Using sub-daily precipitation for grid-based hydrological modelling across Great Britain: Assessing model performance and comparing flood impacts under climate change

Study region: Great Britain. Study focus: National-scale grid-based hydrological models are usually run at fine spatial and temporal resolutions, but driving data are often not available at the required resolutions. Here, a recent observation-based hourly 1 km gridded precipitation dataset is applie...

Full description

Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: AL Kay, MJ Brown
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Elsevier 2023-12-01
Series:Journal of Hydrology: Regional Studies
Subjects:
Online Access:http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2214581823002756
_version_ 1797390460299247616
author AL Kay
MJ Brown
author_facet AL Kay
MJ Brown
author_sort AL Kay
collection DOAJ
description Study region: Great Britain. Study focus: National-scale grid-based hydrological models are usually run at fine spatial and temporal resolutions, but driving data are often not available at the required resolutions. Here, a recent observation-based hourly 1 km gridded precipitation dataset is applied with a 1 km hydrological model to simulate daily mean river flows. Performance is compared to use of equally-disaggregated and profile-disaggregated daily data, for a large number of catchments. Hourly and daily precipitation from a high-resolution convection-permitting climate model (CPM) are then used to drive the hydrological model for baseline (1980–2000) and future (2060–2080) periods, to investigate differences in potential peak flow changes. New hydrological insights: On average, use of observation-based hourly data provides a clear improvement over equally-disaggregated daily data for high flows and peak flow bias, a small improvement for average flows and mean flow bias, but little difference for low flows. Performance in faster-responding catchments typically improves more; performance in some catchments degrades. Use of profile-disaggregated daily data provides the small mean flow bias improvement and some peak flow bias improvement, but other factors degrade. On average, future changes in peak flows from hourly CPM precipitation are only slightly larger than from equally-disaggregated daily data. Future work will look at simulation of hourly mean flows.
first_indexed 2024-03-08T23:12:11Z
format Article
id doaj.art-171e39a6b65d4308be15ffc3e2f01128
institution Directory Open Access Journal
issn 2214-5818
language English
last_indexed 2024-03-08T23:12:11Z
publishDate 2023-12-01
publisher Elsevier
record_format Article
series Journal of Hydrology: Regional Studies
spelling doaj.art-171e39a6b65d4308be15ffc3e2f011282023-12-15T07:24:21ZengElsevierJournal of Hydrology: Regional Studies2214-58182023-12-0150101588Using sub-daily precipitation for grid-based hydrological modelling across Great Britain: Assessing model performance and comparing flood impacts under climate changeAL Kay0MJ Brown1Corresponding author.; UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, Wallingford OX10 8BB, UKUK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, Wallingford OX10 8BB, UKStudy region: Great Britain. Study focus: National-scale grid-based hydrological models are usually run at fine spatial and temporal resolutions, but driving data are often not available at the required resolutions. Here, a recent observation-based hourly 1 km gridded precipitation dataset is applied with a 1 km hydrological model to simulate daily mean river flows. Performance is compared to use of equally-disaggregated and profile-disaggregated daily data, for a large number of catchments. Hourly and daily precipitation from a high-resolution convection-permitting climate model (CPM) are then used to drive the hydrological model for baseline (1980–2000) and future (2060–2080) periods, to investigate differences in potential peak flow changes. New hydrological insights: On average, use of observation-based hourly data provides a clear improvement over equally-disaggregated daily data for high flows and peak flow bias, a small improvement for average flows and mean flow bias, but little difference for low flows. Performance in faster-responding catchments typically improves more; performance in some catchments degrades. Use of profile-disaggregated daily data provides the small mean flow bias improvement and some peak flow bias improvement, but other factors degrade. On average, future changes in peak flows from hourly CPM precipitation are only slightly larger than from equally-disaggregated daily data. Future work will look at simulation of hourly mean flows.http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2214581823002756HydrologyPrecipitationRainfallRainfall-runoff modelUKCP18
spellingShingle AL Kay
MJ Brown
Using sub-daily precipitation for grid-based hydrological modelling across Great Britain: Assessing model performance and comparing flood impacts under climate change
Journal of Hydrology: Regional Studies
Hydrology
Precipitation
Rainfall
Rainfall-runoff model
UKCP18
title Using sub-daily precipitation for grid-based hydrological modelling across Great Britain: Assessing model performance and comparing flood impacts under climate change
title_full Using sub-daily precipitation for grid-based hydrological modelling across Great Britain: Assessing model performance and comparing flood impacts under climate change
title_fullStr Using sub-daily precipitation for grid-based hydrological modelling across Great Britain: Assessing model performance and comparing flood impacts under climate change
title_full_unstemmed Using sub-daily precipitation for grid-based hydrological modelling across Great Britain: Assessing model performance and comparing flood impacts under climate change
title_short Using sub-daily precipitation for grid-based hydrological modelling across Great Britain: Assessing model performance and comparing flood impacts under climate change
title_sort using sub daily precipitation for grid based hydrological modelling across great britain assessing model performance and comparing flood impacts under climate change
topic Hydrology
Precipitation
Rainfall
Rainfall-runoff model
UKCP18
url http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2214581823002756
work_keys_str_mv AT alkay usingsubdailyprecipitationforgridbasedhydrologicalmodellingacrossgreatbritainassessingmodelperformanceandcomparingfloodimpactsunderclimatechange
AT mjbrown usingsubdailyprecipitationforgridbasedhydrologicalmodellingacrossgreatbritainassessingmodelperformanceandcomparingfloodimpactsunderclimatechange