Isotope hydrograph separation in alpine catchments: a review

Isotope hydrograph separation (IHS) is a basic tool in applied hydrology. Its application has expanded to surface water and groundwater interaction, and eco-hydrological processes from runoff generation processes. This paper reviews the progress made in IHS for alpine catchments, with emphasis on its significance in reflecting the impact of global change on water resources. Also, the principle of IHS and its uncertainties are explained in detail. The mechanism of variation of stable isotopes in snow-melt water is discussed, and then methods are presented to improve the separation during snow-melt such as volume weighted average method (VWA), current melt-water method (CMW) and runoff-corrected event water approach (RunCE), with their advantages and disadvantages explained. New approaches may extend the applications of IHS, for example, large basin studies combined with GIS, and develop new theories of runoff generation combined with other parameters such as deuterium excess and DOC