GCIP/OHIO (Kanawha) Project

Experimental Streamflow Forecasting for Water Resources Management in the Ohio River Basin

Andrew Wood and Dennis Lettenmaier (Dept. of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Washington)
Stu Schwartz (Hydrologic Consultant)
Gene Stakhiv (US Army Corps of Engineers Institute for Water Resources)

Abstract

As part of the hydrology and water resources applications activities of the GEWEX Continental Scale International Project (GCIP), an assessment of experimental streamflow forecasts based on experimental ensemble climate forecasts is being conducted in the Kanawha River basin, a major tributary of the Ohio River. The aim of the project is to make probabilistic ensemble forecasts targeted to operationon available to Kanawha River basin water managers. The source of the ensemble forecasts is the NOAA Climate Prediction Center's Global Spectral Model (an atmospheric general circulation model or AGCM). The ensemble streamflow forecasts are derived using the monthly precipitation and temperature anomalies from experimental 10-month AGCM climate outlook ensembles produced by CPC. Daily time series of meteorological forcings for each forecast in an ensemble are assembled via downscaling of AGCM monthly meteorological output and subsequent statistical resampling of daily historic observations. These time series are used to force a spatially distributed hydrologic model which has been calibrated at critical streamflow locations in the basin.

The current forecasts center on the evolving 1999 drought situation. Forecasts derived from the CPC monthly to seasonal ensembles are contrasted with ensemble forecasts based on climatology, a comparison which helps quantify forecast quality. Collaboration with operational decision makers supports both the interpretation of experimental streamflow forecasts as well as the development of decision models that integrate the quality and skill of experimental streamflow forecasts with the risk-based tradeoffs inherent in water management decisions.

Web Report

  1. Introduction
  2. Experimental Framework
  3. Ohio River Basin / Kanawha River Subbasin
  4. VIC Hydrologic Model
  5. Ensemble Forecasts from CPC
  6. Downscaling and Bias Correction
  7. Verification
  8. Results
  9. Conclusions & Lessons Learned
  10. Files for Download

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Questions? Comments? Please email aww@hydro.washington.edu.
Last modified: Wed Oct 20 11:51:01 PDT 1999