Final Report Summary - OPERR (Operational Pan-European River Runoff)
The project addresses the pressing need for reasonable estimates of hindcast data and real-time river discharges including nutrients to the seas for driving the shelf-sea models. This objective has been achieved by extending an already running operational river discharge model (HYPE) for the Baltic Sea drainage basin to cover all European rivers. A sustainable operational system has been built up to respond to GMES downstream services such as coastal ocean models, regional environmental commissions including Helcom and OSPAR, regional and national operational institutes, environmental protection agencies, fishery boards, water regulation bodies and SME's working in this area. The pan-European river discharge model is dependent on remotely sensed databases of land cover and land-use from GMES products to parameterise rainfall-runoff processes.
The users' input to the user requirement document (URD) has been acquired by mutual negotiations with potential users, experience gained from participants' own modelling, observing activities and information derived at conferences, working groups and other types of meetings.
Project context and objectives:
The proposal addresses Activity 9.1 Space-based applications at the service of European society and specifically, Area 9.1.1 Pre-operational validation of GMES services and products and SPA.2010.1.111-01 Stimulating the development of downstream GMES services'.
The overall objective of the project is twofold, first to turn a pan-European river discharge model into an operational discharge model delivering real-time and forecast data to shelf sea models. The discharge model will thereby act as a downstream service based on the currently developed GMES core information service for water. At the same time, the project's delivery of essential new data to shelf sea models stimulates the development and improvement of a new downstream service which includes shelf sea models.
The project addresses the pressing need for reasonable estimates of real-time river discharges to seas for driving the shelf-sea models. This objective has been achieved by extending an already running operational river discharge model (HYPE) for the Baltic Sea drainage basin (Donnelly et al, 2009) to cover all European rivers. A sustainable operational system has been built up to respond to GMES downstream services such as coastal ocean models, regional environmental commissions including Helcom and OSPAR, regional and national operational institutes, environmental protection agencies, fishery boards, water regulation bodies and small to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) working in this area. The pan-European river discharge model is dependent on remotely sensed databases of land cover and land-use from GMES products to parameterise rainfall-runoff processes.
The second main objective of the project is the validation of observed river discharge and the river discharge estimates produced by the project in applications of shelf sea models. The validation of daily river discharge as forcing to shelf sea models includes both operational products for real-time validation and climate studies using hindcast runs. The validation of the performance of shelf sea models is dependent on remotely sensed data of sea surface temperature (NOAA AVHRR and MODIS-Aqua), surface salinity (SMOS) and Chlorophyll (MODIS-Aqua, SeaWiFS). Studies of the impact of daily river discharge on physical and ecological shelf sea models will support the improvement of the performance of regional ocean models.
To upgrade the model to cover the whole of Europe requires support from all regions from the Barents Sea in the North, to the Black Sea in the East. Existing databases for observed river discharge including the Global Runoff Data Centre (GRDC) and European Water Archive (EWA) has been exploited for model calibration; however, as much real-time hydrological data as possible needs to be accessible on a daily basis. Some of this data is already available on national data servers. The available data has been collated operationally for running the river discharge model in real-time mode. All information collected by the project, including project results has been made available to potential users and the public using a file transfer protocol (FTP) and a web site. An important outcome of the project has been the potential to stimulate new and innovative products for SMEs working with coastal management. This has partly been achieved by direct contact and active participation in seminars arranged by regional national agencies. The contact with consultants working with coastal management has been very restricted and is an issue for a further effort.
No research has been carried out in the OPERR.
Project results:
Data support
The objectives of this deliverable has been:
- to coordinate the collection of historical runoff data in selected regions;
- to prepare the historical data set for model calibration;
- to prepare for real-time updating of the river discharge model.
A database of observed river discharge data has been updated. Partners within the project have contacted their respective local hydrological agencies to request data. This data has been collated and used to update the existing river discharge database used for the E-HYPE model. Existing data has been requested from the GRDC, EWA and Baltex databases, sorted and collated into a single database along with any new data collected. The new data has been prepared to be used for calibration and real-time updating of the river discharge model.
The E-HYPE model should be calibrated and validated to historical water quality observations when used to simulate nutrients. An attempt has therefore been made to collate available historical observations of nitrogen and phosphorous concentrations in waterways around Europe.
