety data, exploiting the information contained in observed rainfall records and field-measurements of soil hydraulic and geotechnical parameters. The synthetic data set, dichotomized in triggering and non-triggering rainfall events, is analyzed by receiver operating characteristics (ROC) analysis to derive stochastic-input physically based thresholds that optimize the trade-off between correct and wrong predictions. Moreover, the specific modeling framework implemented in this work, based on hourly analysis, enables one to analyze the uncertainty related to variability of rainfall intensity within events and to past rainfall (antecedent rainfall). A specific focus is dedicated to the widely used power-law rainfall intensity–duration ( I – D ) thresholds. Results indicate that variability of intensity during rainfall events influences significantly rainfall intensity and duration associated with landslide triggering. Remarkably, when a time-variable rainfall-rate event is considered, the simulated triggering points may be separated with a very good approximation from the non-triggering ones by a I – D power-law equation, while a representation of rainfall as constant–intensity hyetographs globally leads to non-conservative results. This indicates that the I – D power-law equation is adequate to represent the triggering part due to transient infiltration produced by rainfall events of variable intensity and thus gives a physically based justification for this widely used threshold form, which provides results that are valid when landslide occurrence is mostly due to that part. These conditions are more likely to occur in hillslopes of low specific upslope contributing area, relatively high hydraulic conductivity and high critical wetness ratio. Otherwise, rainfall time history occurring before single rainfall events influences landslide triggering, determining whether a threshold based only on rainfall intensity and duration may be sufficient or it needs to be improved by the introduction of antecedent rainfall variables. Further analyses show that predictability of landslides decreases with soil depth, critical wetness ratio and the increase of vertical basal drainage (leakage) that occurs in the presence of a fractured bedrock.

Description: Climate change and stream temperature projections in the Columbia River basin: habitat implications of spatial variation in hydrologic drivers Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 18, 4897-4912, 2014 Author(s): D. L. Ficklin, B. L. Barnhart, J. H. Knouft, I. T. Stewart, E. P. Maurer, S. L. Letsinger, and G. W. Whittaker Water temperature is a primary physical factor regulating the persistence and distribution of aquatic taxa. Considering projected increases in air temperature and changes in precipitation in the coming century, accurate assessment of suitable thermal habitats in freshwater systems is critical for predicting aquatic species' responses to changes in climate and for guiding adaptation strategies. We use a hydrologic model coupled with a stream temperature model and downscaled general circulation model outputs to explore the spatially and temporally varying changes in stream temperature for the late 21st century at the subbasin and ecological province scale for the Columbia River basin (CRB). On average, stream temperatures are projected to increase 3.5 °C for the spring, 5.2 °C for the summer, 2.7 °C for the fall, and 1.6 °C for the winter. While results indicate changes in stream temperature are correlated with changes in air temperature, our results also capture the important, and often ignored, influence of hydrological processes on changes in stream temperature. Decreases in future snowcover will result in increased thermal sensitivity within regions that were previously buffered by the cooling effect of flow originating as snowmelt. Other hydrological components, such as precipitation, surface runoff, lateral soil water flow, and groundwater inflow, are negatively correlated to increases in stream temperature depending on the ecological province and season. At the ecological province scale, the largest increase in annual stream temperature was within the Mountain Snake ecological province, which is characterized by migratory coldwater fish species. Stream temperature changes varied seasonally with the largest projected stream temperature increases occurring during the spring and summer for all ecological provinces. Our results indicate that stream temperatures are driven by local processes and ultimately require a physically explicit modeling approach to accurately characterize the habitat regulating the distribution and diversity of aquatic taxa.

Description: Monitoring and modelling of soil–plant interactions: the joint use of ERT, sap flow and Eddy Covariance data to characterize the volume of an orange tree root zone Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 11, 13353-13384, 2014 Author(s): G. Cassiani, J. Boaga, D. Vanella, M. T. Perri, and S. Consoli Mass and energy exchanges between soil, plants and atmosphere control a number of key environmental processes involving hydrology, biota and climate. The understanding of these exchanges also play a critical role for practical purposes e.g. in precision agriculture. In this paper we present a methodology based on coupling innovative data collection and models in order to obtain quantitative estimates of the key parameters of such complex flow system. In particular we propose the use of hydro-geophysical monitoring via 4-D Electrical Resistivity Tomography (ERT) in conjunction with measurements of plant transpiration via sap flow and evapotranspiration from Eddy Covariance (EC). This abundance of data is fed to a spatially distributed soil model in order to characterize the distribution of active roots. We conducted experiments in an orange orchard in Eastern Sicily (Italy), characterized by the typical Mediterranean semi-arid climate. The subsoil dynamics, particularly influenced by irrigation and root uptake, were characterized mainly by the ERT setup, consisting of 48 buried electrodes on 4 instrumented micro boreholes (about 1.2 m deep) placed at the corners of a square (about 1.3 m in side) surrounding the orange tree, plus 24 mini-electrodes on the surface spaced 0.1 m on a square grid. During the monitoring, we collected repeated ERT and TDR soil moisture measurements, soil water samples, sap flow measurements from the orange tree and EC data. We conducted a laboratory calibration of the soil electrical properties as a function of moisture content and pore water electrical conductivity. Irrigation, precipitation, sap flow and ET data are available allowing knowledge of the system's long term forcing conditions on the system. This information was used to calibrate a 1-D Richards' equation model representing the dynamics of the volume monitored via 3-D ERT. Information on the soil hydraulic properties was collected from laboratory and field experiments. The successful results of the calibrated modeling exercise allow the quantification of the soil volume interested by root water uptake. This volume is much smaller (with a surface area less than 2 m 2 , and about 40 cm thickness) than expected and assumed in the design of classical drip irrigation schemes that prove to be losing at least half of the irrigated water that is not uptaken by the plants.

