The Centre for Hydrology is the home of the Cold Regions Hydrological Modelling (CRHM) platform. The system was initially devised to provide a framework within which to integrate numerical algorithms derived from the observation of a range of hydrological processes of considerable uncertainty, based solely on the underlying physical interactions which control them, in small- to medium-sized catchments. The public repository site is here.

 

CRHM has to date been installed by the following organizations;

CRHM Users in Canada Worldwide
(37 nations)
Government Agencies
77
44
Universities
149
142
Corporations
64
16
Others
9
6

Workshops and training courses have been held in

  • Waterloo, ON 
  • Calgary, AB 
  • Winnipeg, MB 
  • Red Deer, AB 
  • Yellowknife, NWT
  • National Hydrological Research Centre, Saskatoon, SK 
  • Coldwater Laboratory, Biogeoscience Institute, Kananaskis, AB 
  • University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, SK 

 

Technical Details

The documentation for CRHM is available here.

The full manual for CRHM is available here.

Processes modelled by the software currently include;

  • blowing snow redistribution
  • snow and rain interception by forest canopies
  • sublimation
  • snowmelt in open and forested environments
  • infiltration into frozen and unfrozen soils
  • soil moisture storage and movement
  • water movement along hillslopes (with and without permafrost)
  • actual evaporation and evapotranspiration
  • radiation exchange on complex surfaces and through vegetation
  • wetland dynamics
  • variable contributing area
  • groundwater flow
  • streamflow hydraulics
  • gravitational snow transport
  • glacier melt

The model also supports the concept of distinct landscape elements (Hydrological Response Units or HRUs), which may be linked episodically in process-specific sequences such as blowing snow, overland flow, organic layer subsurface flow, mineral interflow, groundwater flow, and streamflow.

The software has been implemented as an object-orientated framework within which new representations of specific processes may be incorporated very easily, allowing direct comparison of competing algorithms within the same contexts and forcings. Users are able to select from a wide range of process models, with varying complexities of representation, to build a basin hydrology model suitable for their investigations: the software then links these together in the most logical order.

This also means that the system is not limited to use in the investigation of high-latitude / high-altitude cold regions: by assembling and selecting a suitably relevant set of models, it may be used to investigate the hydrology for a wide variety of landscape / climate combinations.

Note that the software does not provide a means of calibrating these models from streamflow observations; the aim is to encourage reliance on improvements in the numerical representation of the hydrological processes at work to improve predictive performance, rather than to support application of 'fudge factor' parameters in order to force convergence between predicted and observed datasets. This in turn allows the model to be used as a self-testing tool through which to diagnose the adequacy of the hydrological understanding encapsulated within the algorithms employed, thereby reducing uncertainty when the same models are used for predictive applications.

The complete set of CRHM modules has been classified into the following categories;

  • Basin: sets HRU physical, soil and vegetation characteristics

  • Observation: interpolates meteorological data to the HRU, using adiabatic and precipitation distribution relationships, and saturation vapour pressure calculations. Includes climate change (temperature, humidity, precipitation) feature to permit sensitivity analysis

  • Snow Transport: blowing snow transport and sublimation

  • Interception: forest canopy and vegetation interception of rainfall, and interception and sublimation of snowfall, including drip and unloading

  • Radiation: selection of routines for shortwave direct and diffuse algorithms, slope corrections, snow albedo decay, longwave radiation, canopy transmissivity, and net radiation. Permits assimilation of sunshine hours or incoming shortwave observations, and estimation of radiation terms using meteorological relationships where observations are missing

  • Evaporation: including the Granger-Gray, Penman-Monteith, Priestly-Taylor and Shuttleworth-Wallace algorithms and optional soil moisture withdrawal curve and rooting zone control

  • Snowmelt: implements Gray’s Energy-Balance Snowmelt Model, Marks’ USDA SNOBAL, Essery’s simple land-surface scheme melt model as well as simple radiation and temperature index techniques

  • Infiltration: variety of infiltration routines for frozen soils, including Gray’s prairie method, Zhao & Gray’s parametric method, a frost depth calculation, Ayer’s unfrozen soil infiltration, Green-Ampt infiltration and redistribution

  • Soil Moisture Balance: multiple flowpath two-layer model with depressional storage, macropore and groundwater options 

  • Wetlands: permits open water evaporation and fill and spill or traditional routing from wetland or pond depressional storage

  • Flow: mineral and organic layer flow over permafrost based on physically-based model, with timing and storage control of overland, interflow, sub-surface, groundwater and stream flow using options including the lag and route hydrograph method, a Richard’s Equation solution and/or Muskingum routing method 

  • Gravitational Snow Transport: simulate snow transport by gravity along steep slope, this is topographic driven distribution of snow, more description by Bernhardt and Schulz (2010)

  • Glacier Melt: estimate icemelt from glacier ice, firnmelt from firn layers and snowmelt from snowpack above glacier or firn layers based on energy-balance model, and melt fluxes can be estimated using the daily energy inputs or sub-daily energy inputs using katabatic parameterization, and optional debris-cover melt is also included; then movement of icemelt, firnmelt and snowmelt through glacier ice, firn and snowpack are handled by a simple lag and route method, more description by Pradhananga and Pomeroy (2022), Aubry-Wake et al. (2022)

  • Freezing and Thawing Fronts Dynamics: simulate the freezing and thawing fronts in seasonal frost or permafrost soil based on a modified Stefan equation, more description by Xie and Gough (2013)

In most of these categories, a choice of process models is available, ranging from basic to strongly physically-based; this permits the most appropriate algorithms to be used for the available data, information reliability, basin characteristics, scale, intended output, and so on. For more details, download The cold regions hydrological modelling platform for hydrological diagnosis and prediction based on process understanding.