Hindcast run
Hindcast with E-HYPE version 1.0 has been performed for the period 1980 to 2008. All data can be downloaded from the E-HYPEWeb (see http://www.e-hypeweb.smhi.se for details). Calculations have been made with a daily time-step for water quality and volume flux and the results are made available as daily or monthly mean values. All results presented on E-HYPEWeb are from and not fully calibrated version of the E-HYPE application, i.e. the internal parameters are calibrated using data from the Baltic Sea drainage basin. Results should therefore be regarded as only preliminary and only intended to demonstrate the data delivery capabilities of this model application. New results are expected towards the end of 2012 with calibration against a full European data set.
A similar hindcast has also been produced for a Baltic Sea application with higher spatial resolution and with more reliable nutrient loads. These data are available on request.
Results from these models can be used for many different purposes. Discharge and nutrient load results along the coastal boundary of the model domain may be used to examine the impact of freshwater and nutrient influxes to seas. Discharge and water quality results at smaller areas within the model domain can be used for characterisation of water body status, establishment of environmental goals, planning of remedial measures and development of monitoring strategies for the European Water Framework Directive (EWFD).
Many water bodies do not have monitoring programmes, thus, modelled data can be a valuable tool for expert judgments. The models can also be used to describe variability in hydrological and nutrient load variables in a present climate, but can also be run using climate model data to predict future conditions.
Nutrients were included in the hindcast run but no validation has been done for these variables for the Atlantic sub-region. A larger data base of nutrient concentrations is available for the Baltic Sea drainage basin.
Database of hindcast river discharge
The hindcast data base is continuously developed, improved and released in new versions. Data can easily be down-loaded from the E-HYPE webpage http://www.e-hypeweb.smhi.se under an agreement that can be found on the same page. The data base covers the whole Europe and is not restricted to river outlets to the sea but it also contains data from all upstream basins. So far, the data base only contains water discharge but nutrient concentrations will be included in the next version which is planned for late 2012.
Within the OPERR project the hindcast data is a valuable supplement to atmospheric re-analysis products for ocean hindcasts including ecological models. One important application is in connection with climate change impact studies and ensemble modelling. Other ocean applications where river data is important are coastal management and monitoring. The data base also works as a platform for European Union (EU) financial proposal or bodies (e.g. Seventh Framework Programme (FP7), ERA-net, Interreg, GMES, European Commission (EC)) and for SME business development.
Validation of river data
A hindcast run of the hydrological model E-HYPE 2.1 for the years 1979 - 2008 is validated against available observations for selected rivers in northern Europe, south-eastern Bay of Biscay and the western Black Sea. This is a task that addresses the OPERR objective of assessing the usefulness of the E-HYPE predictions in numerical ocean modelling.
E-HYPE is developed and run by SMHI and produces numerical estimates of daily freshwater discharge, N and P species concentrations for all of Europe. E-HYPE 2.1 has a horizontal basin configuration that resolves catchments of about 3000 km2 or more. The hindcast dataset consisting of the discharges to the sea has been compared to observational estimates of freshwater discharge from rivers in four regions: Norway, the United Kingdom (UK), the south-eastern Bay of Biscay and the western Black Sea. In addition, modelled and observed concentrations of N and P have been compared for rivers entering the Kattegat (water body between Denmark and Sweden) and in the Bay of Biscay.
In Norway and the UK, the E-HYPE freshwater estimates are compared with observational data for 21 and 22 rivers, respectively. In addition, comparisons are made for regional aggregate data around the Norwegian coast. E-HYPE validates fairly well with observed estimates for major rivers and aggregated data, with more mixed results for smaller rivers. This is to be expected, considering the native resolution of E-HYPE. The main deficiency of the E-HYPE dataset is underestimation of the total runoff. The Norwegian data basis makes it possible to estimate the deficit in mean flow to 27 % of the observed value. For the UK, no corresponding data basis was found in this study, but the comparative statistics for individual rivers suggest that there is also an underestimation of the total runoff in that region, too. The underestimation of total runoff is believed to be due to inadequacies in the precipitation data used to force the model. On the positive side, E-HYPE is able to replicate fairly well the short-term, seasonal and inter-annual variability in the major rivers. This is an important finding for ocean modelling, since the climatological data that are commonly used for freshwater forcing lack this variability.
