Wu et al. (2026) Evaluating Evapotranspiration Simulation Performance in 30 Conceptual Hydrological Models: Insights Into ET Representation Across Diverse Climates

⚠️ Warning: This summary was generated from the abstract only, as the full text was not available.

Identification

• Journal: Water Resources Research
• Year: 2026
• Date: 2026-03-01
• Authors: Shuyue Wu, Yuting Yang, Changming Li, Wenjing Yang, Jun Zhao
• DOI: 10.1029/2025wr040017

Research Groups

[Information not available in the abstract.]

Short Summary

This study investigates 30 conceptual hydrological models to assess their evapotranspiration (ET) representations and ability to reproduce state-of-the-art ET products across 507 diverse CAMELS-US catchments, providing guidance for appropriate ET modeling based on climate.

Objective

• To investigate the evapotranspiration (ET) representations of 30 conceptual hydrological models and their ability to reproduce two state-of-the-art ET products (PML-V2 and FLUXCOM-X-BASE) across 507 diverse CAMELS-US catchments, and to provide guidance on appropriately representing ET conversion from potential ET and precipitation across different climates.

Study Configuration

• Spatial Scale: 507 CAMELS-US catchments.
• Temporal Scale: Not explicitly defined in the abstract, but covers long-term hydrological processes and rainless periods.

Methodology and Data

• Models used: 30 conceptual hydrological models, a benchmark model.
• Data sources: PML-V2 (evapotranspiration product), FLUXCOM-X-BASE (evapotranspiration product), FLUXNET ET (validation data), CAMELS-US catchments (implying associated meteorological and hydrological data).

Main Results

• The ensemble of conceptual models generally outperformed a benchmark model in reproducing ET products across most catchments.
• Models with different ET representations exhibited distinct ET simulation performance, emphasizing the importance of selection.
• The most appropriate ET representations varied significantly across different climates.
• In humid, summer-rainfall regions, linear and nonlinear ET-soil-moisture equations with a parameter governing the long-term ET-to-PET ratio were sufficient for accurate ET reproduction.
• In arid catchments, considering the contribution of lower soil storage to ET generation was necessary, particularly during rainless periods.
• In humid winter-rainfall-dominated catchments, explicit representation of interception evaporation, constrained by interception capacity or storage, was critical.
• Models that performed well in reproducing product-based ET also showed good performance when validated against FLUXNET ET, supporting the robustness of the findings.

Contributions

• Addresses a significant gap in comparative hydrological model studies by focusing on evapotranspiration (ET) representation, rather than solely streamflow.
• Provides specific, climate-dependent guidance on selecting appropriate ET representations for conceptual hydrological models.
• Helps to constrain model structural uncertainty related to ET processes, which is crucial for reliable hydrological simulations, especially under climate change and in ungauged basins.
• Enhances the robustness of findings through validation against independent FLUXNET ET data.

Funding

[Information not available in the abstract.]

Citation

@article{Wu2026Evaluating,
  author = {Wu, Shuyue and Yang, Yuting and Li, Changming and Yang, Wenjing and Zhao, Jun},
  title = {Evaluating Evapotranspiration Simulation Performance in 30 Conceptual Hydrological Models: Insights Into ET Representation Across Diverse Climates},
  journal = {Water Resources Research},
  year = {2026},
  doi = {10.1029/2025wr040017},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.1029/2025wr040017}
}