Articles | Volume 21, issue 8
https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-21-4245-2017
https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-21-4245-2017
Research article
 | 
29 Aug 2017
Research article |  | 29 Aug 2017

The critical role of uncertainty in projections of hydrological extremes

Hadush K. Meresa and Renata J. Romanowicz

Abstract. This paper aims to quantify the uncertainty in projections of future hydrological extremes in the Biala Tarnowska River at Koszyce gauging station, south Poland. The approach followed is based on several climate projections obtained from the EURO-CORDEX initiative, raw and bias-corrected realizations of catchment precipitation, and flow simulations derived using multiple hydrological model parameter sets. The projections cover the 21st century. Three sources of uncertainty are considered: one related to climate projection ensemble spread, the second related to the uncertainty in hydrological model parameters and the third related to the error in fitting theoretical distribution models to annual extreme flow series. The uncertainty of projected extreme indices related to hydrological model parameters was conditioned on flow observations from the reference period using the generalized likelihood uncertainty estimation (GLUE) approach, with separate criteria for high- and low-flow extremes. Extreme (low and high) flow quantiles were estimated using the generalized extreme value (GEV) distribution at different return periods and were based on two different lengths of the flow time series. A sensitivity analysis based on the analysis of variance (ANOVA) shows that the uncertainty introduced by the hydrological model parameters can be larger than the climate model variability and the distribution fit uncertainty for the low-flow extremes whilst for the high-flow extremes higher uncertainty is observed from climate models than from hydrological parameter and distribution fit uncertainties. This implies that ignoring one of the three uncertainty sources may cause great risk to future hydrological extreme adaptations and water resource planning and management.

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Short summary
Evaluation of the uncertainty in projections of future hydrological extremes in the mountainous catchment was performed. The uncertainty of the estimate of 1-in-100-year return maximum flow based on the 1971–2100 time series exceeds 200 % of its median value with the largest influence of the climate model uncertainty, while the uncertainty of the 1-in-100-year return minimum flow is of the same order (i.e. exceeds 200 %) but it is mainly influenced by the hydrological model parameter uncertainty.