Precipitation scenario analysis is a crucial step in flood risk assessment, in which storm events with different probabilities are defined and used as input for the hydrological/hydrodynamic calculations. Rainfall generators may serve as a basis for the precipitation analysis. With the increase in the use of high resolution spatially-explicit hydrological/hydrodynamic models in flood risk calculations, demand for synthetic gridded precipitation input is increasing. In this work, we present a dynamic spatiotemporal rainfall generator. The model is capable of generating catchment-scale rainfields containing moving storms, which enable physically-plausible and spatiotemporally coherent precipitation events. This is achieved by the tools event-based approach, where dynamic storms are identified as clusters of related data that occur at different locations in space and time, and are then used as basis for event regeneration. The implemented methodology, mainly inspired by Dierden et al. (2019), provides an improvement in the spatial coherence of precipitation extremes, which can in turn be beneficial in flood risk calculations. The model has been validated under different databases such as the radar-based RADALON dataset or spatially-interpolated historical raingauge timeseries of different catchments in Germany, which is also presented in this work. The validation indicates the models ability to adequately preserve observed storm statistics in the generated timeseries. The generator is developed as an extension to the state-of-the-science flood risk modelling tool ProMaIDes (Promaides 2023). The model also puts great focus on user accessibility with offering features such as an easy installation process, support for most operating systems, a user interface and an online user manual.
Knowledge of catchment 3D spatial heterogeneity is crucial for the assessment and modeling of eco-hydrological processes. Especially during the initial development phase of a hydro-geo-system, the primary structural properties have the potential to determine further development pathways. Small-scale heterogeneity (cm to m scale) may have significant effects on processes on larger spatial scales, but is difficult to measure and quantify. The Hühnerwasser (Chicken Creek) catchment offers the unique opportunity to study early ecosystem development within an initial structural setup that is well-known, from the plot up to the catchment scale.
Based on information on the open-cast mining technology, catchment boundaries and sediment properties, we developed a structure generator program for the process-based modeling of specific dumping structures and sediment property distributions on the catchment. The structure generator reproduces the trajectories of spoil ridges and can be conditioned to reproduce actual sediment distributions according to remote sensing and soil sampling data. Alternatively, sediment distribution scenarios can be generated based on geological data from the excavation site, or can be distributed stochastically. Using pedotransfer functions, the effective hydraulic van-Genuchten parameters are then calculated from sediment texture and bulk density. The main application of the 3D catchment model is to provide detailed 3D-distributed flow domain information for hydrological flow modeling. Observation data are available from catchment monitoring are available for determining the boundary conditions (e.g., precipitation), and the calibration / validation of the model (catchment discharge, ground water). The analysis of multiple sediment distribution scenarios allows to evaluate the effect of initial conditions on hydrological behavior development. Generally, the modeling approach can be used to pinpoint the influx of specific soil structural features on ecohydrological processes across spatial scales.
Rainfall is a complex, spatial and temporally variated process and one of the core inputs for hydrological and hydrodynamic modelling. Most rainfalls are known to be moving storms with varying directions and velocities. Storm movement is known to be an important influence on runoff generation, both affecting peak discharge and the shape of hydrographs. Therefore, exploring the extent rainfall dynamics affect runoff generation and consequently flooded areas, can be an asset in effective flood risk management.
In this work, we study how storm movement (e.g. characterized by velocity and direction) can affect surface flow generation, water levels and flooded areas within a catchment. Moreover, the influence of rainfall temporal variability in correlation with storm movement is taken into account. This is achieved by means of numerical-based, spatially explicit surface flow simulations using the tool ProMaIDes (2021), a free software for risk-based evaluation of flood risk mitigation measures. The storm events are generated using a microcanonical random cascade model and further on trajected across the catchment area.
The study area is the Kan river catchment located in the province of Tehran (Iran) with a total area of 836 km², which has experienced multiple flooding events in recent years. Due to its semi-arid climate, steep topography with narrow valleys, this area has high potential for flash flood occurrence as a result of high intensity precipitation.
The results of this study show a range of possible magnitudes of influence of rainfall movement on the catchment´s runoff response. The resulting flood maps highlight the importance of rainfall velocity and most importantly the direction of the movement in the estimation of flood events as well as their likelihood in catchment area. Moreover, its shown that the magnitude of influence of storm velocity and direction on discharge strongly depends on the location within the river network which it is measured.
