Understanding the surface hydrology of the Lake Eyre Basin: Part 2—Streamflow

This is the second of two papers examining the surface hydrology of the Lake Eyre Basin (LEB) (1,140,000 km²) in Australia. The streams are unregulated and are characterised by extreme discharge variation. The analyses reported cover only surface hydrology and include comparisons with arid zone catchments globally. The paper discusses spatial runoff and annual streamflow characteristics, flow duration and baseflow index (BFI) analyses, annual flood frequency analysis and flood transmission losses, a water balance study, wet and dry run length analysis and, finally, yield from hypothetical reservoirs located across the LEB. There are 12 conclusions listed at the end of the paper. We identify two highlights as follows:

• The coefficient of variation of annual flows, Cv, varies from 0.98 to 2.62. Compared with 45 arid zone rivers world-wide excluding Australian rivers, the annual Cv of the LEB streams are approximately double the average variability found world-wide.

• Large transmission losses occur as flood flows move down the middle reaches of the major river systems. The transmission losses vary non-linearly with flood size as a result of differing transmission efficiencies between primary channels and the floodplain, and varying floodplain utilisation.

Keywords: Hydrology; Lake Eyre; Runoff; Surface hydrology; Yield