Hydrometeorological prediction involves the forecasting of the state and variation of hydrometeorological elements -- including precipitation, temperature, humidity, soil moisture, river discharge, gr

Natural weather systems possess certain spatiotemporal variability and correlations. Preserving these spatiotemporal properties is a significant challenge in postprocessing ensemble weather forecasts. To address this challenge, several rank-based methods, the Schaake Shuffle and its variants, have been developed in recent years. This paper presents an extensive assessment of the Schaake Shuffle and its two variants. These schemes differ in how the reference multivariate rank structure is established. The first scheme (SS-CLM), an implementation of the original Schaake Shuffle method, relies on climatological observations to construct rank structures. The second scheme (SS-ANA) utilizes precipitation event analogs obtained from a historical archive of observations. The third scheme (SS-ENS) employs ensemble members from the Global Ensemble Forecast System (GEFS). Each of the three schemes is applied to postprocess precipitation ensemble forecasts from the GEFS for its first three forecast days over the mid-Atlantic region of the United States. In general, the effectiveness of these schemes depends on several factors, including the season (or precipitation pattern) and the level of gridcell aggregation. It is found that 1) the SS-CLM and SS-ANA behave similarly in spatial and temporal correlations; 2) by a measure for capturing spatial variability, the SS-ENS outperforms the SS-ANA, which in turn outperforms the SS-CLM; and 3), overall, the SS-ANA performs better than the SS-CLM. The study also reveals that it is important to choose a proper size for the postprocessed ensembles in order to capture extreme precipitation events.

This article compares the skill of medium-range probabilistic quantitative precipitation forecasts (PQPFs) generated via two postprocessing mechanisms: 1) the mixed-type meta-Gaussian distribution (MMGD) model and 2) the censored shifted Gamma distribution (CSGD) model. MMGD derives the PQPF by conditioning on the mean of raw ensemble forecasts. CSGD, on the other hand, is a regression-based mechanism that estimates PQPF from a prescribed distribution by adjusting the climatological distribution according to the mean, spread, and probability of precipitation (POP) of raw ensemble forecasts. Each mechanism is applied to the reforecast of the Global Ensemble Forecast System (GEFS) to yield a postprocessed PQPF over lead times between 24 and 72 h. The outcome of an evaluation experiment over the mid-Atlantic region of the United States indicates that the CSGD approach broadly outperforms the MMGD in terms of both the ensemble mean and the reliability of distribution, although the performance gap tends to be narrow, and at times mixed, at higher precipitation thresholds (. 5 mm). Analysis of a rare storm event demonstrates the superior reliability and sharpness of the CSGD PQPF and underscores the issue of overforecasting by the MMGD PQPF. This work suggests that the CSGD's incorporation of ensemble spread and POP does help enhance its skill, particularly for light forecast amounts, but CSGD's model structure and its use of optimization in parameter estimation likely play a more determining role in its outperformance.

For water supply, navigational, ecological protection or water quality control purposes, there is a great need in knowing the likelihood of the river level falling below a certain threshold. Ensemble streamflow prediction (ESP) based on simulations of deterministic hydrologic models is widely used to assess this likelihood. Raw ESP results can be biased in both the ensemble means and the spreads. In this study, we applied a modified general linear model post-processor (GLMPP) to correct these biases. The modified GLMPP is built on the basis of regression of simulated and observed streamflow calculated on the basis of canonical events, instead of the daily values as is carried out in the original GLMPP. We conducted the probabilistic analysis of post-processed ESP results falling below pre-specified low-flow levels at seasonal time scale. Raw ESP forecasts from the 1980 to 2006 periods by four different land surface models (LSMs) in eight large river basins in the continental USA are included in the analysis. The four LSMs are Noah, Mosaic, variable infiltration capacity and Sacramento models. The major results from this study are as follows: (1) a modified GLMPP was proposed on the basis of canonical events; (2) post-processing can improve the accuracy and reduce the uncertainty of hydrologic forecasts; (3) post-processing can help deal with the effect of human activity; and (4) raw simulation results from different models vary greatly in different basins. However, post-processing can always remove model biases under different conditions. Copyright (c) 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Applied Uncertainty Analysis for Flood Risk Management, pp. 387-406 (2014) No AccessChapter 15: Operational Hydrologic Ensemble ForecastingAlbrecht H. Weerts, Dong-Jun Seo, Micha Werner, and John SchaakeAlbrecht H. WeertsDeltares, Delft, Netherlands, Dong-Jun SeoThe University of Texas at Arlington, TX, USA, Micha WernerDeltares, Delft, Netherlands, and John SchaakeConsultant to National Weather Service, Silver Spring, MD, USAhttps://doi.org/10.1142/9781848162716_0015Cited by:2 PreviousNext AboutSectionsPDF/EPUB ToolsAdd to favoritesDownload CitationsTrack CitationsRecommend to Library ShareShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditEmail Abstract: The following sections are included: Introduction Atmospheric Uncertainty Aspects Hydrologic Uncertainty Aspects Verification Promises and Challenges Acknowledgements References FiguresReferencesRelatedDetailsCited By 2Evolving Threshold of Flood-Leading Precipitation in a User-Oriented Forecast System Based on the TIGGE DatasetZiyan Zheng, Zhongwei Yan, Jing Chen, Jiarui Han and Jiangjiang Xia et al.22 December 2021 | Frontiers in Earth Science, Vol. 9Reconstructing Environmental Variables with Missing Field Data via End-to-End Machine LearningMatteo Sangiorgio, Stefano Barindelli, Valerio Guglieri, Giovanna Venuti and Giorgio Guariso28 May 2020 Applied Uncertainty Analysis for Flood Risk ManagementMetrics History PDF download

