A canonical correlation approach to the determination of homogeneous regions for regional flood estimation of ungauged basins

Abstract

A canonical correlation method for determining the homogeneous regions used for estimating flood characteristics of ungauged basins is described. The method emphasizes graphical and quantitative analysis of relationships between the basin and flood variables before the data of the gauged basins are used for estimating the flood variables of the ungauged basin. The method can be used for both homogeneous regions, determined a priori by clustering algorithms in the space of the flood-related canonical variables, as well as for “regions of influence” or “neighbourhoods” centred on the point representing the estimated location of the ungauged basin in that space.     

小江断裂中段及其邻近地区应力场时间变化分析

研究地壳构造应力状态及其时空分布特征,特别是应力变化的信息,是探讨地震成因、分析发震条件的重要有效途径之一.本文利用1998年1月至2009年1月以来小江断裂中段及其邻区ML≥2.5的共计740个震源机制解,基于小江断裂中段及其邻近地区地质构造背景,对研究区进行了分区;以该区域内较大地震为界,结合余震时间序列特征,进行...     

Assessing homogeneous regions relative to drought class transitions using an ANOVA-like inference. Application to Alentejo, Portugal

In the present study, an ANOVA-like inference technique is used aiming at to assess if Alentejo, southern Portugal, could be considered a homogeneous region for drought management purposes. First, Alentejo was divided into four sub-regions according to latitude (north and south), and longitude (west and east). Inside each sub-region, 10 weather stations were considered. The time series of the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) were obtained for these stations using precipitation data for the period 1932–1999 (67 years). Contingency tables for the transitions between SPI drought classes were obtained for these time series. Loglinear models were fitted to these contingency tables to estimate the probabilities for drought class transitions. An ANOVA-like inference was applied considering the four sub-regions like treatments of a two way layout with two factors, latitude and longitude, each one with two levels, north and south, and west and east respectively. The weather stations of each sub-region were treated as replicates. Significant differences between west and east were found, that allowed to consider that Alentejo could be composed by two sub-regions.     

Mediating stream baseflow response to climate change: The role of basin storage

Inter‐basin differences in streamflow response to changes in regional hydroclimatology may reflect variations in storage characteristics that control the retention and release of water inputs. These aspects of storage could mediate a basin's sensitivity to climate change. The hypothesis that temporal trends in stream baseflow exhibit a more muted reaction to changes in precipitation and evapotranspiration for basins with greater storage was tested on the Oak Ridges Moraine (ORM) in Southern Ontario, Canada. Long‐term (>25 years) baseflow trends for 16 basins were compared to corresponding trends in precipitation amount and type and in potential evapotranspiration as well as shorter trends in groundwater levels for monitoring wells on the ORM. Inter‐basin differences in storage properties were characterized using physiographic, hydrogeologic, land use/land cover, and streamflow metrics. The latter included the slope of the basin's flow duration curve and basin dynamic storage. Most basins showed temporal increases in baseflow, consistent with limited evidence of increases and decreases in regional precipitation and snowfall: precipitation ratio, respectively, and recent increases in groundwater recharge along the crest of the ORM. Baseflow trend magnitude was uncorrelated to basin physiographic, hydrogeologic, land use/land cover, or flow duration curve characteristics. However, it was positively related to a basin's dynamic storage, particularly for basins with limited coverage of open water and wetlands. The dynamic storage approach assumes that a basin behaves as a first‐order dynamical system, and extensive open water and wetland areas in a basin may invalidate this assumption. Previous work suggested that smaller dynamic storage was linked to greater damping of temporal variations in water inputs and reduced interannual variability in streamflow regime. Storage and release of water inputs to a basin may assist in mediating baseflow response to temporal changes in regional hydroclimatology and may partly account for inter‐basin differences in that response. Such storage characteristics should be considered when forecasting the impacts of climate change on regional streamflow.     

Are the eastern and western basins of the English Channel two separate ecosystems?

The English Channel is part of the "Greater North Sea" sub-region in the Marine Strategy Framework Directive. However, the Channel is characterized by hydrologic, oceanographic and biogeographic features that support its division into two main entities: the western basin and the eastern basin. This paper summarizes the Channel's main natural features and principal human activities to examine the similarities and differences between both basins. The differences between the basins support an ecosystem-based management approach at the combined basin scale, rather than the present approach of separating the France and UK sides.     

