Maier et al. (2026) Undercatch corrected gridded precipitation data to improve hydrological modeling in high-alpine orography

Identification

• Journal: Hydrology and earth system sciences
• Year: 2026
• Date: 2026-09-17
• Authors: Philipp Maier, Caroline Ehrendorfer, Sophie Lücking, Thomas Pulka, Fabian Lehner, Mathew Herrnegger, Herbert Formayer, Franziska Koch
• DOI: 10.5194/hess-30-5901-2026

Research Groups

• Institute of Meteorology and Climatology, BOKU University, Gregor-Mendel-Straße 33, 1180 Vienna, Austria
• Institute of Hydrology and Water Management, BOKU University, Muthgasse 18, 1190 Vienna, Austria
• Department for Climate Impact Research, GeoSphere Austria, Hohe Warte 38, 1190 Vienna, Austria
• Department of Environmental Science, Policy, and Management, University of California Berkeley, 130 Mulford Hall, 94720 Berkeley, CA, USA

Short Summary

This study proposes a method to correct undercatch errors in gridded precipitation data using Generalized Additive Models (GAMs) trained on undercatch-corrected station observations. The approach is applied to Austria and validated against hydrological modeling results.

Objective

• To develop a method for correcting undercatch errors in gridded precipitation data
• To evaluate the performance of the corrected precipitation data using hydrological modeling

Study Configuration

• Spatial Scale: National scale (Austria) with focus on high-alpine regions
• Temporal Scale: Monthly time step

Methodology and Data

• Models used: Generalized Additive Models (GAMs)
• Data sources:
  • Station observations from GeoSphere Austria's weather station network
  • Gridded climate data from SPARTACUS, CHELSA, and WorldClim 2

Main Results

• Undercatch-corrected precipitation reduces runoff simulation biases in high-alpine catchments
• Corrected precipitation closes the water balance in both alpine study regions
• Biases in snow depth simulations decrease after applying undercatch correction

Contributions

• Development of a method for correcting undercatch errors in gridded precipitation data using GAMs
• Validation of the corrected precipitation data against hydrological modeling results
• Publicly available monthly undercatch factors and associated metadata for 261 stations in Austria

Funding

• This study was funded by [project name], [program name], [reference code]
• Additional funding provided by [project name], [program name], [reference code]

Citation

@article{Maier2026Undercatch,
  author = {Maier, Philipp and Ehrendorfer, Caroline and Lücking, Sophie and Pulka, Thomas and Lehner, Fabian and Herrnegger, Mathew and Formayer, Herbert and Koch, Franziska},
  title = {Undercatch corrected gridded precipitation data to improve hydrological modeling in high-alpine orography},
  journal = {Hydrology and earth system sciences},
  year = {2026},
  doi = {10.5194/hess-30-5901-2026},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-30-5901-2026}
}