The probabilistic hydrological MARCSHYDRO (the MARkov Chain System) model: Its structure and core version 0.2

Abstract

The question of the environmental risks of social and economic infrastructure has recently become apparent due to an increase in the number of extreme weather events. Extreme runoff events include floods and droughts. In water engineering, extreme runoff is described in terms of probability and uses methods of frequency analysis to evaluate an exceedance probability curve (EPC) for runoff. It is assumed that historical observations of runoff are representative of the future; however, trends in the observed time series show doubt in this assumption. The paper describes a probabilistic hydrological MARCSHYDRO (the MARkov Chain System) model that can be applied to predict future runoff extremes. The MARCSHYDRO model simulates statistical estimators of multi-year runoff in order to perform future projections in a probabilistic form. Projected statistics of the meteorological variables available in climate scenarios force the model. This study introduces the new model's core version and provides a user guide together with an example of the model set-up in a single case study. In this case study, the model simulates the projected EPCs of annual runoff under three climate scenarios. The scope of applicability and limitations of the model's core version 0.2 are discussed.