Regional analysis of low flow using L-moments for Dongjiang basin,South China

Abstract

Dongjiang water has been the key source of water supplies for Hong Kong and its neighbouring cities in the Pearl River Delta in South China since the mid-1960s. Rapid economic development and population growth in this region have caused serious concerns over the adequacy of the quantity and quality of water withdrawn from the Dongjiang River in the future. Information on the magnitude and frequency of low flows in the basin is needed for planning of water resources at present and in the near future. The L-moment method is used to analyse the regional frequency of low flows, since recent studies have shown that it is superior to other methods that have been used previously, and is now being adopted by many organizations worldwide. In this study, basin-wide analysis of low flows is conducted for Dongjiang basin using five distributions: generalized logistic, generalized extreme value, lognormal, Pearson type III and generalized Pareto. Each of these has three parameters estimated by the L-moment method. The discordancy index and homogeneity testing show that 14 out of the 16 study sites belong to a homogenous region; these are used for further analysis. Based on the L-moment ratios diagram, the Hosking and Wallis goodness-of-fit statistical criterion and the L-kurtosis criterion, the three-parameter lognormal distribution is identified as the most appropriate distribution for the homogeneous study region. The regional low-flow estimates for each return period are obtained using the index flood procedure. Examination of the observed and simulated low flows by regional frequency analysis shows a good agreement in general, and the results may satisfy practical application. Furthermore, the regional low-flow relationship between mean annual 7-day low flows and basin area is developed using linear regression, providing a simple and effective method for estimation of low flows of desired return periods for ungauged catchments.     

基于ICESat轨道交叉点分析的东南极Lambert-Amery系统当前高程变化特征分析

南极冰盖物质平衡仍然是全球海平面变化估计的最大不确定因素.本文使用2003～2007年ICESat/GLAS获取的高精度冰盖测高数据,利用我们开发的高精度高程变化提取程序,首次获取了东南极最大冰流系统-Lambert-Amery地区在ICESat卫星轨道交叉点处的高程变化序列.依据冰川动力学原理,对该流域进行详细划分,...     

A study on characteristics of tectonic block motion and tectonic setting of strong earthquakes in northern part of the Shanxi fault depression zone

Introduction Shanxi fault depression zone (SFDZ) is one of important Cenozoic fault basin zones and strong earthquake belts in Chinese mainland. Its northern part has aroused wide research interests due to the complicated tectonics and high activity of strong earthquakes there. Early researches on this depression zone were carried out since 60s of last century (DENG, et al, 1973; DENG, YOU, 1985; LU, DING, 1985; XU, 1990; XU, et al, 1996, 2002). In 90s of last century, the geologica…     

Review: The International Sediment Initiative case studies of sediment problems in river basins and their management

Management of sediment in river basins and waterways has been an important issue for water managers throughout history. The changing nature of sediment issues has meant that water managers today face many complex technical and environmental challenges in relation to sediment management. UNESCO's International Hydrological Programme(IHP) launched the International Sediment Initiative(ISI) in 2002.ISI aims to further advance sustainable sediment management on a global scale. This is achieved through the delivery of a decision support framework for sediment management that provides guidance on legislative and institutional solutions, applicable across a range of socio-economic and physiographic settings in the context of global change. ISI mobilizes international experience on sediment problems and their management through the compilation of a series of case studies representative of a broad range of physiographic and socio-economic conditions, which are made available as guidance for policy makers dealing with water and river basin management. Case studies prepared to date include the basins of the Nile, Mississippi, Rhine, Volga, Yellow, and Haihe and Liaohe rivers. Available in full from the ISI website,these detailed case studies are briefly introduced in this review articles.     

Hack's law of debris-flow basins

Hack's law was originally derived from basin statistics for varied spatial scales and regions.The exponent value of the law has been shown to vary between 0.47 and 0.70,causing uncertainty in its application.This paper focuses on the emergence of Hack's law from debris-flow basins in China.Over 5,000 debris-flow basins in different regions of China with drainage areas less than 100km2 are included in this study.Basins in the different regions are found to present similar distributions.Hack's law is derived fi'om maximum probability and conditional distributions,suggesting that the law should describe some critical state of basin evolution.Results suggest the exponent value is approximately 0.5.Further analysis indicates that Hack's law is related to other scaling laws underlying the evolution of a basin and that the exponent is not dependent on basin shape but rather on the evolutionary stage.A case study of a well known debris-flow basin further confirms Hack's law and its implications in basin evolution.     

