CGRG Bibliography of Canadian Geomorphology
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Author : Burn, D.H.; Hag Elnur, M.A.; Adamowski, K.; and Ouarda, T.B.M.J.
Date : 2001.
Title : The use of hydrologic variables for detecting climatic change impacts.
Publication : Annual Scientific Meeting of the Canadian Geophysical Union. May 14-17, 2001, University of Ottawa, Ottawa.
Issue :
Page(s) :
Abstract
This paper describes the development and application of a procedure that identifies trends in hydrologic variables. The procedure utilizes the Mann-Kendall non-parametric test to detect trends, a permutation approach to estimate the test distribution, and accounts for the correlation structure in the data in determining the significance level of the test results. Serial correlation is accounted for using a pre-whitening approach while the effects of cross-correlation between sites is accounted for by determining a threshold field significance level using a bootstrap resampling approach. The research investigates 19 hydrologic variables that reflect different parts of the hydrologic cycle. The hydrologic variables include average flow measures, measures of the high and low flow extremes as well as measures of the timing of various hydrologic events. The hydrologic variables are analyzed for a network of 248 Canadian catchments that are part of the Reference Hydrometric Basin Network (RHBN) and are considered to reflect natural conditions. A selection of catchments identified to have trends in hydrologic variables is studied further to investigate the presence of trends in meteorological variables and the relationship between the hydrologic and the meteorological response to climatic change. It is concluded that a greater number of trends are observed than are expected to occur by chance. There are differences in the geographic location of significant trends in the hydrologic variables investigated implying that climatic change impacts are not spatially uniform.
Bibliography of Canadian Geomorphology