HEPEX is an international initiative bringing together hydrologists, meteorologists, researchers and end-users to develop advanced probabilistic hydrological forecast techniques for improved flood, drought and water management. HEPEX was launched in 2004 as an independent, cooperative international scientific activity. During the first meeting, the overarching goal was defined as:" to develop and test procedures to produce reliable hydrological ensemble forecasts, and to demonstrate their utility in decision making related to the water, environmental and emergency management sectors." The applications of hydrological ensemble predictions span across large spatio-temporal scales, ranging from short-term and localized predictions to global climate change and regional modeling. Within the HEPEX community, information is shared through its blog (www. hepex. org), meetings, testbeds and intercompaison …

Applied Uncertainty Analysis for Flood Risk Management, pp. 499-505 (2014) No AccessChapter 18: Case Study: Decision Making for Flood Forecasting in the US National Weather ServiceRobert Hartman and John SchaakeRobert HartmanNOAA National Weather Service, USA and John SchaakeNOAA National Weather Service, USAhttps://doi.org/10.1142/9781848162716_0018Cited by:1 PreviousNext AboutSectionsPDF/EPUB ToolsAdd to favoritesDownload CitationsTrack CitationsRecommend to Library ShareShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditEmail Abstract: The following sections are included: Introduction Flash Flooding and Rapid Hydrologic Response Flood Forecasting Reservoir Inflow Forecasting Spring Snowmelt Forecasting Seasonal Water Supply Forecasting Forecast Uncertainty FiguresReferencesRelatedDetailsCited By 1IntroductionKevin Sene1 Jan 2016 Applied Uncertainty Analysis for Flood Risk ManagementMetrics History PDF download

Recent advances in seasonal to interannual hydroclimate predictions provide an opportunity for developing a proactive approach toward water management. This motivated a recent AGU Chapman Conference (see program details at http://chapman.agu.org/watermanagement/). Approximately 85 participants from the United States, Oceania, Asia, Europe, and South America presented and discussed the current state of successes, challenges, and opportunities in seasonal to interannual hydroclimate forecasts and water management, and a number of key messages emerged.

NOAA's National Weather Service (NWS) is implementing a short- to long-range Hydrologic Ensemble Forecast Service (HEFS). The HEFS addresses the need to quantify uncertainty in hydrologic forecasts for flood risk management, water supply management, streamflow regulation, recreation planning, and ecosystem management, among other applications. The HEFS extends the existing hydrologic ensemble services to include short-range forecasts, incorporate additional weather and climate information, and better quantify the major uncertainties in hydrologic forecasting. It provides, at forecast horizons ranging from 6 h to about a year, ensemble forecasts and verification products that can be tailored to users' needs.Based on separate modeling of the input and hydrologic uncertainties, the HEFS includes 1) the Meteorological Ensemble Forecast Processor, which ingests weather and climate forecasts from multiple numerical weather prediction models to produce bias-corrected forcing ensembles at the hydrologic basin scales; 2) the Hydrologic Processor, which inputs the forcing ensembles into hydrologic, hydraulic, and reservoir models to generate streamflow ensembles; 3) the hydrologic Ensemble Postprocessor, which aims to account for the total hydrologic uncertainty and correct for systematic biases in streamflow; 4) the Ensemble Verification Service, which verifies the forcing and streamflow ensembles to help identify the main sources of skill and error in the forecasts; and 5) the Graphics Generator, which enables forecasters to create a large array of ensemble and related products. Examples of verification results from multiyear hind-casting illustrate the expected performance and limitations of HEFS. Finally, future scientific and operational challenges to fully embrace and practice the ensemble paradigm in hydrology and water resources services are discussed.

Hydrologic extremes in the form of flood and drought have large impacts on society that can be reduced through preparations made possible by seasonal prediction. However, the skill of seasonal predictions from global climate models is uncertain, which severely limits their practical use. In the past, the skill assessment has been limited to a single temporal or spatial resolution for a short hindcast period, which is prone to sampling errors, and noise that leads to uncertainty. In this work a framework that uses "canonical" forecast events, or averages in space-time, to provide a more certain assessment of when and where models are skillful is developed. This framework is demonstrated by using NCEP's Climate Forecast System, version 2, hindcast dataset for precipitation and temperature over the contiguous United States (CONUS). As part of the canonical event analyses, the probabilistic predictability metric (PPM) is used to define spatial and seasonal variability of forecast skill and its attribution to El Nino-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) over the CONUS. The PPM indicates that there are clear seasonal and spatial patterns of model skill that provide a better understanding of when and where to have confidence in model predictions as compared to a skill metric based on a single temporal and spatial scale. Furthermore, the canonical event analysis also facilitates the attribution of spatiotemporal variations of precipitation predictive skill to the antecedent ENSO conditions. This work illustrates the importance of using canonical event analysis to diagnose seasonal predictions and discusses its extensions for model development.

As part of this special issue on hydrological ensemble prediction systems, this paper reports on the intercomparison experiment for post-processing techniques that has been initiated in 2011 by the International Community on Hydrologic Ensemble Predictions. The design of this intercomparison experiment and the data sets available are presented. The post-processing methods that have been applied to date are listed and example results are shown. It is expected that through the exchange and joint verification and analysis of the post-processing results, the intercomparison experiment will contribute to a fast improvement and applicability of post-processing techniques. Readers are invited to join the intercomparison experiment. Copyright (C) 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.