On the prediction of the Toce alpine basin floods with distributed hydrologic models

With the objective of improving flood predictions, in recent years sophisticated continuous hydrologic models that include complex land‐surface sub‐models have been developed. This has produced a significant increase in parameterization; consequently, applications of distributed models to ungauged basins lacking specific data from field campaigns may become redundant. The objective of this paper is to produce a parsimonious and robust distributed hydrologic model for flood predictions in Italian alpine basins. Application is made to the Toce basin (area 1534 km²). The Toce basin was a case study of the RAPHAEL European Union research project, during which a comprehensive set of hydrologic, meteorological and physiographic data were collected, including the hydrologic analysis of the 1996–1997 period. Two major floods occurred during this period. We compare the FEST04 event model (which computes rainfall abstraction and antecedent soil moisture conditions through the simple Soil Conservation Service curve number method) and two continuous hydrologic models, SDM and TDM (which differ in soil water balance scheme, and base flow and runoff generation computations). The simple FEST04 event model demonstrated good performance in the prediction of the 1997 flood, but shows limits in the prediction of the long and moderate 1996 flood. More robust predictions are obtained with the parsimonious SDM continuous hydrologic model, which uses a simple one‐layer soil water balance model and an infiltration excess mechanism for runoff generation, and demonstrates good performance in both long‐term runoff modelling and flood predictions. Instead, the use of a more sophisticated continuous hydrologic model, the TDM, that simulates soil moisture dynamics in two layers of soil, and computes runoff and base flow using some TOPMODEL concepts, does not seem to be advantageous for this alpine basin. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

基于有限断层动力学模型的逆断层—三维层状沉积盆地地震动模拟

近断层效应使得沉积盆地对地震动放大效应更为复杂。本文针对逆断层发震下三维层状沉积盆地地震反应,基于波动谱元法,采用有限断层动力学模型,模拟断层动力破裂、地壳层地震波传播和层状沉积盆地对地震波散射全过程。在此基础上,对比分析了层状和均质沉积盆地对近断层地震动放大效应的影响,讨论了不同断层倾角下层状沉积盆地地震动加速度特性。结果表明：层状沉积盆地PGA空间分布与均质沉积盆地存在较大差异,由于近断层效应和盆地效应,层状沉积盆地地表局部范围竖向PGA大于水平向PGA;90°断层倾角下层状沉积盆地地表地震动放大范围与60°断层倾角结果明显不同,主要集中在盆地中心区域和断层附近,且幅值远小于60°断层倾角下结果;沿断层走向,盆地内地表地震动加速度峰值对应时刻较盆地外延后。     

基于Copula函数的太湖流域汛期洪涝灾害危险性分析

太湖流域位于长江入海口,地处中国沿海经济带和长江沿线内陆经济带的交汇处,是中国高度城镇化地区之一.流域汛期降水受到多重天气系统的影响,不同的天气系统带来时空分布各异的降水,给该地区城镇防洪排涝工作造成了巨大的挑战.本文基于Copula理论对太湖流域汛期洪涝风险进行研究,考虑了因降水主导因素不同所造成的流域洪涝风险的时空差异性.在时间角度,采用降水主导因素发生时间的概率分布,将汛期划分为梅汛期和台汛期;在空间角度,通过Copula函数,对研究区进行聚类划分;在此基础上,根据太湖流域防洪规划,对流域梅汛期和台汛期的洪涝风险进行分析.研究结果表明:①太湖流域的汛期划分为:6月24日7月21日为梅汛期,7月22日9月22日为台汛期;②根据各分区降水和太湖水位的联合分布函数拟合效果的优劣,在梅汛期,太湖流域被划分为P-Ⅰ区、P-Ⅱ区和P-Ⅲ区;在台汛期,整个流域的降水作为一个整体,不分区;③到2025年,太湖流域在梅汛期和台汛期出现排涝不利情境的风险概率分别为2.4%和1.1%.本文的研究方法可以为太湖流域设计暴雨的调整、洪水资源的利用以及防洪排涝实时调度的决策提供科学参考.     

