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Heavy tails of flood peak distribution – controls along the flood process cascade

Authors
/persons/resource/emac

Macdonald,  Elena
IUGG 2023, General Assemblies, 1 General, International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics (IUGG), External Organizations;
4.4 Hydrology, 4.0 Geosystems, Departments, GFZ Publication Database, Deutsches GeoForschungsZentrum;

/persons/resource/bmerz

Merz,  B.
IUGG 2023, General Assemblies, 1 General, International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics (IUGG), External Organizations;
4.4 Hydrology, 4.0 Geosystems, Departments, GFZ Publication Database, Deutsches GeoForschungsZentrum;

/persons/resource/bfguse

Guse,  Björn
IUGG 2023, General Assemblies, 1 General, International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics (IUGG), External Organizations;
4.4 Hydrology, 4.0 Geosystems, Departments, GFZ Publication Database, Deutsches GeoForschungsZentrum;

/persons/resource/dung

Nguyen,  D.
IUGG 2023, General Assemblies, 1 General, International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics (IUGG), External Organizations;
4.4 Hydrology, 4.0 Geosystems, Departments, GFZ Publication Database, Deutsches GeoForschungsZentrum;

/persons/resource/gdlhf

Guan,  Dongliang
IUGG 2023, General Assemblies, 1 General, International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics (IUGG), External Organizations;
1.1 Space Geodetic Techniques, 1.0 Geodesy, Departments, GFZ Publication Database, Deutsches GeoForschungsZentrum;

/persons/resource/vorogus

Vorogushyn,  S.
IUGG 2023, General Assemblies, 1 General, International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics (IUGG), External Organizations;
4.4 Hydrology, 4.0 Geosystems, Departments, GFZ Publication Database, Deutsches GeoForschungsZentrum;

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Citation

Macdonald, E., Merz, B., Guse, B., Nguyen, D., Guan, D., Vorogushyn, S. (2023): Heavy tails of flood peak distribution – controls along the flood process cascade, XXVIII General Assembly of the International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics (IUGG) (Berlin 2023).
https://doi.org/10.57757/IUGG23-1786


Cite as: https://gfzpublic.gfz-potsdam.de/pubman/item/item_5017828
Abstract
Many observed time series of precipitation and streamflow show heavy tail behaviour. This means that the occurrence probability of extreme events is higher than for distributions with an exponentially receding tail. If we neglect heavy tail behaviour we might considerably underestimate rarely observed, high-impact events. More robust estimations of upper tail behaviour can be achieved by using long time series and by improving the understanding of the relevant process controls. Here, a conceptual rainfall-runoff model is used to analyse how precipitation and runoff generation characteristics affect the upper tail of flood peak distributions. With a stochastic weather generator long, synthetic precipitation time series with different tail behaviour are produced and subsequently used as input for a rainfall-runoff model. Between different model runs, catchment characteristics linked to a threshold process in the runoff generation are varied. The upper tail behaviour of the simulated discharge time series is characterized with the shape parameter of the generalized extreme value distribution (GEV). Our analysis shows that the rainfall distributions asymptotically govern the flood peak distributions above a certain, catchment-specific return period. Below this return period, threshold processes in the runoff generation lead to heavier tails of flood peak distributions. We conclude that, for return periods that are mostly of interest to flood risk management, runoff generation is often a more pronounced control of flood heavy tails than precipitation.