skip to main content
OSTI.GOV title logo U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Title: Historical trends and extremes in boreal Alaska river basins

Journal Article · · Journal of Hydrology
 [1];  [2];  [1]
  1. Univ. of Alaska, Fairbanks, AK (United States)
  2. Univ. of Victoria, Victoria, BC (Canada)

Climate change will shift the frequency, intensity, duration and persistence of extreme hydroclimate events and have particularly disastrous consequences in vulnerable systems such as the warm permafrost-dominated Interior region of boreal Alaska. This work focuses on recent research results from nonparametric trends and nonstationary generalized extreme value (GEV) analyses at eight Interior Alaskan river basins for the past 50/60 years (1954/64–2013). Trends analysis of maximum and minimum streamflow indicates a strong (>+50%) and statistically significant increase in 11-day flow events during the late fall/winter and during the snowmelt period (late April/mid-May), followed by a significant decrease in the 11-day flow events during the post-snowmelt period (late May and into the summer). The April–May–June seasonal trends show significant decreases in maximum streamflow for snowmelt dominated systems (<–50%) and glacially influenced basins (–24% to –33%). Annual maximum streamflow trends indicate that most systems are experiencing declines, while minimum flow trends are largely increasing. Nonstationary GEV analysis identifies time-dependent changes in the distribution of spring extremes for snowmelt dominated and glacially dominated systems. Temperature in spring influences the glacial and high elevation snowmelt systems and winter precipitation drives changes in the snowmelt dominated basins. The Pacific Decadal Oscillation was associated with changes occurring in snowmelt dominated systems, and the Arctic Oscillation was linked to one lake dominated basin, with half of the basins exhibiting no change in response to climate variability. The paper indicates that broad scale studies examining trend and direction of change should employ multiple methods across various scales and consider regime dependent shifts to identify and understand changes in extreme streamflow within boreal forested watersheds of Alaska.

Research Organization:
Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE
Grant/Contract Number:
AC52-06NA25396
OSTI ID:
1236702
Report Number(s):
LA-UR-15-21132; PII: S0022169415003248
Journal Information:
Journal of Hydrology, Vol. 527, Issue C; ISSN 0022-1694
Publisher:
ElsevierCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 32 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

References (67)