Description: Impact of changes in grain size and pore space on the hydraulic conductivity and spectral induced polarization response of sand Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 15, 1785-1794, 2011 Author(s): K. Koch, A. Kemna, J. Irving, and K. Holliger Understanding the influence of pore space characteristics on the hydraulic conductivity and spectral induced polarization (SIP) response is critical for establishing relationships between the electrical and hydrological properties of surficial unconsolidated sedimentary deposits, which host the bulk of the world's readily accessible groundwater resources. Here, we present the results of laboratory SIP measurements on industrial-grade, saturated quartz samples with granulometric characteristics ranging from fine sand to fine gravel. We altered the pore space characteristics by changing (i) the grain size spectra, (ii) the degree of compaction, and (iii) the level of sorting. We then examined how these changes affect the SIP response, the hydraulic conductivity, and the specific surface area of the considered samples. In general, the results indicate a clear connection between the SIP response and the granulometric as well as pore space characteristics. In particular, we observe a systematic correlation between the hydraulic conductivity and the relaxation time of the Cole-Cole model describing the observed SIP effect for the entire range of considered grain sizes. The results do, however, also indicate that the detailed nature of these relations depends strongly on variations in the pore space characteristics, such as, for example, the degree of compaction. This underlines the complexity of the origin of the SIP signal as well as the difficulty to relate it to a single structural factor of a studied sample, and hence raises some fundamental questions with regard to the practical use of SIP measurements as site- and/or sample-independent predictors of the hydraulic conductivity.

Description: WRF simulation of a precipitation event over the Tibetan Plateau, China – an assessment using remote sensing and ground observations Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 15, 1795-1817, 2011 Author(s): F. Maussion, D. Scherer, R. Finkelnburg, J. Richters, W. Yang, and T. Yao Meteorological observations over the Tibetan Plateau (TiP) are scarce, and precipitation estimations over this remote region are difficult. The constantly improving capabilities of numerical weather prediction (NWP) models offer the opportunity to reduce this problem by providing precipitation fields and other meteorological variables of high spatial and temporal resolution. Longer time periods of years to decades can be simulated by NWP models by successive model runs of shorter periods, which can be described by the term "regional atmospheric reanalysis". In this paper, we assess the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) models capacity in retrieving rain- and snowfall on the TiP in such a configuration using a nested approach: the simulations are conducted with three nested domains at spatial resolutions of 30, 10, and 2 km. A validation study is carried out for a one-month period with a special focus on one-week (22–28 October 2008), during which strong rain- and snowfall was observed on the TiP. The output of the model in each resolution is compared to the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) data set for precipitation and to the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) data set for snow extent. TRMM and WRF data are then compared to weather-station measurements. Our results suggest an overall improvement from WRF over TRMM with respect to weather-station measurements. Various configurations of the model with different nesting and forcing strategies, as well as physical parameterisation schemes are compared to propose a suitable design for a regional atmospheric reanalysis over the TiP. The WRF model showed good accuracy in simulating snow- and rainfall on the TiP for a one-month simulation period. Our study reveals that there is nothing like an optimal model strategy applicable for the high-altitude TiP, its fringing high-mountain areas of extremely complex topography and the low-altitude land and sea regions from which much of the precipitation on the TiP is originating. The choice of the physical parameterisation scheme will thus be always a compromise depending on the specific purpose of a model simulation. Our study demonstrates the high importance of orographic precipitation, but the problem of the orographic bias remains unsolved since reliable observational data are still missing. The results are relevant for anyone interested in carrying out a regional atmospheric reanalysis. Many hydrological analyses and applications like rainfall-runoff modelling or the analysis of flood events require precipitation rates at daily or even hourly intervals. Thus, our study offers a process-oriented alternative for retrieving precipitation fields of high spatio-temporal resolution in regions like the TiP, where other data sources are limited.