Semi-automatic image analysis of spatiotemporal vegetation evolution in the Hühnerwasser catchment
(2020)
Vegetation self-organisation in water-limited ecosystems in semi-arid climates has been extensively studied by means of numerical simulation using a set of different reaction-diffusion-equations. Most of such models and studies have been concerned with the long-term steady ecohydrological steady states on domains with periodic boundary conditions and forced by steady rainfall. A vast majority of the modelling literature on vegetation self-organisation exists around near-equilibrium conditions. One of the clearest examples of this is that most of the published numerical results have been obtained by evolving near-equilibrium initial conditions to asymptotic steady states, since researchers have been historically interested in the resilience and stability of the systems to perturbation around converged, steady (equilibrium) states and little interest has been given to the transient states which lead to the equilibrium states. Nonetheless, ecohydrological theory recognises that dryland ecosystems can often be far-from-equilibrium systems, in quasi-permanent transient condition, exhibiting non-linear responses to boundary conditions and forcings. This prompts the question of how different the behaviour of the system can be when far-from equilibrium.
In this contribution we explore the role of far-from equilibrium initial hydrological conditions on both the transient and long-term asymptotically steady ecohydrological states. A simulation study was performed using the HilleRisLambers-Rietkerk ecohydrological model on a flatland varying the initial available water both near and far from equilibrium whilst also spanning the rainfall gradient (90 – 360 mm/year), performing simulations up to 200 years long. The results were assessed in terms of the evolution of total biomass yield and hydrological water balance, as well as a quantitative assessment of vegetation patterns.
The results show that equilibrium conditions always yield smooth system trajectories, with little over- or undershooting, converging to the well-established patterns in the literature. However, as initial conditions move further away from equilibrium, the patterns start to differ, both in their temporal trajectory as in their long-term stable states. Conditions closer to equilibrium generate patterns with quantitative differences when compared to equilibrium conditions (e.g., larger spots). Conditions far from equilibrium can result in an entirely different hybrid patterns, consisting of a mix of spots, arcs and spirals. We evaluate these differences both qualitatively (by observing the patterns) and quantitatively, through a set of geometric indicators which describe the patterns. The results show that the patterns are history dependent and suggest that published results so far are only a subset of possible patterns. Additionally, the quantitative assessment of pattern properties in time shows that although patterns appear steady, they may indeed be slowly changing over time, while the total biomass and vegetation cover are steady early on. This has implications on the definitions of ecohydrological steady states. We also show that the effects of the idealised initial conditions on model results can be analogous to singular hydrometeorological events, as even stable patterns can be shifted into hybrid patterns by single events. Furthermore, we also explore how the new hybrid patterns compare to the well-established ones in terms of resilience to hydrological perturbations.
The Huehnerwasser catchment is a monitored, early-development constructed catchment within the Lower Lausatia post-mining landscape in Germany. From the initial bare catchment state, a sequence of landscape-forming processes occurred, including erosion-based topographic change and vegetation establishment, which are at the centre of this study. Erosion-based topographic change is strongly driven by surface runoff, while in turn itself also modifying runoff in the catchment. These topographic changes can have a significant impact on the hydrological response of a catchment, as they can affect flow paths, flow speeds and rainfall-runoff-infiltration partitioning, all of which manifest in different ways in runoff hydrographs in response to rainfall events. Vegetation establishment enhances local infiltration capacity, introducing infiltration heterogeneity, thus affecting the topography-controlled
flowpaths as water infiltrates at vegetation patches.
Critical-zone observatories and monitored early-development systems allow to document signatures of the evolution of catchments and to correlate certain behaviours to processes. However, readily and easily achievable runoff signatures often cannot provide a clear nor full description of process interactions, as the individual roles of processes are stacked together, and strongly shaped by the temporal distribution of rainfall, making it very difficult to disentangle the effects of each process, and making modelling a necessary approach to understand these interactions and their manifestations. All such processes occur at small spatial scales, and are difficult to observe or assess when experimentally studying catchment hydrology. Moreover, given that the complexity of processes contributing to morphological changes and the corresponding alteration of runoff signatures, single catchment experiments and even comprehensive monitoring programmes of whole catchments will neither allow to decipher all processes interactions nor will it allow to apply a statistically derived experimental.
In this work, we study the effects that spatial distributions of surface topography and infiltration properties have on surface runoff and surface connectivity in response to single rainfall events, in the context of the Huehnerwasser catchment. We simulate rainfall/runoff processes by means of a physically-based, spatially explicit surface flow model, and assess the results in terms of hydrological signatures (hydrograph, hydrological balance), spatial distribution of the hydrodynamics of runoff, and surface flow connectivity. To do this, we use several DEMs of the Hühnerwasser catchment recorded during the erosion-based development of the surface (2006-2010), different hypothetical infiltration properties distributions, and a set of different singular rainfall events. The study allows to observe the individual effects that topographic properties and infiltration distributions have on the hydrograph signatures and connect cause-and-effect through an intermediate, conceptual property of the system: surface runoff connectivity, arguably an indicator of hydrological organisation of the runoff response. Moreover, by systematic analysis, the interactions between topography and infiltration can also be assessed in the hydrograph and explained through connectivity. The results show a range of possible magnitudes of influence of topography and infiltration on the runoff response, while highlighting that the onset of runoff and the rising limb of the hydrograph are mostly affected by these features and their interactions, and strongly related to surface runoff connectivity.
Terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems are increasingly exposed to high level of salt (NaCl) concentrations. Impacts of increased salt concentration on mobilisation of heavy metals have been shown for road side soils receiving de-icing salt, for sediments and soils exposed to salt water intrusions, and soils and aquifers receiving runoff from salt mines. In fact, this study was motivated by the impact of salt dumps on soil and groundwater observed for potash mines in the central part of Germany.
The objectives of this contribution is to asses the impact of NaCl concentration on heavy metal mobilization using speciation modelling. In particular, we focus on the effect of chloride complex formation in solution and how strongly this complex formation is “extracting” heavy metal cation from soil and sediments substrates.
As experimental data for speciation at very high ionic strength is not readily available and not easily measurable, we focus on PHREEQC modelling to assess NaCl concentration ranges up to 3 M, needing to employ Pitzer equation as the activity model. In order to determine the competition of surface reaction and complex formation in aqueous solution, we used three reaction models: i) surface complexation with a high and low affinity site for iron hydroxide, ii) a heterogeneous binding site model for humic acids and iii) ion exchange as described with Rothmund-Kornfeld equation We did a series of simulations for Zn, Cd and Pb. Species distribution for the aqueous phase and the solid surfaces where determined by increasing NaCl solutions for a given total heavy metal concentration.
In nearly all simulations conducted, the difference between simulations allowing chloride complexes to form and simulations where complexation is disabled, showed the emergence of a characteristic concentration range of NaCl for which the effect of chloride complexation reaches a maximum. In general, the range of highest sensitivity concerning mobilization occurs within the range of 1-3M NaCl for all simulations. At the lower end of this range shows the highest sensitivity to NaCl changes and is determined by several factors including the affinity to bonding sites and the speciation of an element along the salinity gradient. The peak of this curve is controlled by the point along the salinity gradient where the majority of heavy metal has been mobilized from the surface phase. One important outcome of this study is, that increasing NaCl background concentration behaves in a nonlinear way that is determined by the heterogeneity of the surface binding sites and that there is no simple way of assessing the mobilization potential of chloride complexation in soils and sediments.
Reactive solute leaching from the top soil has received wide attention as it relates to major environmental challenges like groundwater and river water pollution by leached reactive solutes such as agricultural pesticides or biochemical pollutants. Adequate understanding of how fast, when and how such solutes and possible contaminants are leached from the top soil is necessary to enhance agricultural practice, pollution risk assessment and overall water quality management. Many empirical studies have been carried on the subject, with varied their approaches and complexity, and have been carried out under different site and atmospheric conditions. Some ofsuch studies argue that properties of soils and solutes are dominant for the leaching process, while others emphasizeatmospheric drivers as a main trigger for preferential flow. Long residence times have also been observed, with solutes lingering in the soils long after initially introduced and after experiencing rainfall events. Modelling and analytical studies have been put forward to better explain these behaviours, but often neglecting some of of the sources of complexity (such as preferential flow and soil heterogeneity) or with simplified modelling strategies.
In this work, we study reactive solute dissipation processes in a soil column with a contaminated top soil layer in response to rainfall events. To cope with a heterogeneous soil structure, within an intermediate-complexity and physically-based framework, we solve Richards equation together with a mobile-immobile soil model together with a non-equilibrium advection-diffusion reaction model in Hydrus1D. We perform an extensive analysis of the sensitivity of solute dissipation rates from the top soil in response to all permutations of a parameter space comprised of soil properties (immobile fraction, mobile-immobile mass transfer coefficient), solute properties (decay coefficient, adsorption coefficient), rainfall parameters (total precipitation, duration, frequency) and the presence or absence of evaporation. Results are assessed in terms of the resulting solute dissipation curves and are fitted to exponential decay curves for comparison purposes.
The results show that different solute dissipation regimes exist in response to the dominant physical process under a particular set of conditions. We identify three dissipation regimes which exhibit characteristic time scales and dissipation curve shapes: an advection dominated regime occurring under particular rainfall conditions, an evaporation dominated regime occurring under low rainfall volume and intensity and a decay-dominated regime exists, in which the bio- or chemical- decay rate of the substance is large and therefore dominant. Our results also provide further evidence and rationale for long residence times (which have been previously noted in the literature) in the top soil under preferential flow conditions, as the complex interactions between different processes may favour at mobilisation or immobilisation of the solute, which can be related to the characteristic shapes of the dissipation curves and in turn the regimes.
The results allow a better understanding of the controlling processes and the related parameters interactions that dominate each regime. The thorough sensitivity analysis shows that, within those regimes, certain properties have higher weight and respectively more attention should be given when investigating them in comprehensive leaching risk assessment.