E-HYPE predictions of total N and P are compared with observations from some 20 stations around the Kattegat. For TN, the mean concentrations compare fairly well so that E-HYPE should be able to give a good estimate of fluxes to the Kattegat. P is notoriously more difficult to simulate than N, and in this study there is a bias toward overestimation of TP around the Kattegat.
In the south-eastern Bay of Biscay, two major and four small rivers are studied, both for freshwater discharges and nutrients. The results for freshwater discharge are rather similar to those found for northern Europe. E-HYPE tends to underestimate the mean flow, especially for the small rivers. The short-term, seasonal and inter-annual variability are fairly well reproduced, although the maximal events are generally underestimated. These results suggest that, here too, the E-HYPE freshwater runoff data may be beneficial when applied in ocean models. On the other hand, the E-HYPE N and P data do not validate well at all in the SE Biscay rivers. This is a difficult modelling task, for which comparable observations are scarce, and is clearly an area for further model development.
In the western Black Sea, the freshwater discharge from three major rivers, including the Danube, is investigated. For the Danube, E-HYPE underestimates the overall mean flow by about 10 %; there is a seasonal signal, where the underestimation occurs in May - September. For the other two rivers, South Bug and Dnieper, E-HYPE 2.1 overestimates considerably the observed flow, by 135 % and 75 %, respectively. This is attributed to the complexity of water consumption in these watersheds. For all three rivers, E-HYPE reproduces rather well the observed variability patterns (seasonal and inter-annual scales).
Evaluation of the impact of daily river runoff on ecological ocean models and reanalysis products
The OPERR project has two overall objectives, according to the project description: '...first to turn a pan-European river discharge model into operational use and thereby acting as a downstream service based on earlier developed GMES core services and at the same time stimulating the development and improvement of new downstream services...' and secondly 'the validation of observed river discharge and the river discharge estimates produced by the project in applications of shelf sea ocean.'
This report addresses the second objective of OPERR. Specifically, it aims to assess the quality of the hindcast datasets produced in the project by SMHI, using the prognostic river discharge model E-HYPE. The report focuses on two different tasks. The objective of the first task is to assess the impact of assimilating river runoff data in a Biscay hydrodynamic model simulations, and thus assessing the utility of having river runoff forecast estimates, such as those from E-HYPE, for better predictions on coastal hydrological conditions, while in the second task the focus has been on an evaluation of the impact of using E-HYPE data in an ecological ocean model for the North Sea. The main focus of the present deliverable is to see the impact of different rivers (E-HYPE data or observations) on the quality of results when applied in numerical ocean models. The validation of the actual runoff through a comparison with observed river data is presented in D4.1 and is not considered here.
In simple terms, the aim of this work is to investigate the importance and sensitivity in ocean models to the river forcing, and how well an ocean model using E-HYPE is able to reproduce observed features in the ocean compared to the same model using observed river runoff. The main question to be answered is whether or not E-HYPE can replace the traditional river data used by most ocean modellers. The validation studies are carried out using the ROMS model for the Biscay and the NORWECOM ocean model for a hindcast covering an extended North Sea with a special focus on the quality of the model along the Torungen-Hirtshals transect in the Skagerrak.
The OPERR project has two overall objectives, according to the project description: '...first to turn a pan-European river discharge model into operational use and thereby acting as a downstream service based on earlier developed GMES core services and at the same time stimulating the development and improvement of new downstream services...' and secondly 'the validation of observed river discharge and the river discharge estimates produced by the project in applications of shelf sea ocean.'
This report addresses the second objective of OPERR. Specifically, it aims to assess the quality of the hindcast datasets produced in the project by SMHI, using the prognostic river discharge model E-HYPE. The report focuses on two different tasks. The objective of the first task is to assess the impact of assimilating river runoff data in a Biscay hydrodynamic model simulations, and thus assessing the utility of having river runoff forecast estimates, such as those from E-HYPE, for better predictions on coastal hydrological conditions, while in the second task the focus has been on an evaluation of the impact of using E-HYPE data in an ecological ocean model for the North Sea. The main focus of the present deliverable is to see the impact of different rivers (E-HYPE data or observations) on the quality of results when applied in numerical ocean models. The validation of the actual runoff through a comparison with observed river data is presented in D4.1 and is not considered here.