Hack＇s law of debris-flow basins

Hack＇s law was originally derived from basin statistics for varied spatial scales and regions. The exponent value of the law has been shown to vary between 0.47 and 0.70, causing uncertainty in its application. This paper focuses on the emergence of Hack＇s law from debris-flow basins in China. Over 5,000 debris-flow basins in different regions of China with drainage areas less than 100km^2 are included in this study. Basins in the different regions are found to present similar distributions. Hack＇s law is derived from maximum probability and conditional distributions, suggesting that the law should describe some critical state of basin evolution. Results suggest the exponent value is approximately 0,5. Further analysis indicates that Hack＇s law is related to other scaling laws underlying the evolution of a basin and that the exponent is not dependent on basin shape but rather on the evolutionary stage. A case study of a well known debris-flow basin further confirms Hack＇s law and its implications in basin evolution.     

应用地震学方法研究中国大陆活动地块应力应变场

在中国大陆活动地块假说及活动边界研究的基础上，将中国大陆按照地震活动特征进行分区. 利用大地震的震源机制资料和历史强震资料，结合小震综合节面解，研究了各地震区的应力应变状态，给出了各地震区的平均应力主轴方向和平均应变率. 应用地震应变能积累释放模型研究了各地震区的地震活动水平. 结果表明最大剪切应变率与地震活动水平存在线性关系. 将地震资料给出的中国大陆地壳应力应变场与GPS测量给出的结果进行了比较，初步说明了两种结果存在着统一性，从而显示出活动地块运动变形与强震活动的内在联系.     

Effects of basin size on low-flow stream chemistry and subsurface contact time in the Neversink River watershed,New York

The effects of basin size on low-flow stream chemistry and subsurface contact time were examined for a part of the Neversink River watershed in southern New York State. Acid neutralizing capacity (ANC), the sum of base cation concentrations (SBC), pH and concentrations of total aluminum (Al), dissolved organic carbon (DOC) and silicon (Si) were measured during low stream flow at the outlets of nested basins ranging in size from 0·2 to 166·3 km². ANC, SBC, pH, Al and DOC showed pronounced changes as basin size increased from 0·2 to 3 km², but relatively small variations were observed as basin size increased beyond 3 km². An index of subsurface contact time computed from basin topography and soil hydraulic conductivity also showed pronounced changes as basin size increased from 0·2 to 3 km² and smaller changes as basin size increased beyond 3 km². These results suggest that basin size affects low-flow stream chemistry because of the effects of basin size on subsurface contact time. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Spatial interpolation of snow water equivalency using surface observations and remotely sensed images of snow‐covered area

As demand for water continues to escalate in the western Unites States, so does the need for accurate monitoring of the snowpack in mountainous areas. In this study, we describe a simple methodology for generating gridded‐estimates of snow water equivalency (SWE) using both surface observations of SWE and remotely sensed estimates of snow‐covered area (SCA). Multiple regression was used to quantify the relationship between physiographic variables (elevation, slope, aspect, clear‐sky solar radiation, etc.) and SWE as measured at a number of sites in a mountainous basin in south‐central Idaho (Big Wood River Basin). The elevation of the snowline, obtained from the SCA estimates, was used to constrain the predicted SWE values. The results from the analysis are encouraging and compare well to those found in previous studies, which often utilized more sophisticated spatial interpolation techniques. Cross‐validation results indicate that the spatial interpolation method produces accurate SWE estimates [mean R² = 0·82, mean mean absolute error (MAE) = 4·34 cm, mean root mean squared error (RMSE) = 5·29 cm]. The basin examined in this study is typical of many mid‐elevation mountainous basins throughout the western United States, in terms of the distribution of topographic variables, as well as the number and characteristics of sites at which the necessary ground data are available. Thus, there is high potential for this methodology to be successfully applied to other mountainous basins. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Regionalization of precipitation characteristics in the Canadian Prairie Provinces using large-scale atmospheric covariates and geophysical attributes

Observed data at most stations are often inadequate to obtain reliable estimates of many hydro-meteorological variables that not only define water availability across a region but also the vulnerability of social infrastructure to climatic extremes. To overcome this, data from neighboring sites with similar statistical characteristics are often pooled. The pooling process is based on partitioning of a larger region into smaller sub-regions with homogeneous features of interest. The established approaches rely heavily on statistics computed from observed precipitation data rather than the covariates that play a significant role in modulating the regional and local climate patterns at various temporal and spatial scales. In this study, a new approach for identifying homogeneous regions for regionalization of precipitation characteristics is proposed for the Canadian Prairie Provinces. This approach incorporates information about large-scale atmospheric covariates, teleconnection indices and geographical site attributes that impact spatial patterns of precipitation in order to delineate homogeneous precipitation regions through combined use of multivariate approaches—principal component analysis, canonical correlation analysis and fuzzy C-means clustering. Results of the analyses suggest that the study area can be partitioned into five homogeneous regions. These partitions are validated independently for homogeneity using statistics computed from monthly and seasonal precipitation totals, and seasonal extremes from a network of observation stations. Furthermore, based on the identified regions, precipitation magnitude-frequency relationships of warm and cold season single- and multi-day precipitation extremes, developed through regional frequency analysis, are mapped spatially. Such estimates are important for numerous water resources related activities.     

