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2010
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216 pages
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Hydrological modeling has become a widely accepted theoretical tool for water resources engineering and management. Rainfall-runoff models are used both for short and medium time management (for example flood forecasting) and long-time design purposes. However, the application of hydrological models is limited due to several reasons. One important limitation is imposed by the availability of data and parameter estimation. Discharges are only measured at a few selected river cross sections, leading to a small number of catchments for which the runoff calculated from the models might be verified. Further, the high spatial and temporal variability of the meteorological input (such as precipitation, temperature or wind) cannot fully be captured by the usually small number of meteorological stations. Radar measurement of precipitation can provide more detailed space time information on precipitation but unfortunately the reliability of the data is at present still low. Other influencing ...
Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 2008
The estimation of hydrological model parameters is a challenging task. With increasing capacity of computational power several complex optimization algorithms have emerged, but none of the algorithms gives an unique and very best parameter vector. The parameters of hydrological models depend upon the input data. The quality 5 of input data cannot be assured as there may be measurement errors for both input and state variables. In this study a methodology has been developed to find a set of robust parameter vectors for a hydrological model. To see the effect of observational error on parameters, stochastically generated synthetic measurement errors were applied to observed discharge and temperature data. With this modified data, the model 10 was calibrated and the effect of measurement errors on parameters was analysed. It was found that the measurement errors have a significant effect on the best performing parameter vector. The erroneous data led to very different optimal parameter vectors. To overcome this problem and to find a set of robust parameter vectors, a geometrical approach based on the half space depth was used. The depth of the set of N randomly 15 generated parameters was calculated with respect to the set with the best model performance (Nash-Sutclife efficiency was used for this study) for each parameter vector. Based on the depth of parameter vectors, one can find a set of robust parameter vectors. The results show that the parameters chosen according to the above criteria have low sensitivity and perform well when transfered to a different time period. The method 20 is demonstrated on the upper Neckar catchment in Germany. The conceptual HBV model was used for this study.
2008
The extent to which the five parameters of a unit-hydrograph-based rainfall–streamflow model vary with modelling time-step is demonstrated for a 10.6 km catchment in Wales. As the data time-step decreases from 24 hours to one hour, the calibrated parameters change by between 52% and 81%. The impact of time-stepdependent model parameters on the uncertainty in statistical relationships linking a model parameter and catchment properties is discussed. A simple method is described for normalising the parameters to give time-stepindependent values. The results are discussed in terms of model parameter regionalisation towards estimation, from rainfall, of continuous streamflow in ungauged (flow) basins. Possible future work is outlined to compare the normalised model parameters presented in the paper with similar results from a modelling methodology presented by other authors that yields time-step-independent model parameters directly from analysis of discrete data.
Hydrological …, 2004
Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 2015
During the last decade the opportunity and usefulness of using remote-sensing data in hydrology, hydrometeorology and geomorphology has become even more evident and clear. Satellite-based products often allow for the advantage of observing hydrologic variables in a distributed way, offering a different view with respect to traditional observations that can help with understanding and modeling the hydrological cycle. Moreover, remote-sensing data are fundamental in scarce data environments. The use of satellite-derived digital elevation models (DEMs), which are now globally available at 30 m resolution (e.g., from Shuttle Radar Topographic Mission, SRTM), have become standard practice in hydrologic model implementation, but other types of satellite-derived data are still underutilized. As a consequence there is the need for developing and testing techniques that allow the opportunities given by remote-sensing data to be exploited, parameterizing hydrological models and improving their calibration. In this work, Meteosat Second Generation land-surface temperature (LST) estimates and surface soil moisture (SSM), available from European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (EUMETSAT) H-SAF, are used together with streamflow observations (S. N.) to calibrate the Continuum hydrological model that computes such state variables in a prognostic mode. The first part of the work aims at proving that satellite observations can be exploited to reduce uncertainties in parameter calibration by reducing the parameter equifinality that can become an issue in forecast mode. In the second part, four parameter estimation strategies are implemented and tested in a comparative mode: (i) a multi-objective approach that includes both satellite and ground observations which is an attempt to use different sources of data to add constraints to the parameters; (ii and iii) two approaches solely based on remotely sensed data that reproduce the case of a scarce data environment where streamflow observation are not available; (iv) a standard calibration based on streamflow observations used as a benchmark for the others. Two Italian catchments are used as a test bed to verify the model capability in reproducing long-term (multi-year) simulations. The results of the analysis evidence that, as a result of the model structure and the nature itself of the catchment hydrologic processes, some model parameters are only weakly dependent on discharge observations, and prove the usefulness of using data from both ground stations and satellites to additionally constrain the parameters in the calibration process and reduce the number of equifinal solutions.
Journal of Hydrology, 1993
A streamflow model of a 4800 km 2 rural catchment using distributed rain inputs and infiltration was set up in a computer. Rain inputs were provided in the form of half-hour accumulation maps of real storm events collected by radar over southern Quebec. Point sampling of the accumulation pattern simulated gauge returns. Interpolation of the "gauge' data to complete coverage was accomplished using Thiessen polygons. Hydrographs were computed for the interpolated and radar accumulation fields as a simple function of distance from the catchment outflow point. Ten sampling densities were used, and for each density hydrographs were computed for a large number of repetitions with gauges redistributed randomly for each realization. Comparisons of estimates of total rainfall, total runoff, peak runoff and time to peak between the hydrographs resulting from the random sampling and interpolation, and that computed from the full rcsc.lutio,i radar accumulation field were made. As with estimates of areal rainfall we find that gauge density has a very strong effect on the estimation accuracy of hydrograph parameters with the standard error generally falling off as a power law with increasing gauge density.
Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 2010
Rainfall-runoff models are common tools for river discharge estimation in the field of hydrology. In ungauged basins, the dependence on observed river discharge data for calibration restricts applications of rainfall-runoff models. The strong correlation between quantities of river cross-sectional water surface width obtained from remote sensing and corresponding in situ gauged river discharge has been verified by many researchers. In this study, a calibration scheme of rainfall-runoff models based on satellite observations of river width at basin outlet is illustrated. One distinct advantage is that this calibration is independent of river discharge information. The at-a-station hydraulic geometry is implemented to facilitate shifting the calibration objective from river discharge to river width. The generalized likelihood uncertainty estimation (GLUE) is applied to model calibration and uncertainty analysis. The calibration scheme is demonstrated through a case study for simulating river discharge at Pakse in the Mekong Basin. The effectiveness of the calibration scheme and uncertainties associated with utilization of river width observations from space are examined from model input-state-output behaviour, capability of reproducing river discharge and posterior parameter distribution. The results indicate that the satellite observation of the river width is a competent surrogate of observed discharge for the calibration of rainfall-runoff model at Pakse and the proposed method has the potential for improving reliability of river discharge estimation in basins without any discharge gauging.
2011
The need for calibration limits the direct application of rainfall-runoff (RR) models in ungauged basins. In this paper, we present a conceptual framework for calibrating RR models using river hydraulic variables (river width or water surface elevation) that are observable by remote sensing. By integrating a RR model with at-a-station hydraulic geometry, using power functions to describe the cross-sectional hydraulic relationship at the basin outlet, the simulated river width or water surface elevation become the output of the integrated model. The objective of the calibration is then shifted to minimizing the difference between the simulated values and the satellite measurements of the hydraulic variables. Correspondingly, the calibration process is carried out by tuning the RR model and power function parameters simultaneously. The HYdrological MODel (HYMOD) RR model and Nondominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm II (NSGAII) multi-objective optimization scheme were selected based on the characteristics of satellite observations. A proof-of-concept experiment was carried out for the Pakse gauging station in the Mekong Basin, southwest Laos. Discharge estimates with acceptable accuracy were obtained by calibration, using ground measurements of either river width or water surface elevation at the Pakse gauging station, under designed average and low satellite observation frequencies. From the results of the experiment, a higher observational frequency was found to be preferable for making more reliable estimations. Using ground measurements with the possible error of satellite observations as calibration data, the maximum uncertainty was less than 20% of the mean daily discharge at Pakse station. This conceptual framework can provide a new tool for improving river discharge estimation in large ungauged basins.
Australasian Journal of Water Resources
Estimation of parameter values is an essential step in the application of catchment modelling systems. This step is time-consuming and requires considerable effort. While a variety of approaches have been developed to accelerate the process, the selection of an approach depends on the problem requiring catchment modelling, the dominant processes influencing the catchment response to storm events and, moreover, the number of parameters that need consideration. This paper will propose a method to reduce significantly the number of parameters for a large catchment when a semi-distributed catchment modelling system is applied. Past studies have reported on the use of a scaling parameter to adjust parameter values from their initial values, introduced herein is the use of a scaling parameter together with a variation coefficient. This enables the spatial variation of changes in parameter values across the catchment to be considered. A case study was conducted for a 14,000 km 2 catchment to assess the validity of this approach where the focus of the catchment modelling was the prediction of a design flood statistic. This catchment was divided into 155 subcatchments with 5 sensitive parameters per subcatchment. Hence, a total of 775 parameters needed to be considered. Using the proposed approach, the number of parameters considered during the calibration was reduced to 8 coefficients which was reasonable for a calibration and validation process that also enabled an estimate of the parameter variability.
Advances in Geosciences, 2007
Hydrologic rainfall-runoff models are usually calibrated with reference to a limited number of recorded flood events, for which rainfall and runoff measurements are available. In this framework, model's parameters consistency depends on the number of both events and hydrograph points used for calibration, and on measurements reliability. Recently, to make users aware of application limits, major attention has been devoted to the estimation of uncertainty in hydrologic modelling. Here a simple numerical experiment is proposed, that allows the analysis of uncertainty in hydrologic rainfall-runoff modelling associated to both quantity and quality of available data. A distributed rainfall-runoff model based on geomorphologic concepts has been used. The experiment involves the analysis of an ensemble of model runs, and its overall set up holds if the model is to be applied in different catchments and climates, or even if a different hydrologic model is used. With reference to a set of 100 synthetic rainfall events characterized by a given rainfall volume, the effect of uncertainty in parameters calibration is studied. An artificial truth-perfect observation-is created by using the model in a known configuration. An external source of uncertainty is introduced by assuming realistic, i.e. uncertain, discharge observations to calibrate the model. The range of parameters' values able to "reproduce" the observation is studied. Finally, the model uncertainty is evaluated and discussed. The experiment gives useful indications about the number of both events and data points needed for a careful and stable calibration of a specific model, applied in a given climate and catchment. Moreover, an insight on the expected and maximum error in flood peak discharge simulations is given: errors ranging up to 40% are to be expected if parameters are calibrated on insufficient data sets.
2015
A natural rainfall-runoff process is conceptualized (or modeled) by hydrologist’s perception or experience in mathematical form. These rainfall-runoff models are usually calibrated and verified based on streamflow data at the outlet of interest. The streamflow data, aggregated response over a catchment is obviously required but is not sufficient information to identify conceptual parameters of such models since numerous parameter combinations can often result in either identical model performance measures or indistinguishable hydrographs. One of the efficient techniques to enhance the parameter identification is to use additional constraints (or complementary information) in model calibration. This study aims to exemplify the equifinality problem due to insufficiency of model identification based only on streamflow data in distributed rainfall-runoff modeling. Moreover, a potential use of additional constraints provided by a computational tracer method is presented in order to rejec...
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