A fine-scale point process model of rainfall with dependent pulse depths within cells

Abstract

A cluster point process model is considered for the analysis of fine-scale rainfall time series. The model is based on three Poisson processes. The first is a Poisson process of storm origins, where each storm has a random (exponential) lifetime. The second is a Poisson process of cell origins that occur during the storm lifetime, terminating when the storm finishes. Each cell has a random lifetime that follows an exponential distribution (or terminates when the storm terminates, whichever occurs first). During cell lifetimes, a third Poisson process of instantaneous pulses occurs. The model is essentially an extension of the well-known Bartlett-Lewis rectangular pulses model, with the rectangular profiles replaced with a Poisson process of instantaneous pulse depths to ensure more realistic rainfall profiles for fine-scale series. Model equations, derived in Cowpertwait et al. (2007 Cowpertwait, P., Isham, V. and Onof, C. 2007. Point process models of rainfall: developments for fine-scale structure. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Series A, 463: 2569–2587. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), are used to fit different sets of properties to a 60 year record of 5-min data taken from Kelburn, New Zealand. As in the previous work, two superposed processes are used to account for two main and distinct precipitation types (convective and stratiform). By treating the within-cell pulses as dependent random variables, it is found, by simulation, that improved fits to extreme values and the proportion of dry intervals are obtained.

Citation Cowpertwait, P. S. P., Xie, G., Isham, V., Onof, C. & Walsh, D. C. I. (2011) A fine-scale point process model of rainfall with dependent pulse depths within cells. Hydrol. Sci. J. 56(7), 1110–1117.