Abstract
Intense human activities have greatly changed the flood generation conditions in most areas of the world, and have destroyed the consistency in the annual flood peak and volume series. For design flood estimation, coaxial correlation diagram and conceptual hydrological model are two frequently used tools to adjust and reconstruct the flood series under human disturbance. This study took a typical mountain catchment of the Haihe River Basin as an example to investigate the effects of human activities on flood regime and to compare and assess the two adjustment methods. The main purpose is to construct a conceptual hydrological model which can incorporate the effects of human activities. The results show that the coaxial correlation diagram is simple and widely-used, but can only adjust the time series of total flood volumes. Therefore, it is only applicable under certain conditions (e.g. There is a strong link between the flood peaks and volumes and the link is not significantly affected by human activities). The conceptual model is a powerful tool to adjust the time series of both flood peak flows and flood volumes over different durations provided that it is closely related to the catchment hydrological characteristics, specifically accounting for the effects of human activities, and incorporating expert knowledge when estimating or calibrating parameters. It is suggested that the two methods should be used together to cross check each other.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Anderson RM, Koren VI, Reed SM (2006) Using SSURGO data to improve Sacramento Model a priori parameter estimates. Journal of Hydrology 320(1–2): 103–116. DOI: 10.1016/j.jhydrol.2005.07.020
Bao ZX, Zhang JY, Wang GQ, et al. (2012) Attribution for decreasing streamflow of the Haihe River basin, northern China: Climate variability or human activities? Journal of Hydrology 460: 117–129. DOI: 10.1016/j.jhydrol.2012.06.054
Beighley RE, Moglen GE (2003) Adjusting measured peak discharges from an urbanizing watershed to reflect a stationary land use signal. Water resources research 39(4) DOI: 10.1029/2002wr001846
Brocca L, Melone F, Moramarco T (2008) On the estimation of antecedent wetness conditions in rainfall-runoff modelling. Hydrological Processes 22(5): 629–642. DOI: 10.1002/hyp.6629
Di Baldassarre G, Kooy M, Kemerink JS, et al. (2013) Towards understanding the dynamic behaviour of floodplains as human-water systems. Hydrology and Earth System Sciences 17(8): 3235–3244. DOI: 10.5194/hess-17-3235-2013
Duan QY, Sorooshian S, Gupta V (1992) Effective and efficient global optimization for conceptual rainfall-runoff models. Water resources research 28(4): 1015–1031. DOI: 10.1029/91WR02985
Duan QY, Sorooshian S, Gupta VK (1994) Optimal use of the SCE-UA global optimization method for calibrating watershed models. Journal of Hydrology 158(3): 265–284. DOI: 10.1016/0022-1694(94)90057-4
Fenicia F, Kavetski D, Savenije HHG, et al. (2014) Catchment properties, function, and conceptual model representation: is there a correspondence?. Hydrological Processes 28(4): 2451–2467. DOI: 10.1002/hyp.9726
Gaal L, Szolgay J, Kohnova S, et al. (2015) Dependence between flood peaks and volumes: a case study on climate and hydrological controls. Hydrological Sciences Journal-Journal Des Sciences Hydrologiques 60(6): 968–984. DOI: 10.1080/02626667.2014.951361
Gan TY (1998) Hydroclimatic trends and possible climatic warming in the Canadian Prairies. Water resources research 34(11): 3009–3015. DOI: 10.1029/98WR01265
Gan TY, Dlamini EM, Biftu GF (1997) Effects of model complexity and structure, data quality, and objective functions on hydrologic modeling. Journal of Hydrology 192(1): 81–103. DOI: 10.1016/S0022-1694(96)03114-9
Gharari S, Hrachowitz M, Fenicia F, et al. (2014) Using expert knowledge to increase realism in environmental system models can dramatically reduce the need for calibration. Hydrology and Earth System Sciences 18(12): 4839–4859. DOI: 10.5194/hessd-10-14801-2013
Hall J, Arheimer B, Borga M, et al. (2014) Understanding flood regime changes in Europe: a state-of-the-art assessment. Hydrology and Earth System Sciences 18(7): 2735–2772. DOI: 10.5194/hess-18-2735-2014
He H, Xia DZ, Gan HX (2011) Study on Extraction and Application of Hydrological Characteristics. Water Resources Informatization 103(4): 4–8. (In Chinese)
Hrachowitz M, Fovet O, Ruiz L, et al. (2014) Process consistency in models: The importance of system signatures, expert knowledge, and process complexity. Water resources research 50(9): 7445–7469. DOI: 10.1002/2014WR015484
Jothityangkoon C, Sivapalan M, Farmer DL (2001) Process controls of water balance variability in a large semi-arid catchment: downward approach to hydrological model development. Journal of Hydrology 254(1–4): 174–198. DOI: 10.1016/S0022-1694(01)00496-6
Latron J, Gallart F (2008) Runoff generation processes in a small Mediterranean research catchment (Vallcebre, Eastern Pyrenees). Journal of Hydrology 358(3–4): 206–220. DOI: 10.1016/j.jhydrol.2008.06.014
Li DL, Wang WS, Hu SX, et al. (2012) Characteristics of annual runoff variation in major rivers of China. Hydrological Processes 26(19): 2866–2877. DOI: 10.1002/hyp.8361
Li JZ, Feng P, Chen FL (2014) Effects of land use change on flood characteristics in mountainous area of Daqinghe watershed, China. Natural Hazards 70(1): 593–607. DOI: 10.1007/s11069-013-0830-8.
