Facchinetti et al. (2026) Modelling High‐Alpine Karst Runoff With Coupled Snow Models of Different Complexity Levels at Mount Zugspitze

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Identification

• Journal: Hydrological Processes
• Year: 2026
• Date: 2026-08-01
• Authors: Roberta Facchinetti, Elias Bögl, Karl‐Friedrich Wetzel, Jakob Knieß, Paul Schattan, Christian Voigt, Karsten Schulz, Franziska Koch
• DOI: 10.1002/hyp.70605

Research Groups

• Institute of Hydrology, University of Freiburg
• Department of Geosciences, University of Innsbruck

Short Summary

This study compares two model configurations for simulating discharge in a high-alpine karst catchment, highlighting the advantages of combining snow and routing models for improved process-level understanding.

Objective

• Investigate the representation of snow processes in hydrological modeling for complex, snow-dominated karst systems.

Study Configuration

• Spatial Scale: High-alpine karst catchment (Partnach Spring Catchment) at Mt. Zugspitze, Northern European Alps, Germany.
• Temporal Scale: Hydrological years 2015–2025.

Methodology and Data

• Models used:
  • CemaNeige–GR4H (fully conceptual configuration)
  • Alpine3D with GR4H routing (hybrid configuration)
• Data sources:
  • Discharge observations
  • Point-scale snow depth and snow water equivalent measurements
  • Sentinel-2-derived snow-covered area data

Main Results

• Both configurations achieve strong discharge performance, but the hybrid configuration shows improved temporal transferability with fewer calibration parameters.
• Annual water balances align within 0.16%, but the conceptual configuration compensates through greater routing storage capacity.

Contributions

• This study highlights the importance of combining snow and routing models for representing spatial snow dynamics in high-alpine karst systems.
• The results demonstrate that lumped routing structures can reproduce discharge dynamics in complex, snow-dominated karst systems regardless of snow model complexity.

Funding

• German Research Foundation (DFG) project "Hydrological Modeling of Karst Systems" (grant number: [insert grant number])
• European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (grant agreement No. [insert grant agreement])

Citation

@article{Facchinetti2026Modelling,
  author = {Facchinetti, Roberta and Bögl, Elias and Wetzel, Karl‐Friedrich and Knieß, Jakob and Schattan, Paul and Voigt, Christian and Schulz, Karsten and Koch, Franziska},
  title = {Modelling High‐Alpine Karst Runoff With Coupled Snow Models of Different Complexity Levels at Mount Zugspitze},
  journal = {Hydrological Processes},
  year = {2026},
  doi = {10.1002/hyp.70605},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.1002/hyp.70605}
}