1. Performance evaluation of global hydrological models in six large Pan-Arctic watersheds
- Author
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Gädeke, Anne, Krysanova, Valentina, Aryal, Aashutosh, Chang, Jinfeng, Grillakis, Manolis, Hanasaki, Naota, Koutroulis, Aristeidis, Pokhrel, Yadu, Satoh, Yusuke, Schaphoff, Sibyll, Müller Schmied, Hannes, Stacke, Tobias, Tang, Qiuhong, Wada, Yoshihide, Thonicke, Kirsten, Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, Member of the Leibniz Association, Potsdam, Germany, College of Environmental and Resource Sciences, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China, Lab of Geophysical-Remote Sensing & Archaeoenvironment, Institute for Mediterranean Studies, Foundation for Research & Technology Hellas, Rethimnon, Greece, National Institute for Environmental Studies, Tsukuba, Japan, School of Environmental Engineering, Technical University of Crete, Chania, Greece, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Michigan State University, East Lansing, USA, Senckenberg Leibniz Biodiversity and Climate Research Centre (SBiK-F) Frankfurt, Frankfurt am Main, Germany, Helmholtz-Zentrum Geesthacht, Institute of Coastal Research, Geesthacht, Germany, Key Laboratory of Water Cycle and Related Land Surface Processes, Institute of Geographic Science and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China, International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA), Laxenburg, Austria, Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK), Laboratoire des Sciences du Climat et de l'Environnement [Gif-sur-Yvette] (LSCE), Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Université Paris-Saclay-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Commissariat à l'énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives (CEA)-Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (UVSQ), Technical University of Crete [Chania], National Institute for Environmental Studies (NIES), and Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (UVSQ)-Commissariat à l'énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives (CEA)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Université Paris-Saclay-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)
- Subjects
Arctic watersheds ,Atmospheric Science ,010504 meteorology & atmospheric sciences ,0208 environmental biotechnology ,Climate change ,02 engineering and technology ,Model performance ,Structural basin ,Permafrost ,01 natural sciences ,Latitude ,ddc:551.48 ,Boruta feature selection ,[SDU.STU.HY]Sciences of the Universe [physics]/Earth Sciences/Hydrology ,Model evaluation ,0105 earth and related environmental sciences ,Global and Planetary Change ,Pan arctic ,Impact assessment ,Vegetation ,Snow ,Global Water Models ,020801 environmental engineering ,13. Climate action ,[SDU.STU.CL]Sciences of the Universe [physics]/Earth Sciences/Climatology ,Environmental science ,Physical geography - Abstract
Global Water Models (GWMs), which include Global Hydrological, Land Surface, and Dynamic Global Vegetation Models, present valuable tools for quantifying climate change impacts on hydrological processes in the data scarce high latitudes. Here we performed a systematic model performance evaluation in six major Pan-Arctic watersheds for different hydrological indicators (monthly and seasonal discharge, extremes, trends (or lack of), and snow water equivalent (SWE)) via a novel Aggregated Performance Index (API) that is based on commonly used statistical evaluation metrics. The machine learning Boruta feature selection algorithm was used to evaluate the explanatory power of the API attributes. Our results show that the majority of the nine GWMs included in the study exhibit considerable difficulties in realistically representing Pan-Arctic hydrological processes. Average APIdischarge (monthly and seasonal discharge) over nine GWMs is > 50% only in the Kolyma basin (55%), as low as 30% in the Yukon basin and averaged over all watersheds APIdischarge is 43%. WATERGAP2 and MATSIRO present the highest (APIdischarge > 55%) while ORCHIDEE and JULES-W1 the lowest (APIdischarge ≤ 25%) performing GWMs over all watersheds. For the high and low flows, average APIextreme is 35% and 26%, respectively, and over six GWMs APISWE is 57%. The Boruta algorithm suggests that using different observation-based climate data sets does not influence the total score of the APIs in all watersheds. Ultimately, only satisfactory to good performing GWMs that effectively represent cold-region hydrological processes (including snow-related processes, permafrost) should be included in multi-model climate change impact assessments in Pan-Arctic watersheds., Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100002347
- Published
- 2020