Li L, Xia J, Xu C-Y, et al. (2009) Analyse the sources of equifinality in hydrological model using GLUE methodology. In: Hydroinformatics in Hydrology, Hydrogeology and Water Resources, Proceedings of Symposium JS. pp: 130–138.
Liu CM, Yu JJ, Kendy E (2001) Groundwater exploitation and its impact on the environment in the North China Plain. Water International 26(2): 265–272. DOI: 10.1080/02508060108686913
McIntyre N, Al-Qurashi A (2009) Performance of ten rainfallrunoff models applied to an arid catchment in Oman. Environmental Modelling & Software 24(6): 726–738. DOI: 10.1016/j.envsoft.2008.11.001
Ministry of Water Resources of PRC (2006) Regulation for calculating design flood of water resources and hydropower projects. China Water & Power Press, Beijing, P.R.China. p 7 (In Chinese).
Nash J, Sutcliffe JV (1970) River flow forecasting through conceptual models part I—A discussion of principles. Journal of Hydrology 10(3): 282–290.
National Center of Hydrological Information (2000) Standard for hydrological information and hydrological forecasting. China WaterPower Press, Beijing, China. pp: 19 (In Chinese).
Niehoff D, Fritsch U, Bronstert A (2002) Land-use impacts on storm-runoff generation: scenarios of land-use change and simulation of hydrological response in a meso-scale catchment in SW-Germany. Journal of Hydrology 267(1–2): 80–93. DOI: 10.1016/S0022-1694(02)00142-7
Petrone KC, Hughes JD, Van Niel TG, et al. (2010) Streamflow decline in southwestern Australia, 1950-2008. Geophysical Research Letters 37: L11401. DOI: 10.1029/2010GL043102
Sanderson EW, Jaiteh M, Levy MA, et al. (2002) The human footprint and the last of the wild. Bioscience 52(10): 891–904. DOI: 10.1641/0006-3568(2002)052[0891:THFATL]2.0
Savenije HHG, Hoekstra AY, van der Zaag P (2014) Evolving water science in the Anthropocene. Hydrology and Earth System Sciences 18(1): 319–332. DOI: 10.5194/hess-18-319-2014
Shih SS, Yang SC, Ouyang HT (2014) Anthropogenic effects and climate change threats on the flood diversion of Erchung Floodway in Tanshui River, northern Taiwan. Natural Hazards 73(3): 1733–1747. DOI: 10.1007/s11069-014-1166-8
Son K, Sivapalan M (2007) Improving model structure and reducing parameter uncertainty in conceptual water balance models through the use of auxiliary data. Water resources research 43(1): W01415. DOI: 10.1029/2006wr005032
Wang WG, Shao QX, Yang T, et al. (2013) Quantitative assessment of the impact of climate variability and human activities on runoff changes: a case study in four catchments of the Haihe River basin, China. Hydrological Processes 27(8): 1158–1174. DOI: 10.1002/hyp.9299
Wang YC, Yu PS, Yang TC (2010) Comparison of genetic algorithms and shuffled complex evolution approach for calibrating distributed rainfall-runoff model. Hydrological Processes 24(8): 1015–1026. DOI: 10.1002/Hyp.7543
Xiong LH, Yu KX, Zhang HG, et al. (2013) Annual runoff change in the headstream of Yangtze River and its relation to precipitation and air temperature. Hydrology Research 44(5): 850–874. DOI: 10.2166/nh.2012.120
Xu HL, Xu CY, Chen H, et al. (2013) Assessing the influence of rain gauge density and distribution on hydrological model performance in a humid region of China. Journal of Hydrology 505: 1–12. DOI: 10.1016/j.jhydrol.2013.09.004
Yang YH, Tian F (2009) Abrupt change of runoff and its major driving factors in Haihe River Catchment, China. Journal of Hydrology 374(3–4): 373–383. DOI: 10.1016/j.jhydrol.2009.06.040
Yao C, Zhang K, Yu ZB, et al. (2014) Improving the flood prediction capability of the Xinanjiang model in ungauged nested catchments by coupling it with the geomorphologic instantaneous unit hydrograph. Journal of Hydrology 517: 1035–1048. DOI: 10.1016/j.jhydrol.2014.06.037
Yuan X, Lei T (2004) Soil and water conservation measures and their benefits in runoff and sediment reductions. Transactions of the CSAE 20(2): 296–300. (In Chinese).
Zhang L, Zhou Y (2009) Analysis of soil and water conservation measures in the Qiuzhuang catchment. Hebei Water Resources 6: 29. (In Chinese).
Zhao RJ (1992) The Xinanjiang model applied in China. Journal of Hydrology 135(1): 371–381. DOI: 10.1016/0022-1694(92)90096-E
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-8202-5361
http://orcid.org/0000-0001-8278-9479
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-4796-4988
http://orcid.org/0000-0001-5288-9372
http://orcid.org/0000-0003-0498-429X
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Huang, Pn., Li, Zj., Li, Ql. et al. Application and comparison of coaxial correlation diagram and hydrological model for reconstructing flood series under human disturbance. J. Mt. Sci. 13, 1245–1264 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11629-015-3474-1
Received:
Revised:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11629-015-3474-1