@article{da3531a17bc54c5dbf81a5d53cb9f7bb,
title = "Discharge and floods projected to increase more than precipitation extremes",
abstract = "Floods claim a high toll in fatalities and economic impacts. Despite their societal relevance, there is much more to learn about the projected changes in discharge and flooding. Here we force an operational hydrologic model over the state of Iowa with high-resolution convection-permitting climate-model precipitation to evaluate the response of 140 watersheds to climate change. At the end of the century, under the most aggressive scenario in terms of fossil fuel use, we show that the transition from snow to rainfall and approximately 30% increase in extreme precipitation rates lead to a doubling of maximum discharge during the spring and extending the flood season into the fall. Total discharge volumes are also expected to increase. Our results suggest that flood projections based on extreme precipitation increases alone substantially underestimate future risk due to the non-linearity of the hydrologic response explained by long-term soil moisture memory and its feedbacks with precipitation. This study is one of the first to show floods are increasing due to the prevalence of rain-on-snow events, and indeed that discharge might increase more than precipitation.",
keywords = "climate change, convection-permitting climate model, discharge, floods, non-linearity, precipitation, rain-on-snow, soil moisture",
author = "Felipe Quintero and Gabriele Villarini and Prein, {Andreas F.} and Wei Zhang and Krajewski, {Witold F.}",
note = "Funding Information: This work was supported in part by the Iowa Department of Transportation (Project number 20-SPR2-002). The opinions, findings and conclusions expressed in this publication are those of the author and not necessarily those of the Iowa Department of Transportation or the United States Department of Transportation, Federal Highway Administration. Support by the Iowa Flood Center, IIHR—Hydroscience & Engineering, and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' Institute for Water Resources is gratefully acknowledged. NCAR is partly funded by the National Science Foundation under Cooperative Agreement No. 1852977. Comments by three anonymous reviewers are gratefully acknowledged. Funding Information: This work was supported in part by the Iowa Department of Transportation (Project number 20‐SPR2‐002). The opinions, findings and conclusions expressed in this publication are those of the author and not necessarily those of the Iowa Department of Transportation or the United States Department of Transportation, Federal Highway Administration. Support by the Iowa Flood Center, IIHR—Hydroscience & Engineering, and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' Institute for Water Resources is gratefully acknowledged. NCAR is partly funded by the National Science Foundation under Cooperative Agreement No. 1852977. Comments by three anonymous reviewers are gratefully acknowledged. Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2022 The Authors. Hydrological Processes published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.",
year = "2022",
month = nov,
doi = "10.1002/hyp.14738",
language = "English (US)",
volume = "36",
journal = "Hydrological Processes",
issn = "0885-6087",
publisher = "John Wiley and Sons Ltd",
number = "11",
}