Scaling and physiographic controls on streamflow behaviour on the Precambrian Shield, south-central Ontario

Relationships explaining streamflow behaviour in terms of drainage basin physiography greatly assist efforts to extrapolate streamflow metrics from gauged to ungauged basins in the same landscape. The Dorset Environmental Science Centre (DESC) has monitored streamflow from 22 small basins (3.4–190.5 ha) on the Precambrian Shield in south-central Ontario, in some cases since 1976. The basins exhibit regional coherence in their interannual response to precipitation; however, there is often a poor correlation between streamflow metrics from basins separated by as little as 1 km. This study assesses whether inter-basin variations in such metrics can be explained in terms of basin scale and physiography. Several characteristics (annual maximum, minimum and average flow) exhibited simple scaling with basin area, while magnitude, range and timing of annual maximum daily runoff showed scaling behaviour consistent with the Representative Elementary Area (REA) concept. This REA behaviour is partly attributed to convergence of fractional coverage of the two dominant and hydrologically-contrasting land cover types in the DESC region with increasing basin size. Three Principal Components (PCs) explained 82.4% of the variation among basin physiographic properties, and several runoff metrics (magnitude and timing of annual minimum daily runoff, mean number of days per year with 0 streamflow) exhibited significant relationships with one or more PC. Significant relationships were obtained between basin quickflow (QF) production and the PCs on a seasonal and annual basis, almost all of which were superior to simple area-based relationships. Basin physiography influenced QF generation via its control on slope runoff, water storage and hydrologic connectivity; however, this role was minimized during Spring when QF production in response to large rain-on-snow events was relatively uniform across the DESC basins. The PC-based relationships and inter-seasonal changes in their form were consistent with previous research conducted at point, slope and basin scales in the DESC region, and perceptions of key hydrological processes in these small basins may not have been as readily obtained from scaling studies using streamflow from larger basins. This process understanding provides insights into scaling behaviour beyond those derived from simple scaling and REA analyses. The physiography of the study area is representative of large portions of the Precambrian Shield, such that basin streamflow behaviour could potentially be extended across much of south-central Ontario. This would assist predictions of streamflow conditions at ungauged locations, development and testing of hydrological models for this landscape, and interpretation of inter-basin and intra-annual differences in hydrochemical behaviour on the southern Precambrian Shield.     

Seismic response of multi-layered basins with velocity gradients upon incidence of plane shear waves

A boundary integral scheme based on boundary-integral discrete-wave-number approach has been developed to compute the seismic response of two-dimensional irregular-shaped basins with horizontal soil layers. Each layer exhibits a linear gradient of shear wave velocity with depth. The approach combines the boundary-integral representation of the seismic wave field outside the basin with plane wave representation of the seismic wave field inside the basin. The propagation throughout the layers is performed by matrix propagators in which the effect of the vertical variation of the velocity is incorporated by using confluent hyper-geometric functions of the Whittaker type. Our method is tested against otherwell-accepted solutions for the case of a circular basin with excellent agreement. Test of the ground response for a semi-circular basin with radius a shows that stable solutions are obtained if the chosen model parameters satisfy following conditions: (1) the distance from the sources to the interface is greater than 0·1a; (2) the distance between the sources is smaller than a quarter of the incident wavelength; and (3) the discrete wave-number step is smaller than 2π/4a. The computation of ground response of basins with a sharp interface and several horizontal deposits leads to the following main results: (1) the amplification of a basin with velocity gradients is larger than that of a basin with homogeneous layers; (2) the frequencies of the second- and third-order harmonics for a basin with velocity gradients are lower than those of a basin with homogeneous layers; and (3) the response amplitude of the basin with velocity gradients attenuates more slowly in time domain than when layers are homogeneous. Since these results have been obtained for realistic values of basin geometrical and mechanical consideration, they should find some interest in earthquake engineering or seismic microzonation studies. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.