Distributed hydrological modelling of a heavily glaciated Alpine river basin

Abstract

Abstract A glacier submodel was successfully integrated into the distributed hydrological model WaSiM-ETH to simulate the discharge of a heavily glaciated drainage basin. The glacier submodel comprises a distributed temperature index model including solar radiation to simulate the melt rate of glaciated areas. Meltwater and rainfall are transformed into glacier discharge by using a linear reservoir approach. The model was tested on a high-alpine sub-basin of the Rhone basin (central Switzerland) of which 48% is glaciated. Continuous discharge simulations were performed for the period 1990–1996 and compared with hourly discharge observations. The pronounced daily and annual fluctuations in discharge were simulated well. The obtained efficiency criterion, R2, exceeds 0.89 for all years. The good performance of the glacier submodel is also demonstrated by integrating it into the hydrological model PREVAH.