Hydrograph separation: an impartial parametrisation for an imperfect method

Séparation d’hydrogramme : une paramétrisation impartiale pour une méthode imparfaite

Antoine Pelletier (1) , Vazken Andréassian (2)

1 ENPC - École des Ponts ParisTech
2 IRSTEA - Institut national de recherche en sciences et technologies pour l'environnement et l'agriculture

This paper presents a new method for hydrograph separation. It is well-known that all hydrological methods aiming at separating streamflow into baseflow-its slow or delayed component-and quickflow-its non-delayed component present large imperfections, and we do not claim to provide here a perfect solution. However, the method described here is at least (i) impartial in the determination of its two parameters (a quadratic reservoir capacity and a response time), (ii) coherent in time (as assessed by a split-sample test) and (iii) geologically coherent (an exhaustive validation on 1664 French catchments shows a good match with what we know of France's hydrogeology). With these characteristics, the method can be used to perform a general assessment of hydroclimatic memory of catchments. Last, an R package is provided to ensure reproducibility of the results presented.

Domains: Hydrology

Antoine Pelletier, Vazken Andréassian. Hydrograph separation: an impartial parametrisation for an imperfect method. Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, 2020, 24 (3), pp.1171-1187. ⟨10.5194/hess-24-1171-2020⟩. ⟨hal-02505312⟩