Title: Next-Generation Intensity-Duration-Frequency Curves for Climate-Resilient Infrastructure Design: Advances and Opportunities

Abstract

National and international security communities (e.g., U.S. Department of Defense) have shown increasing attention for innovating critical infrastructure and installations due to recurring high-profile flooding events in recent years. The standard infrastructure design approach relies on local precipitation-based intensity-duration-frequency (PREC-IDF) curves that do not account for snow process and assume stationary climate, leading to high failure risk and increased maintenance costs. This paper reviews the recently developed next-generation IDF (NG-IDF) curves that explicitly account for the mechanisms of extreme water available for runoff including rainfall, snowmelt, and rain-on-snow under nonstationary climate. The NG-IDF curve is an enhancement to the PREC-IDF curve and provides a consistent design approach across rain- to snow-dominated regions, which can benefit engineers and planners responsible for designing climate-resilient facilities, federal emergency agencies responsible for the flood insurance program, and local jurisdictions responsible for developing design manuals and approving subsequent infrastructure designs. Further, we discuss the recent advances in climate and hydrologic science communities that have not been translated into actional information in the engineering community. To bridge the gap, we advocate that building climate-resilient infrastructure goes beyond the traditional local design scale where engineers rely on recipe-based methods only; the future hydrologic design is a multi-scalemore » problem and requires closer collaboration between climate scientists, hydrologists, and civil engineers.« less

Authors:

Yan, Hongxiang  ^[1];

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Sun, Ning ^[1]; Chen, Xiaodong  ^[1];

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Wigmosta, Mark S. ^[2]

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+ Show Author Affiliations

1. Pacific Northwest National Lab. (PNNL), Richland, WA (United States)
2. Pacific Northwest National Lab. (PNNL), Richland, WA (United States); Univ. of Washington, Seattle, WA (United States)

Publication Date:

2020-12-03

Research Org.:

Pacific Northwest National Lab. (PNNL), Richland, WA (United States)

Sponsoring Org.:

USDOE

OSTI Identifier:

1755009

Report Number(s):

PNNL-SA-152783
Journal ID: ISSN 2624-9375

Grant/Contract Number:  

AC05-76RL01830

Resource Type:

Journal Article: Accepted Manuscript

Journal Name:

Frontiers in Water

Additional Journal Information:

Journal Volume: 2; Journal ID: ISSN 2624-9375

Publisher:

Frontiers

Country of Publication:

United States

Language:

English

Subject:

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES; NG-IDF curves; snowmelt; rain-on-snow; floods; nonstationarity; extreme events; atmospheric river; DHSVM