Frequency analysis of precipitation extremes under climate change

• Published in: International journal of climatology Vol. 39; no. 3; pp. 1373 - 1387
• Main Authors: Mo, Chongxun, Ruan, Yuli, He, Jiaqi, Jin, JuLiang, Liu, Peng, Sun, Guikai
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Chichester, UK John Wiley & Sons, Ltd 15.03.2019; Wiley Subscription Services, Inc
• Subjects: Atmospheric precipitations; Climate change; Climatic analysis; Climatic extremes; Design rainfall; Distribution; Environmental impact; Extreme values; Extreme weather; Frameworks; Frequency analysis; Gauges; GEV distribution model; GPD distribution model; Hydrologic models; Hydrology; Mathematical models; Maximum likelihood estimates; Parameters; Precipitation; precipitation extreme; Rain; Rain gauges; Rainfall; Rainfall data; River basins; Rivers; Water engineering; Water supply systems
• ISSN: 0899-8418; 1097-0088
• DOI: 10.1002/joc.5887

Frequency analysis of precipitation extremes is significant for the selection of design rainfalls, which are essential inputs for the design of water infrastructure projects, especially when the climate has changed. Therefore, the objective of this study was to propose a framework for more reasonably analysing the frequency of extreme rainfalls. The proposed framework consists of a maximum likelihood estimate (MLE) method for analysing the parameter trends, a hydrological variation diagnosis system to determine abrupt change times, generalized extreme value (GEV) and generalized Pareto distribution (GPD) models for frequency analysis of precipitation extremes, and an ensemble‐methods approach for choosing the most appropriate distributions. The methodology was successfully implemented using a 52‐year time series (1963–2014) of rainfall data recorded by eight rain gauges in Chengbi River basin (south China). The results show that the rainfall series mutated in 1993 and that the entire data set could be divided into two slices (1963–1992 and 1993–2014). Climate change was found to have some impacts on the precipitation extremes: the extreme rainfall value and the parameters of GEV and GPD were variable in the context of climate change. Furthermore, the GPD distribution model outperformed the GEV distribution model. The location of Chengbi River basin and the distribution of the rainfall stations, and the representative rainfall stations are shown as red stars.