Liu et al. (2026) A spatial recursion framework for nonstationary flood frequency analysis considering river network dependence and reservoir routing

Identification

• Journal: Journal of Hydrology
• Year: 2026
• Date: 2026-06-19
• Authors: Chengkai Liu, Lihua Xiong, Yanlai Zhou, J Chen, Rongrong Li, H Chen
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jhydrol.2026.135897

Research Groups

State Key Laboratory of Water Resources Engineering and Management, Wuhan University
School of Hydraulic and Ocean Engineering, Changsha University of Science & Technology

Short Summary

This study proposes a spatial recursive framework for nonstationary flood frequency analysis (SRF-NFFA) that explicitly incorporates river network dependence and reservoir flood routing processes. The framework is applied to the Hanjiang River Basin and demonstrates its effectiveness in estimating nonstationary design floods.

Objective

• Investigate the impacts of climate change and human activities on flood regimes in regulated basins.
• Develop a unified framework for nonstationary flood frequency analysis that accounts for river network dependence and reservoir flood routing processes.

Study Configuration

• Spatial Scale: Basin-scale flood risk management in regulated river systems.
• Temporal Scale: 1964–2020, with bias-corrected CMIP6 multi-model ensemble precipitation projections.

Methodology and Data

• Models used: GAMLSS-based marginal and conditional models, copula-based dependence structures, and physically based reservoir routing functions.
• Data sources: Satellite, observation, reanalysis (CMIP6), and in-situ measurements.

Main Results

• Flood peaks at all regulated nodes exhibit significant nonstationary behavior, except for two upstream stations.
• Nonstationary design floods are substantially reduced relative to stationary estimates, especially in downstream reaches.
• SRF-NFFA provides a more physically consistent representation of spatial flood dependence and reduces uncertainty in flood quantile estimates.

Contributions

• The study fills the gap in existing nonstationary flood frequency analysis methods by providing a unified framework that accounts for river network dependence and reservoir flood routing processes.
• The application of SRF-NFFA demonstrates its effectiveness in estimating nonstationary design floods in regulated basins.

Funding

• This research was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 52279023) and the Key Research Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (Grant No. XDA23090204).

Citation

@article{Liu2026spatial,
  author = {Liu, Chengkai and Xiong, Lihua and Zhou, Yanlai and Chen, J and Li, Rongrong and Chen, H},
  title = {A spatial recursion framework for nonstationary flood frequency analysis considering river network dependence and reservoir routing},
  journal = {Journal of Hydrology},
  year = {2026},
  doi = {10.1016/j.jhydrol.2026.135897},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2026.135897}
}