In simple terms, the aim of this work is to investigate the importance and sensitivity in ocean models to the river forcing, and how well an ocean model using E-HYPE is able to reproduce observed features in the ocean compared to the same model using observed river runoff. The main question to be answered is whether or not E-HYPE can replace the traditional river data used by most ocean modellers. The validation studies are carried out using the ROMS model for the Biscay and the Norwecom ocean model for a hindcast covering an extended North Sea with a special focus on the quality of the model along the Torungen-Hirtshals transect in the Skagerrak.
Project website: http://www/smhi.se/operr
The users' input to the user requirement document (URD) has been acquired by mutual negotiations with potential users, experience gained from participants' own modelling, observing activities and information derived at conferences, working groups and other types of meetings.
Project context and objectives:
The proposal addresses Activity 9.1 Space-based applications at the service of European society and specifically, Area 9.1.1 Pre-operational validation of GMES services and products and SPA.2010.1.111-01 Stimulating the development of downstream GMES services'.
The overall objective of the project is twofold, first to turn a pan-European river discharge model into an operational discharge model delivering real-time and forecast data to shelf sea models. The discharge model will thereby act as a downstream service based on the currently developed GMES core information service for water. At the same time, the project's delivery of essential new data to shelf sea models stimulates the development and improvement of a new downstream service which includes shelf sea models.
The project addresses the pressing need for reasonable estimates of real-time river discharges to seas for driving the shelf-sea models. This objective has been achieved by extending an already running operational river discharge model (HYPE) for the Baltic Sea drainage basin (Donnelly et al, 2009) to cover all European rivers. A sustainable operational system has been built up to respond to GMES downstream services such as coastal ocean models, regional environmental commissions including Helcom and OSPAR, regional and national operational institutes, environmental protection agencies, fishery boards, water regulation bodies and small to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) working in this area. The pan-European river discharge model is dependent on remotely sensed databases of land cover and land-use from GMES products to parameterise rainfall-runoff processes.
The second main objective of the project is the validation of observed river discharge and the river discharge estimates produced by the project in applications of shelf sea models. The validation of daily river discharge as forcing to shelf sea models includes both operational products for real-time validation and climate studies using hindcast runs. The validation of the performance of shelf sea models is dependent on remotely sensed data of sea surface temperature (NOAA AVHRR and MODIS-Aqua), surface salinity (SMOS) and Chlorophyll (MODIS-Aqua, SeaWiFS). Studies of the impact of daily river discharge on physical and ecological shelf sea models will support the improvement of the performance of regional ocean models.
To upgrade the model to cover the whole of Europe requires support from all regions from the Barents Sea in the North, to the Black Sea in the East. Existing databases for observed river discharge including the Global Runoff Data Centre (GRDC) and European Water Archive (EWA) has been exploited for model calibration; however, as much real-time hydrological data as possible needs to be accessible on a daily basis. Some of this data is already available on national data servers. The available data has been collated operationally for running the river discharge model in real-time mode. All information collected by the project, including project results has been made available to potential users and the public using a file transfer protocol (FTP) and a web site. An important outcome of the project has been the potential to stimulate new and innovative products for SMEs working with coastal management. This has partly been achieved by direct contact and active participation in seminars arranged by regional national agencies. The contact with consultants working with coastal management has been very restricted and is an issue for a further effort.
No research has been carried out in the OPERR.
Project results:
Data support
The objectives of this deliverable has been:
- to coordinate the collection of historical runoff data in selected regions;
- to prepare the historical data set for model calibration;
- to prepare for real-time updating of the river discharge model.
A database of observed river discharge data has been updated. Partners within the project have contacted their respective local hydrological agencies to request data. This data has been collated and used to update the existing river discharge database used for the E-HYPE model. Existing data has been requested from the GRDC, EWA and Baltex databases, sorted and collated into a single database along with any new data collected. The new data has been prepared to be used for calibration and real-time updating of the river discharge model.
The E-HYPE model should be calibrated and validated to historical water quality observations when used to simulate nutrients. An attempt has therefore been made to collate available historical observations of nitrogen and phosphorous concentrations in waterways around Europe.
Hindcast run
Hindcast with E-HYPE version 1.0 has been performed for the period 1980 to 2008. All data can be downloaded from the E-HYPEWeb (see http://www.e-hypeweb.smhi.se for details). Calculations have been made with a daily time-step for water quality and volume flux and the results are made available as daily or monthly mean values. All results presented on E-HYPEWeb are from and not fully calibrated version of the E-HYPE application, i.e. the internal parameters are calibrated using data from the Baltic Sea drainage basin. Results should therefore be regarded as only preliminary and only intended to demonstrate the data delivery capabilities of this model application. New results are expected towards the end of 2012 with calibration against a full European data set.
