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Recent climate change impact studies suggest that current rainfall intensity-frequency- duration (IFD) curves are likely to change as a result of climate change. In this paper, an effort was made to quantify the changing character of storm IFD curves using data of four consecutive 30-year time slices from 1880 to 2010. The Melbourne Regional Office rainfall data were used for the purposes of the study. Annual maximum series and generalised extreme value distribution were employed to derive the IFD curves using the data of different time slices and the whole period. Results of IFD curves produced from data for the whole period and the current IFD procedure in Australia, described in Australian Rainfall and Runoff (ARR), showed that the former had produced higher intensities for all sub-hourly storms of return periods of 10 to 100 years compared to the latter, and vice versa for return periods below 10 years. For all other storm durations (ie. 1-72 hours) and for short return periods (<10 years), the current ARR method had generated more intense storms. The above results demonstrate that there is a need to conduct further analysis to investigate changing character of storm IFD curves using rainfall data at several stations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Among the processes most affected by global warming are the hydrological cycle and water resources. Regions where the majority of runoff consists of snowmelt are very sensitive to climate change. It is significant to express the relationship between climate change and snow hydrology and it is imperative to perform climate change impact studies on snow hydrology at global and regional scales. Climate change impacts on the mountainous Upper Euphrates Basin were investigated in this paper. First, historical data trend analysis of significant hydro-meteorological data is presented. Available future climate data are then explained, and, finally, future climate data are used in hydrological models, which are calibrated and validated using historical hydro-meteorological data, and future streamflow is projected for the period 2070–2100. The hydrological model outcomes indicate substantial runoff decreases in summer and spring season runoff, which will have significant consequences on water sectors in the Euphrates Basin. Citation Yilmaz, A.G. & Imteaz, M.A. (2011) Impact of climate change on runoff in the upper part of the Euphrates basin. Hydrol. Sci. J. 56(7), 1265–1279. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A response from the author of the article "Time-varying character of storm intensity frequency and duration curves" by AG Yilmaz and collegues" in the previous issue is presented.