Assessment and Improvement of IDF Generation Algorithms Used in the IDF_CC Tool

Fahad Alzahrani (), Ousmane Seidou and Abdullah Alodah ()
Additional contact information
Fahad Alzahrani: University of Ottawa
Ousmane Seidou: University of Ottawa
Abdullah Alodah: Qassim University

Water Resources Management: An International Journal, Published for the European Water Resources Association (EWRA), 2022, vol. 36, issue 12, No 9, 4606 pages

Abstract: Abstract Climate change will modify the spatio-temporal variation of hydrological variables worldwide, potentially leading to more extreme events and hydraulic infrastructure failures. Changes in extreme sub-daily precipitation must be accounted for in urban infrastructure planning and management; hence in intensity–duration–frequency (IDF) curves which represent the primary climatic input to urban water infrastructure design. The IDF_CC tool is a computerized tool for developing IDF curves under a changing climate that is widely used in adaptation studies, particularly in Canada. Earlier versions of the tool generate IDF curves using equidistant quantile mapping (EQM), while the latest version uses quantile delta mapping (QDM). In this study, we critically assess both algorithms to propose new and improved versions and compare their performance to the original algorithms at four locations in Eastern Ontario, Canada. In total, 3,600 simulated precipitation intensity series of the control (1976–2005) and future (2011–2100) periods under the RCP 4.5 and RCP 8.5 climate scenarios derived from four global climate models (GCMs) and four regional climate models (RCMs) were analyzed. The original EQM method was found to be insensitive to the climate change signal whereas the original QDM used an inadequate mapping function between quantiles of observed and RCM-simulated precipitation time series, leading to misrepresentations of future climate conditions. In general, the new versions outperformed the original versions and showed consistent projections, hence providing better inputs for adaptation assessments.

Keywords: Climate change; IDF generation; IDF_CC tool; EQM; QDM; Climate sensitivity; Quantile mapping algorithms (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11269-022-03265-3 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:waterr:v:36:y:2022:i:12:d:10.1007_s11269-022-03265-3

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/economics/journal/11269

DOI: 10.1007/s11269-022-03265-3

Access Statistics for this article

Water Resources Management: An International Journal, Published for the European Water Resources Association (EWRA) is currently edited by G. Tsakiris

More articles in Water Resources Management: An International Journal, Published for the European Water Resources Association (EWRA) from Springer, European Water Resources Association (EWRA)
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().