Description
CHIHE will advance our basic scientific understanding of recent and future changes in floods and droughts through: (i) the statistical analysis of observed hydro-meteorological time series with a focus on extreme events, (ii) development of hydrological projections for likely changes in extremes, including an assessment of uncertainty in the projections, and (iii) the further development and application of methods for flood and drought frequency analysis within a non-stationary framework. (iv) development of adaptation strategy to future floods. The focal study areas will be in Poland and Norway, and the collaboration will build on and strengthen existing expertise in the analysis of extremes among the partners. In addition to the scientific output, the project will also develop recommendations for an adaptation strategy for managing the impact of climate change on hydrological extremes in PL, with a particular focus on flooding within the context of the European Flood Directive. Participants will also actively engage with the international research community and thereby further strengthen links between Polish and Norwegian research activities.
Summary of project results
Hydrological extremes have a direct effect on water dependent sectors, including agriculture, forestry, fishing, hydropower, domestic water supply, and tourism. Extreme hydrological events can also disrupt vital infrastructure, such as transport systems and healthcare facilities. It is therefore important for society as a whole that the occurrence and patterns of hydrological extremes, both in today’s and under a future climate are well understood. This will enable effective management of water resources under changing conditions. The overall aim of the project CHIHE was to investigate the effect of climate change on extreme flows (floods and droughts) in selected twinned catchments in Poland and Norway. The know-how on the bias corrections of climate model simulations, procedure for development of hydrological projections using an ensemble approach, uncertainty assessment, nonstationary flood frequency analysis, statistical analysis of trends, flood risk assessment and adaptation issues developed during the CHIHE project form the foundations of the top-edge research on the subject of influence of climate change on the environment and the society. The knowledge gained will be useful in numerous applications related to water management in both countries and also at international level. The assessment of likely changes in drought indices under a future climate in Poland and Norway can be used to inform discussions on climate change adaptation in relevant sectors (e.g. agriculture, water supply, hydropower). The establishment of a benchmark database of nearly natural catchments for the long-term climate change impact studies, following the Norwegian experience, is an important step for the development of a climate change adaptation strategy for the whole of Poland. The project outcomes have the form of eight Technical Reports, nine peer-reviewed accepted/published papers in international journals from the JRC list, two published peer-reviewed book chapters and five papers submitted for publication in international journals from the JRC list. In addition six more papers are being prepared for the submission in international journals. The doctoral thesis (habilitation) was successfully awarded to one of the project participants, based in large extent on the project results. PhD theses of three researchers employed in the project are under completion and should be finished by the end of the 2017.
Summary of bilateral results
The main bilateral cooperation between IG PAS and NVE took place within the first two and the third work packages. The following issues were jointly researched: 1. Development of hydrological models for selected catchments in Poland and extending/adaptation of existing hydrological models for Norwegian catchments and assessment of their predictive uncertainty. 2. Detection of trends and shifts in observed hydro-climatological data for the Norwegian and Polish catchments, inter-comparison and discussion of the results. 3. Derivation of projected changes in hydrological extremes in Poland that can be further used in climate change adaptation planning and comparison of the Polish and Norwegian results; bias correction of meteorological projections. 4. Development of methods for quantifying uncertainty in hydrological projections resulting from the propagation of uncertainty resulting from multiple ensembles and bias correction methods, emission scenarios and geographical features of the catchment. 10. Recommendations for an adaptation strategy for managing the impact of climate change on hydrological extremes in Poland, with a particular focus on flooding within the context of the European Flood Directive. 11. Guidelines on how to quantify and handle uncertainty when adapting to changes in floods under a future climate. One of the project applications consists of the Polar research on Svalbard, undertaken by one of the project participants and presented in two published papers and also at the international conferences. The other outcome consists of the cooperation between two other Polish-Norwegian projects, PolCitClim (
http://polcitclim.uw.edu.pl/) and CHASE (
http://www.chase-pl.pl/). The cooperation with the scientists from the Norwegian Institute for Urban and Regional Research is planned as an extension of work on the adaptation of flood risk management to climate change (WP4) and in the area of increasing local adaptive capacity towards the negative effects of climate change related to flooding and landslides.