A Poisson Cluster Stochastic Rainfall Generator That Accounts for the Interannual Variability of Rainfall Statistics: Validation at Various Geographic Locations across the United States

Abstract

A novel approach for a Poisson cluster stochastic rainfall generator was validated in its ability to reproduce important rainfall and watershed response characteristics at 104 locations in the United States. The suggested novel approach, The Hybrid Model (THM), as compared to the traditional Poisson cluster rainfall modeling approaches, has an additional capability to account for the interannual variability of rainfall statistics. THM and a traditional approach of Poisson cluster rainfall model (modified Bartlett-Lewis rectangular pulse model) were compared in their ability to reproduce the characteristics of extreme rainfall and watershed response variables such as runoff and peak flow. The results of the comparison indicate that THM generally outperforms the traditional approach in reproducing the distributions of peak rainfall, peak flow, and runoff volume. In addition, THM significantly outperformed the traditional approach in reproducing extreme rainfall by 2.3% to 66% and extreme flow values by 32% to 71%.