A similar hindcast has also been produced for a Baltic Sea application with higher spatial resolution and with more reliable nutrient loads. These data are available on request.
Results from these models can be used for many different purposes. Discharge and nutrient load results along the coastal boundary of the model domain may be used to examine the impact of freshwater and nutrient influxes to seas. Discharge and water quality results at smaller areas within the model domain can be used for characterisation of water body status, establishment of environmental goals, planning of remedial measures and development of monitoring strategies for the European Water Framework Directive (EWFD).
Many water bodies do not have monitoring programmes, thus, modelled data can be a valuable tool for expert judgments. The models can also be used to describe variability in hydrological and nutrient load variables in a present climate, but can also be run using climate model data to predict future conditions.
Nutrients were included in the hindcast run but no validation has been done for these variables for the Atlantic sub-region. A larger data base of nutrient concentrations is available for the Baltic Sea drainage basin.
Database of hindcast river discharge
The hindcast data base is continuously developed, improved and released in new versions. Data can easily be down-loaded from the E-HYPE webpage http://www.e-hypeweb.smhi.se under an agreement that can be found on the same page. The data base covers the whole Europe and is not restricted to river outlets to the sea but it also contains data from all upstream basins. So far, the data base only contains water discharge but nutrient concentrations will be included in the next version which is planned for late 2012.
Within the OPERR project the hindcast data is a valuable supplement to atmospheric re-analysis products for ocean hindcasts including ecological models. One important application is in connection with climate change impact studies and ensemble modelling. Other ocean applications where river data is important are coastal management and monitoring. The data base also works as a platform for European Union (EU) financial proposal or bodies (e.g. Seventh Framework Programme (FP7), ERA-net, Interreg, GMES, European Commission (EC)) and for SME business development.
Validation of river data
A hindcast run of the hydrological model E-HYPE 2.1 for the years 1979 - 2008 is validated against available observations for selected rivers in northern Europe, south-eastern Bay of Biscay and the western Black Sea. This is a task that addresses the OPERR objective of assessing the usefulness of the E-HYPE predictions in numerical ocean modelling.
E-HYPE is developed and run by SMHI and produces numerical estimates of daily freshwater discharge, N and P species concentrations for all of Europe. E-HYPE 2.1 has a horizontal basin configuration that resolves catchments of about 3000 km2 or more. The hindcast dataset consisting of the discharges to the sea has been compared to observational estimates of freshwater discharge from rivers in four regions: Norway, the United Kingdom (UK), the south-eastern Bay of Biscay and the western Black Sea. In addition, modelled and observed concentrations of N and P have been compared for rivers entering the Kattegat (water body between Denmark and Sweden) and in the Bay of Biscay.
In Norway and the UK, the E-HYPE freshwater estimates are compared with observational data for 21 and 22 rivers, respectively. In addition, comparisons are made for regional aggregate data around the Norwegian coast. E-HYPE validates fairly well with observed estimates for major rivers and aggregated data, with more mixed results for smaller rivers. This is to be expected, considering the native resolution of E-HYPE. The main deficiency of the E-HYPE dataset is underestimation of the total runoff. The Norwegian data basis makes it possible to estimate the deficit in mean flow to 27 % of the observed value. For the UK, no corresponding data basis was found in this study, but the comparative statistics for individual rivers suggest that there is also an underestimation of the total runoff in that region, too. The underestimation of total runoff is believed to be due to inadequacies in the precipitation data used to force the model. On the positive side, E-HYPE is able to replicate fairly well the short-term, seasonal and inter-annual variability in the major rivers. This is an important finding for ocean modelling, since the climatological data that are commonly used for freshwater forcing lack this variability.
E-HYPE predictions of total N and P are compared with observations from some 20 stations around the Kattegat. For TN, the mean concentrations compare fairly well so that E-HYPE should be able to give a good estimate of fluxes to the Kattegat. P is notoriously more difficult to simulate than N, and in this study there is a bias toward overestimation of TP around the Kattegat.
