Section 10: Design Flood

Hydrographs

• Factors affecting peak flow

• Methods to estimate design hydrographs
• Average variability method
• kinDog example
Random Factors Affecting Flood Hydrograph

The conversion of storm rainfall into a hydrograph depends on the

interaction of several random variables:
• storm depth or average intensity
• storm duration
• rainfall temporal pattern
• rainfall spatial pattern
• antecedent catchment wetness

10-2
 Storm Duration and Depth
Effect of varying storm duration assuming all other variables constant

Intensity
Shorter duration storm
Discharge Q

Time

Intensity
Longer duration storm

Time

Time

Effect of changing storm depth assuming all other variables constant

Intensity
Greater depth
Discharge Q

Time

Intensity
Smaller depth

Time
10-3
Antecedent Wetness and Temporal Patterns
Effect of changing antecedent wetness assuming all other variables constant

Low initial loss (wet antecedent

Discharge Q

conditions)

High initial loss (dry antecedent

conditions)

Time

Effect of changing storm temporal pattern assuming all other variables constant

Intensity
Peaked pattern
Discharge Q

Time

Intensity
Uniform pattern

Time
10-4
 Design Flood Hydrographs
There are 3 general approaches to deriving hydrographs whose
peak flow has an ARI of Y years:

Continuous Simulation
Randomly sample a long sequence of rainfall and convert to a long
sequence of streamflow.
This is considered best approach but capability to simulate high-
resolution long rainfall sequences is just being developed
In future this will be the main method

Empirical
eg Probabilistic rational method is based on frequency analysis of
rainfall and flood data to estimate Y-year peak flow

Average Variability Method

Use average values of variables other than rainfall depth to convert
design rainfall with Y-year intensity to peak flow with Y-year ARI

10-5
 Average Variability Method
Average variability method is the main method used in Australian
design practice. This is because rainfall IFD has been regionalised
across Australia and there is limited streamflow gauging.

Australian Rainfall Runoff outlines the following steps:

Step 1: Select design ARI, say Y year
Step 2: Derive design storms using regional IFD approach and design
temporal patterns for a range of durations
Step 3: Estimate the average initial condition for the catchment eg initial loss
Step 4: Calibrate an event rainfall-runoff model eg kinDog, RAFTS, URBS
Step 5: Run each design storm through the rainfall-runoff model
Step 6: Select the storm duration which maximizes the peak flow. This duration
is called the critical duration. The resultant hydrograph is the design
hydrograph.

10-6
 Design Storms
Intensity
mm/hr
(a) ARR IFD analysis yields gross
characteristics of design storms: average
i
Time
intensity and storm duration
ts td

Intensity
mm/hr (b)
ARR temporal patterns disaggregate
gross storm into a design storm
Time
ts

Australian Rainfall Runoff design

storms are actually bursts
embedded in longer duration storms
This distinction is important in
systems where flood response is
sensitive to initial conditions eg initial
water level in reservoir

Source: ARR (1987) Book 6

10-7
 Average Variability Rainfall Patterns
Rainfall temporal patterns show tremendous variation which significantly
affects magnitude of storm peak
Average variability patterns represent the average deviation from a uniform
temporal pattern Æ use as design patterns in Australian Rainfall Runoff

4-hour duration patterns 20-minute duration

for 50 most intense patterns for 50 most
bursts in Sydney intense bursts in Sydney
10-8
 Design Loss Parameters for Eastern NSW
Design initial losses must be selected so that Y-year design rainfall
storm produces a Y-year flood peak

Walsh (1991) derived design initial loss rates for eastern NSW
using the following approach:
• Select a gauged catchment
• Estimate Y-year flood using flood frequency analysis
• Calibrate a rainfall-runoff model
• Using Y-year design storm find the design initial loss which yields
Y-year flood peak obtained from the frequency analysis
• Repeat for a number of catchments and regionalize results

Walsh, M. initial loss for design flood estimation in NSW, International Hydrology and Water
resources Symposium, Institution of Engineers, Aust., Perth, 1991
10-9
 Initial Loss Results for Eastern NSW

Note wide scatter in

calibrated initial loses

Walsh, M. initial loss for design flood estimation in NSW, International Hydrology and Water
resources Symposium, Institution of Engineers, Aust., Perth, 1991
10-10
 Design Loss Parameters for Eastern NSW

Walsh, M. initial loss for design flood estimation in NSW, International Hydrology and Water
resources Symposium, Institution of Engineers, Aust., Perth, 1991
10-11
Reliability of Average Variability Method
The average variability method is approximate in that peak flow does not
necessarily have the same ARI as the design rainfall.

