Influence of Hydrological Model Selection on Simulation of Moderate and Extreme Flow Events: A Case Study of the Blue Nile Basin

Abstract

Five hydrological models were applied based on data from the Blue Nile Basin. Optimal parameters of each model were obtained by automatic calibration. Model performance was tested under both moderate and extreme flow conditions. Extreme events for the model performance evaluation were extracted based on seven criteria. Apart from graphical techniques, there were nine statistical “goodness-of-fit” metrics used to judge the model performance. It was found that whereas the influence of model selection may be minimal in the simulation of normal flow events, it can lead to large under- and/or overestimations of extreme events. Besides, the selection of the best model for extreme events may be influenced by the choice of the statistical “goodness-of-fit” measures as well as the criteria for extraction of high and low flows. It was noted that the use of overall water-balance-based objective function not only is suitable for moderate flow conditions but also influences the models to perform better for high flows than low flows. Thus, the choice of a particular model is recommended to be made on a case by case basis with respect to the objectives of the modeling as well as the results from evaluation of the intermodel differences.