Description: Domestic wells have high probability of pumping septic tank leachate Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 8, 5701-5732, 2011 Author(s): J. E. Horn and T. Harter Onsite wastewater treatment systems such as septic systems are common in rural and semi-rural areas around the world; in the US, about 25–30 % of households are served by a septic system and a private drinking water well. Site-specific conditions and local groundwater flow are often ignored when installing septic systems and wells. Particularly in areas with small lots, thus a high septic system density, these typically shallow wells are prone to contamination by septic system leachate. Typically, mass balance approaches are used to determine a maximum septic system density that would prevent contamination of the aquifer. In this study, we estimate the probability of a well pumping partially septic system leachate. A detailed groundwater and transport model is used to calculate the capture zone of a typical drinking water well. A spatial probability analysis is performed to assess the probability that a capture zone overlaps with a septic system drainfield depending on aquifer properties, lot and drainfield size. We show that a high septic system density poses a high probability of pumping septic system leachate. The hydraulic conductivity of the aquifer has a strong influence on the intersection probability. We conclude that mass balances calculations applied on a regional scale underestimate the contamination risk of individual drinking water wells by septic systems. This is particularly relevant for contaminants released at high concentrations, for substances which experience limited attenuation, and those being harmful even in low concentrations.

Description: Use of ENVISAT ASAR Global Monitoring Mode to complement optical data in the mapping of rapid broad-scale flooding in Pakistan Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 8, 5769-5809, 2011 Author(s): D. O'Grady, M. Leblanc, and D. Gillieson Envisat ASAR Global Monitoring Mode (GM) data are used to produce maps of the extent of the flooding in Pakistan which are made available to the rapid response effort within 24 h of acquisition. The high temporal frequency and independence of the data from cloud-free skies makes GM data a viable tool for mapping flood waters during those periods where optical satellite data is unavailable, which may be crucial to rapid response disaster planning, where thousands of lives are affected. Image differencing techniques are used, with pre-flood baseline image backscatter values being deducted from target values to eliminate regions with a permanent flood-like radar response due to volume scattering and attenuation, and to highlight the low response caused by specular reflection by open flood water. The effect of local incidence angle on the received signal is mitigated by ensuring that the deducted image is acquired from the same orbit track as the target image. Poor separability of the water class with land in areas beyond the river channels is tackled using a region-growing algorithm which seeks threshold-conformance from seed pixels at the center of the river channels. The resultant mapped extents are tested against MODIS SWIR data where available, with encouraging results.

Description: Soil weathering rates in 21 catchments of the Canadian Shield Hydrology and Earth System Sciences Discussions, 8, 5743-5768, 2011 Author(s): D. Houle, P. Lamoureux, N. Bélanger, M. Bouchard, C. Gagnon, S. Couture, and A. Bouffard Soil mineral weathering represents an essential source of nutrient base cation (Ca, Mg and K) for forest growth in addition to provide a buffering power against precipitation acidity for soils and surface waters. Weathering rates of base cations were obtained for 21 catchments located within the temperate and the boreal forest of the Canadian Shield with the geochemical model PROFILE. Weathering rates ranged from 0.58 to 4.46 kmol c ha −1 yr −1 and their spatial variation within the studied area was mostly in agreement with spatial variations in soil mineralogy. Weathering rates of Ca and Mg were significantly correlated ( r = 0.80 and 0.64) with their respective lake concentrations. Weathering rates of K and Na did not correlate with lake concentrations of K and Na. The modeled weathering rates for each catchment were also compared with estimations of net catchment exportations. The result show that modeled weathering rates of Ca were not significantly different than the net catchment exportations while modeled weathering rates of Mg were higher by 51 %. Larger differences were observed for K and Na weathering rates that were significantly different than net catchment exportations being 6.9 and 2.2 times higher than net exportations, respectively. The results for K were expected given its high reactivity with biotic compartments and suggest that most of the K produced by weathering reactions was retained within soil catchments and/or above ground biomass. This explanation does not apply to Na, however, which is a conservative element in forest ecosystems because of the insignificant needs of Na for soil microorganisms and above ground vegetations. It raises concern about the liability of the PROFILE model to provide reliable values of Na weathering rates. Overall, we concluded that the PROFILE model is powerful enough to reproduce spatial geographical gradients in weathering rates for relatively large areas as well as adequately predict absolute weathering rates values for the sum of base cations, Ca and Mg.

Description: Spatio-temporal variations in soil moisture and physicochemical properties of a typical semiarid sand-meadow-desert landscape as influenced by land use Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 15, 1865-1877, 2011 Author(s): L. Duan, T. Liu, X. Wang, G. Wang, L. Ma, and Y. Luo A good understanding of the interrelations between land cover alteration and changes in hydrologic conditions (e.g., soil moisture) as well as soil physicochemical properties (e.g., fine soil particles and nutrients) is crucial for maintaining the fragile hydrologic and environmental conditions of semiarid land, such as the Horqin Sandy Land in China, but is lacking in existing literature. The objectives of this study were to examine: (1) spatio-temporal variations of soil moisture and physicochemical properties in semiarid land; and (2) how those variations are influenced by land cover alteration. Using the data collected in a 9.71 km 2 well-instrumented area of the Horqin Sandy Land, this study examined by visual examination and statistical analyses the spatio-temporal variations of soil moisture and physicochemical properties. The results indicated that for the study area, the soil moisture and physicochemical properties were dependent on local topography, soil texture, vegetation density, and human activity. Long-term reclamation for agriculture was found to reduce soil moisture by over 23 % and significantly (p-value 〈 0.05) lower the contents of soil organic matter, fine soil particles, and nutrients.