Main limitation is that the design storm is

the most intense burst in a longer storm.
The pre-design storm rainfall can
significantly affect initial conditions.

Walsh’s design initial loss compensates for tension storage in catchment

soils. However it cannot compensate for initial water level in water storages.
The average variability method can significantly underestimate the flood peak
if significant water storage is present in the catchment. In such cases should
use continuous simulation or embed design storm in a longer storm
Æ next revision of ARR will provide more guidance
10-12
 kinDog: Parameter Estimation
Before kinDog can be used to estimate design hydrograph its parameters
must be estimated

kinDog is a conceptual rainfall-runoff model Æ its parameters cannot be

estimated from direct measurement
Need to calibrate to observed storms or using regionalisation methods

Three options available to estimate parameters:

1. Use default values (can be highly inaccurate)
2. Calibrate to one or more observed storm events in catchment or in nearby
cacthment (recommended)
3. Using a regionalisation method (recommended if no observed data are
available)

10-13
 Default kinDog Parameters
Process Parameter Default value Comment

Channel Channel 6 m0.2s-1 Cr affects the speed of flood wave. Increasing Cs causes
conveyance Cr floodwave to travel faster

m (inbank flow) 1.4 Do not vary

m (overbank flow) 1.0 Do not vary

Hillslope Overland flow Cs 0.7 s1/2 This is the most sensitive parameter in kinDog. Increasing Cs
reduces and delays peak flow

γ 0.5 Do not vary

Groundwater Cg Highly variable In catchment with evidence of little or no baseflow set Cg to

a large value, say 1000 ms-1 to minimize baseflow
contribution during storm.

This is appropriate for many catchments in eastern NSW

Infiltration Initial loss IL Highly variable Need to assess antecedent conditions. A value close to 0 mm
means catchment will produce overland almost immediately
after start of rainfall

Continuing loss φ 2.5 mm/hr IL and φ control the storm water balance.

10-14
kinDog Calibration to Observed Events
Calibration involves adjusting kinDog parameters until observed and simulated
hydrographs have best match

Select calibration option

Node 9 is a pluvio node which

contains rainfall for an
observed storm

Node 1 has a red number

label to highlight that observed
hydrograph has been entered
10-15
 kinDog Calibration to Observed Events

SCE requires lower and upper

bounds for each fitted
parameter

Select shuffled complex

evolution (SCE) algorithm to
automatically search for good
parameters. It is slow but quite
robust

10-16
kinDog Calibration to Observed Events

Observed and simulated runoff

This is an unusually
good fit! Ceff =1 for
a perfect fit.

Ceff is a goodness-of-fit criterion called the Nash-Sutcliffe criterion.

Variance of errors ∑t (q t − q̂ t )
2

It is defined as 1 − =1−
Variance of observed flow ∑ (q t − q )2
t

where qt is the observed flow at time t, q̂t is the simulated flow at time t
and q is the arithmetic mean of the observed flows. 10-17
kinDog Design Hydrograph
Select ARR design
storm

10-18
 kinDog Design Hydrograph
Select design
storm duration

Enter design
initial loss

10-19
 kinDog Design Hydrograph

100-year 1-hr design storm 100-year 30-hr design storm

Æ peak flow 48 m3/s Æ peak flow 787 m3/s
Storm duration hr Peak flow m3/s
1 7
9 451
12 538
18 682
24 730
30 787 30 hr storm is critical duration
36 748 Adopt as 100-year design
48 716
72 720
hydrograph
10-20