Value of adaptive water resources management in Northern California under climatic variability and change: Reservoir management

Georgakakos, Aris P.; Yao, Haiyuan; Kistenmacher, M.; Georgakakos, Konstantine P.; Graham, Nicholas E.; Cheng, Feng; Spencer, Cristopher R.; Shamir, Eylon

doi:10.1016/j.jhydrol.2011.04.038

Cited by 140 publications

(59 citation statements)

References 13 publications

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“…Due to the significant computational time involved, dynamical downscaling efforts often yield a single downscaled realization of physically consistent input vectors for hydrologic modeling (e.g., downscaling 30 years of GCM data produces a single 30 year simulation). This approach often requires bias adjustment for the downscaled high resolution fields and/or for the resultant streamflow (Georgakakos et al, 2012a).…”

Section: N Peleg Et Al: Modeling Convective Rainfall Sensitivity Tomentioning

confidence: 99%

A framework for assessing hydrological regime sensitivity to climate change in a convective rainfall environment: a case study of two medium-sized eastern Mediterranean catchments, Israel

Peleg

Shamir

Georgakakos

et al. 2015

Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci.

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Abstract.A modeling framework is formulated and applied to assess the sensitivity of the hydrological regime of two catchments in a convective rainfall environment with respect to projected climate change. The study uses likely rainfall scenarios with high spatiotemporal resolution that are dependent on projected changes in the driving regional meteorological synoptic systems. The framework was applied to a case study in two medium-sized Mediterranean catchments in Israel, affected by convective rainfall, by combining the HiReS-WG rainfall generator and the SAC-SMA hydrological model. The projected climate change impact on the hydrological regime was examined for the RCP4.5 and RCP8.5 emission scenarios, comparing the historical (beginning of the 21st century) and future (mid-21st-century) periods from three general circulation model simulations available from CMIP5. Focusing on changes in the occurrence frequency of regional synoptic systems and their impact on rainfall and streamflow patterns, we find that the mean annual rainfall over the catchments is projected to be reduced by 15 % (outer range 2-23 %) and 18 % (7-25 %) for the RCP4.5 sand RCP8.5 emission scenarios, respectively. The mean annual streamflow volumes are projected to be reduced by 45 % (10-60 %) and 47 % (16-66 %). The average events' streamflow volumes for a given event rainfall depth are projected to be lower by a factor of 1.4-2.1. Moreover, the streamflow season in these ephemeral streams is projected to be shorter by 22 % and 26-28 % for the RCP4.5 and RCP8.5, respectively. The amplification in reduction of streamflow volumes relative to rainfall amounts is related to the projected reduction in soil moisture, as a result of fewer rainfall events and longer dry spells between rainfall events during the wet season. The dominant factors for the projected reduction in rainfall amount were the reduction in occurrence of wet synoptic systems and the shortening of the wet synoptic systems durations. Changes in the occurrence frequency of the two dominant types of the regional wet synoptic systems (active Red Sea trough and Mediterranean low) were found to have a minor impact on the total rainfall.

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Section: N Peleg Et Al: Modeling Convective Rainfall Sensitivity Tomentioning

confidence: 99%

A framework for assessing hydrological regime sensitivity to climate change in a convective rainfall environment: a case study of two medium-sized eastern Mediterranean catchments, Israel

Peleg

Shamir

Georgakakos

et al. 2015

Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci.

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“…An emerging field of research has begun to demonstrate the value of seasonal streamflow forecasts when applied to real-world water management problems, such as determining the appropriate water release from a reservoir -the focus of the present study. Water release decisions can be improved with seasonal forecasts across a variety of reservoir types, including hydropower dams (Kim and Palmer, 1997;Faber and Stedinger, 2001;Hamlet et al, 2002;Alemu et al, 2010;Block, 2011), water supply reservoirs (Anghileri et al, 2016;Zhao and Zhao, 2014;Li et al, 2014) and reservoir systems operated for multiple competing objectives (Graham and Georgakakos, 2010;Georgakakos et al, 2012). Operators considering whether to adopt a forecast-informed operating scheme should be encouraged by these outcomes.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Complex relationship between seasonal streamflow forecast skill and value in reservoir operations

Turner

Bennett

Robertson

et al. 2017

Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci.