In the south-eastern Bay of Biscay, two major and four small rivers are studied, both for freshwater discharges and nutrients. The results for freshwater discharge are rather similar to those found for northern Europe. E-HYPE tends to underestimate the mean flow, especially for the small rivers. The short-term, seasonal and inter-annual variability are fairly well reproduced, although the maximal events are generally underestimated. These results suggest that, here too, the E-HYPE freshwater runoff data may be beneficial when applied in ocean models. On the other hand, the E-HYPE N and P data do not validate well at all in the SE Biscay rivers. This is a difficult modelling task, for which comparable observations are scarce, and is clearly an area for further model development.
In the western Black Sea, the freshwater discharge from three major rivers, including the Danube, is investigated. For the Danube, E-HYPE underestimates the overall mean flow by about 10 %; there is a seasonal signal, where the underestimation occurs in May - September. For the other two rivers, South Bug and Dnieper, E-HYPE 2.1 overestimates considerably the observed flow, by 135 % and 75 %, respectively. This is attributed to the complexity of water consumption in these watersheds. For all three rivers, E-HYPE reproduces rather well the observed variability patterns (seasonal and inter-annual scales).
Evaluation of the impact of daily river runoff on ecological ocean models and reanalysis products
The OPERR project has two overall objectives, according to the project description: '...first to turn a pan-European river discharge model into operational use and thereby acting as a downstream service based on earlier developed GMES core services and at the same time stimulating the development and improvement of new downstream services...' and secondly 'the validation of observed river discharge and the river discharge estimates produced by the project in applications of shelf sea ocean.'
This report addresses the second objective of OPERR. Specifically, it aims to assess the quality of the hindcast datasets produced in the project by SMHI, using the prognostic river discharge model E-HYPE. The report focuses on two different tasks. The objective of the first task is to assess the impact of assimilating river runoff data in a Biscay hydrodynamic model simulations, and thus assessing the utility of having river runoff forecast estimates, such as those from E-HYPE, for better predictions on coastal hydrological conditions, while in the second task the focus has been on an evaluation of the impact of using E-HYPE data in an ecological ocean model for the North Sea. The main focus of the present deliverable is to see the impact of different rivers (E-HYPE data or observations) on the quality of results when applied in numerical ocean models. The validation of the actual runoff through a comparison with observed river data is presented in D4.1 and is not considered here.
In simple terms, the aim of this work is to investigate the importance and sensitivity in ocean models to the river forcing, and how well an ocean model using E-HYPE is able to reproduce observed features in the ocean compared to the same model using observed river runoff. The main question to be answered is whether or not E-HYPE can replace the traditional river data used by most ocean modellers. The validation studies are carried out using the ROMS model for the Biscay and the NORWECOM ocean model for a hindcast covering an extended North Sea with a special focus on the quality of the model along the Torungen-Hirtshals transect in the Skagerrak.
The OPERR project has two overall objectives, according to the project description: '...first to turn a pan-European river discharge model into operational use and thereby acting as a downstream service based on earlier developed GMES core services and at the same time stimulating the development and improvement of new downstream services...' and secondly 'the validation of observed river discharge and the river discharge estimates produced by the project in applications of shelf sea ocean.'
This report addresses the second objective of OPERR. Specifically, it aims to assess the quality of the hindcast datasets produced in the project by SMHI, using the prognostic river discharge model E-HYPE. The report focuses on two different tasks. The objective of the first task is to assess the impact of assimilating river runoff data in a Biscay hydrodynamic model simulations, and thus assessing the utility of having river runoff forecast estimates, such as those from E-HYPE, for better predictions on coastal hydrological conditions, while in the second task the focus has been on an evaluation of the impact of using E-HYPE data in an ecological ocean model for the North Sea. The main focus of the present deliverable is to see the impact of different rivers (E-HYPE data or observations) on the quality of results when applied in numerical ocean models. The validation of the actual runoff through a comparison with observed river data is presented in D4.1 and is not considered here.
In simple terms, the aim of this work is to investigate the importance and sensitivity in ocean models to the river forcing, and how well an ocean model using E-HYPE is able to reproduce observed features in the ocean compared to the same model using observed river runoff. The main question to be answered is whether or not E-HYPE can replace the traditional river data used by most ocean modellers. The validation studies are carried out using the ROMS model for the Biscay and the Norwecom ocean model for a hindcast covering an extended North Sea with a special focus on the quality of the model along the Torungen-Hirtshals transect in the Skagerrak.
Project website: http://www/smhi.se/operr