Rapid Wastage of Alaska Glaciers and Their Contribution to Rising Sea Level journal July 2002
Interannual to Decadal Variability in Climate and the Glacier Mass Balance in Washington, Western Canada, and Alaska* journal November 1999
ENSO's effect on Alaska during opposite phases of the Arctic Oscillation journal January 2006
Trends in streamflow in the Yukon River Basin from 1944 to 2005 and the influence of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation journal June 2009
Northern Hemisphere Snow Cover Variability and Change, 1915–97 journal July 2000
AIC model selection and multimodel inference in behavioral ecology: some background, observations, and comparisons journal August 2010
A flexible nonlinear modelling framework for nonstationary generalized extreme value analysis in hydroclimatology journal November 2009
GEVcdn: An R package for nonstationary extreme value analysis by generalized extreme value conditional density estimation network journal September 2011
Neural networks for probabilistic environmental prediction: Conditional Density Estimation Network Creation and Evaluation (CaDENCE) in R journal April 2012
Hydrology of two slopes in subarctic Yukon, Canada journal November 1999
Predictive uncertainty in environmental modelling journal May 2007
Non-stationary extreme value analysis in a changing climate journal September 2014
Likelihood-Based Inference for Extreme Value Models journal January 2000
Teleconnection between the Arctic Oscillation and Hudson Bay river discharge journal January 2004
Decreasing river discharge in northern Canada journal January 2005
Characteristics and Trends of River Discharge into Hudson, James, and Ungava Bays, 1964–2000 journal July 2005
Observational evidence of an intensifying hydrological cycle in northern Canada journal January 2009
Generalized maximum likelihood estimators for the nonstationary generalized extreme value model: GMLE FOR THE NONSTATIONARY GEV MODELOR journal March 2007
Modulation of linear and nonlinear hydroclimatic dynamics by mountain glaciers in Canada and Norway: Results from information-theoretic polynomial selection journal July 2014
Parabolic northern-hemisphere river flow teleconnections to El Niño-Southern Oscillation and the Arctic Oscillation journal October 2014
Glacier-mediated streamflow teleconnections to the Arctic Oscillation journal January 2006
Climatic Controls on Streamflow and Suspended Sediment Transport in Three Large Middle Arctic Catchments, Boothia Peninsula, Nunavut, Canada journal August 2005
Probabilistic forecasts, calibration and sharpness journal April 2007
Nonstationarity in Flood Time Series journal July 2014
Updated high-resolution grids of monthly climatic observations - the CRU TS3.10 Dataset: UPDATED HIGH-RESOLUTION GRIDS OF MONTHLY CLIMATIC OBSERVATIONS journal May 2013
The Significance of the 1976 Pacific Climate Shift in the Climatology of Alaska journal November 2005
Evidence and Implications of Recent Climate Change in Northern Alaska and Other Arctic Regions journal October 2005
Streamflow changes in Alaska between the cool phase (1947-1976) and the warm phase (1977-2006) of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation: The influence of glaciers: HISTORICAL STREAMFLOW CHANGES journal June 2009
The long-term response of stream flow to climatic warming in headwater streams of interior AlaskaThis article is one of a selection of papers from The Dynamics of Change in Alaska’s Boreal Forests: Resilience and Vulnerability in Response to Climate Warming. journal July 2010
On inference of statistical regression models for extreme events based on incomplete observation data journal January 2014
An Overview of a Nested Watershed Study in Arctic Alaska journal August 2000
An Extreme Rainfall/Runoff Event in Arctic Alaska journal December 2003
Extreme events in a changing climate: Variability is more important than averages journal July 1992
The Changing Cryosphere: Pan-Arctic Snow Trends (1979–2009) journal November 2011
Historical Trends in Lake and River Ice Cover in the Northern Hemisphere journal September 2000
Nonparametric Tests Against Trend journal July 1945
A Pacific Interdecadal Climate Oscillation with Impacts on Salmon Production journal June 1997
An analysis of streamflow hydrology in the Kuparuk River Basin, Arctic Alaska: a nested watershed approach journal April 1998
Stationarity Is Dead: Whither Water Management? journal February 2008
Mass balance and streamflow variability at Place Glacier, Canada, in relation to recent climate fluctuations journal December 2001
Glacier change in western North America: influences on hydrology, geomorphic hazards and water quality journal January 2009
Linking the pacific decadal oscillation to seasonal stream discharge patterns in Southeast Alaska journal June 2002
The recent warming of permafrost in Alaska journal December 2005
Increasing River Discharge to the Arctic Ocean journal December 2002
Analysis of the Arctic System for Freshwater Cycle Intensification: Observations and Expectations journal November 2010
Surface Climate and Streamflow Variability in the Western United States and Their Relationship to Large-Scale Circulation Indices journal September 1991
Regional differences in response of flow in glacier-fed Himalayan rivers to climatic warming journal January 2006
Effects of Climate Change on the Freshwaters of Arctic and Subarctic North America journal June 1997
Revisiting the Concepts of Return Period and Risk for Nonstationary Hydrologic Extreme Events journal March 2014
Estimates of the Regression Coefficient Based on Kendall's Tau journal December 1968
Observational Evidence of Recent Change in the Northern High-Latitude Environment journal January 2000
The emergence of surface-based Arctic amplification journal January 2009
Canadian Precipitation Patterns Associated with the Southern Oscillation journal December 1997
Rising minimum daily flows in northern Eurasian rivers: A growing influence of groundwater in the high-latitude hydrologic cycle: RISING MINIMUM FLOWS IN EURASIAN RIVERS journal December 2007
Increasing winter baseflow and mean annual streamflow from possible permafrost thawing in the Northwest Territories, Canada journal January 2009
Changes toward Earlier Streamflow Timing across Western North America journal April 2005
Increased groundwater to stream discharge from permafrost thawing in the Yukon River basin: Potential impacts on lateral export of carbon and nitrogen journal January 2007
Changes of Extreme Wave Heights in Northern Hemisphere Oceans and Related Atmospheric Circulation Regimes journal May 2001
ClimateWNA—High-Resolution Spatial Climate Data for Western North America journal January 2012
Recent variations in seasonality of temperature and precipitation in Canada, 1976-95 journal January 2002
Streamflow in the Mackenzie Basin, Canada journal January 2003
Streamflow hydrology in the boreal region under the influences of climate and human interference journal November 2007
Progress in permafrost hydrology in the new millennium journal January 2008
Streamflow response to seasonal snow cover extent changes in large Siberian watersheds journal January 2003
Relationships between extremes of the Southern oscillation and the winter climate of the Anglo-American Pacific Coast journal January 1986
The influence of autocorrelation on the ability to detect trend in hydrological series journal January 2002
Trends in Canadian streamflow journal April 2001

Cited By (8)

Projected changes in future climate over the Midwest and Great Lakes region using downscaled CMIP5 ensembles: PROJECTED CLIMATE CHANGES OVER THE MIDWEST AND GREAT LAKES REGION journal January 2018
The Role of Land Cover in the Propagation of Rainfall Into Streamflow Trends journal September 2018
Using MODIS estimates of fractional snow cover area to improve streamflow forecasts in interior Alaska journal January 2019
A Rapid-Assessment Method to Estimate the Distribution of Juvenile Chinook Salmon in Tributary Habitats Using eDNA and Occupancy Estimation journal February 2018
Climate-driven disturbances in the San Juan River sub-basin of the Colorado River journal January 2018
Northern Eurasia Future Initiative (NEFI): facing the challenges and pathways of global change in the twenty-first century journal December 2017
Main stem and off-channel habitat use by juvenile Chinook salmon in a sub-Arctic riverscape journal January 2019
The role of density-dependent and –independent processes in spawning habitat selection by salmon in an Arctic riverscape journal May 2017