Investigating common assumptions about hydrologic modelling in a large-sample approach

Wednesday 3 March 2021

16:00-17:00 UTC

About the Event

This study uses 36 conceptual hydrologic models calibrated to streamflow observations in 559 catchments across the United States to investigate differences and similarities in model performance. Central in this talk is the common approach to setting up hydrologic models that uses separate calibration and evaluation periods and a single objective function to quantify model performance. We investigate this topic from multiple angles and show that several common, and sometimes implicit, assumptions in this approach are not supported by our large-sample results. This study provides ample large-sample evidence that the traditional approach to calibrating and evaluating conceptual models is not sufficient to ensure a model produces “the right results for the right reasons” and that more thoughtful model evaluation is needed.

A recording of the event is here:

About the Speaker

Dr Wouter Knoben –Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Saskatchewan, Canada

Dr Knoben is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Saskatchewan at Canmore, board member of the Young Hydrologic Society and ex board member of the AGU Hydrology Section Student Subcommittee. His research focuses on three main areas: (i) using knowledge from experimental basins to improve continental domain models; (ii) model structure uncertainty, realism and benchmarking; and (iii) hydrologic similarity.