108

105

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Abstract. Considerable research effort has recently been directed at improving and operationalising ensemble seasonal streamflow forecasts. Whilst this creates new opportunities for improving the performance of water resources systems, there may also be associated risks. Here, we explore these potential risks by examining the sensitivity of forecast value (improvement in system performance brought about by adopting forecasts) to changes in the forecast skill for a range of hypothetical reservoir designs with contrasting operating objectives. Forecast-informed operations are simulated using rolling horizon, adaptive control and then benchmarked against optimised control rules to assess performance improvements. Results show that there exists a strong relationship between forecast skill and value for systems operated to maintain a target water level. But this relationship breaks down when the reservoir is operated to satisfy a target demand for water; good forecast accuracy does not necessarily translate into performance improvement. We show that the primary cause of this behaviour is the buffering role played by storage in water supply reservoirs, which renders the forecast superfluous for long periods of the operation. System performance depends primarily on forecast accuracy when critical decisions are made -namely during severe drought. As it is not possible to know in advance if a forecast will perform well at such moments, we advocate measuring the consistency of forecast performance, through bootstrap resampling, to indicate potential usefulness in storage operations. Our results highlight the need for sensitivity assessment in value-of-forecast studies involving reservoirs with supply objectives.

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“…It is a simplified orographic precipitation model that decouples the momentum equation from the atmospheric moisture conservation equations, and uses a potential theory flow solution for the three-dimensional wind field over undulating terrain. This model was successfully implemented in the Sierra Nevada, Northern California [48][49][50][51][52], Southern California [53], and the Panama Canal watershed [54,55]. It was shown to perform comparably to the full-physics numerical weather prediction mesoscale models (e.g., WRF) in regions with pronounced terrain features [18,[48][49][50][51][52] at a very significant computational savings.…”

Section: Orographic Precipitation Model (Opm)mentioning

confidence: 99%

The Use of an Orographic Precipitation Model to Assess the Precipitation Spatial Distribution in Lake Kinneret Watershed

Shamir

Rimmer

Georgakakos

2016

Water

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Abstract:A high-resolution 3-D orographic precipitation model (OPM) forced by Climate Forecast System (CFS) reanalysis fields was developed for the Lake Kinneret watershed (Israel-Syria-Lebanon territories). The OPM was tuned to represent the interaction between the advected and stratiform rainfall, and the local orographic enhancement. The OPM evaluation was focused on the densely instrumented lower part of the watershed. To evaluate the ungauged upper-elevation, bias-adjusted precipitation estimates from the Global-Hydro-Estimator were used. The OPM simulates higher rainfall amounts in the upper-elevation watershed compared to currently used rainfall estimates from an elevation dependent regression. The larger differences are during rain events with southwesterly wind flow and high moisture flux. These conditions, according to the OPM, are conducive to enhanced orographic lifting in the Hermon Mountain. A sensitivity analysis indicated that the higher wind speeds for southwesterly-northwesterly trajectories generate significant orographic lifting and increase the precipitation differences between the lower and upper elevations.

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Value of adaptive water resources management in Northern California under climatic variability and change: Reservoir management

Cited by 140 publications

References 13 publications

A framework for assessing hydrological regime sensitivity to climate change in a convective rainfall environment: a case study of two medium-sized eastern Mediterranean catchments, Israel

A framework for assessing hydrological regime sensitivity to climate change in a convective rainfall environment: a case study of two medium-sized eastern Mediterranean catchments, Israel

Complex relationship between seasonal streamflow forecast skill and value in reservoir operations

The Use of an Orographic Precipitation Model to Assess the Precipitation Spatial Distribution in Lake Kinneret Watershed

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