 

CRHM requires files (extension .obs) of high-frequency (preferably hourly) continuous time series of observed air temperature, wind speed, humidity, and precipitation. The R package CRHMr can be used to prepare these time series, including infilling missing values. CRHMr can also be used to post-process and plot CRHM outputs.

There are several other packages that can be used to acquire data for use by CRHM.

MSCr (https://github.com/CentreForHydrology/MSCr) reads data from Meteorological Service of Canada files.

Reanalysis (https://github.com/CentreForHydrology/Reanalysis) creates .obs files from several types of reanalysis files, including ERA, WATCH and NARR.

WISKIr (https://github.com/CentreForHydrology/WISKIr) reads data from a Wiski web server.

Performance

CRHM was included in the recent Earth System Models Snow Model Intercomparison Project (ESM-SnowMIP), the purpose of the project is to identify crucial processes and snow characteristics that need to be improved in local- and global-scale modeling, and it is tightly linked to the 6th phase of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP6). The description paper can be found from here.

Download

The latest version of software is available for download here. The installation file along with source code and documentation of CRHM are listed in Assets.

To help keep track of our user-base, we request that you kindly send a message to centre.hydrology@usask.ca with the following details:

  • Your name
  • Your position or role
  • Your institution, university or other organisation
  • The city and country in which your institution is located
  • Your e-mail address
  • The purpose for which you intend to use the model

Many thanks!

Publications

  • Menard C.B., Essery R.,Krinner G., Arduini G., Bartlett P., Boone A., Brutel-Vuilmet C., Burke E., Cuntz M., Dai Y., Decharme B., Dutra E., Fang X.*, Fierz C., Gusev Y., Hagemann S., Haverd V., Kim H., Lafaysse M., Marke T., Nasonova O., Nitta T., Niwano M., Pomeroy J., Schadler G., Semenov V., Smirnova T., Strasser U., Swenson S., Turkov D., Wever N. and Yuan H. (2021)
    Scientific and human errors in a snow model intercomparison
    Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society: 102, pp. E61-E79
    DOI: 10.1175/BAMS-D-19-0329.1
    2.13 Mb PDF 
  • Shea J.M. and Whitfield P.H. and Fang X. and Pomeroy J.W. (2021)
    The Role of Basin Geometry in Mountain Snowpack Responses to Climate Change
    Frontiers in Water: 3, pp. 1-18
    DOI: 10.3389/frwa.2021.604275
    4.35 Mb PDF 
  • Essery R.;Kim H.;Wang L., Bartlett P.;Boone A.;Brutel-Vuilmet C.;Burke E.;Cuntz M.;Decharme B.;Dutra E.;Fang X.;Gusev Y.;Hagemann S.;Haverd V.;Kontu A.;Krinner G.;Lafaysse M.;Lejeune Y.;Marke T.;Marks D.;Marty C.;Menard C. B.;Nasonova O.;Nitta T.;Pomeroy J.;Schädler G.;Semenov V.;Smirnova T.;Swenson S.;Turkov D.;Wever N.;Yuan H. (2020)
    Snow cover duration trends observed at sites and predicted by multiple models
    The Cryosphere: 14, pp. 4687-4698
    DOI: 10.5194/tc-14-4687-2020
    2.49 Mb PDF 
  • Fang X. and Pomeroy J.W. (2020)
    Diagnosis of future changes in hydrology for a Canadian Rockies headwater basin
    Hydrology and Earth System Sciences: 24, pp. 2731-2754
    DOI: 10.5194/hess-24-2731-2020
    7.05 Mb PDF 
  • López-Moreno, J.I.;Pomeroy J.W.;Alonso-González E.;Morán-Tejeda E.;Revuelto J. (2020)
    Decoupling of warming mountain snowpacks from hydrological regimes
    Environmental Research Letters: 15, pp. 1-10
    DOI: 10.1088/1748-9326/abb55f
    1.45 Mb PDF 
  • Krogh S.A. and Pomeroy J.W. (2019)
    Impact of Future Climate and Vegetation on the Hydrology of an Arctic Headwater Basin at the Tundra-Taiga Transition
    Journal of Hydrometeorology: 20, pp. 197-215
    DOI: 10.1175/JHM-D-18-0187.1
    2.72 Mb PDF 
  • Lv Z., Pomeroy J.W., and Fang X. (2019)
    Evaluation of SNODAS Snow Water Equivalent in Western Canada and Assimilation Into a Cold Region Hydrological Model
    Water Resources Research: 55, pp. 11166-11187
    DOI: 10.1029/2019WR025333
    13.98 Mb PDF 
  • Rasouli K., Pomeroy J.W., and Whitfield P.H. (2019)
    Are the effects of vegetation and soil changes as important as climate change impacts on hydrological processes?
    Hydrology and Earth System Sciences: 23, pp. 4933-4954
    DOI: 10.5194/hess-23-4933-2019
    4.77 Mb PDF 
  • Rasouli K., Pomeroy J.W., and Whitfield P.H. (2019)
    Hydrological Responses of Headwater Basins to Monthly Perturbed Climate in the North American Cordillera
    Journal of Hydrometeorology: 20, pp. 863-882
    DOI: 10.1175/JHM-D-18-0166.1
    2.24 Mb PDF
  • Stone L.E., Fang, X., Haynes, K.M., Helbig, M., Pomeroy, J.W., Sonnentag, O. and Quinton, W.L. (2019)
    Modelling the effects of permafrost loss on discharge from a wetland-dominated, discontinuous permafrost basin
    Hydrological Processes: 33, pp. 2607-2626
    DOI: 10.1002/hyp.13546
    6.09 Mb PDF
  • Krogh S.A. and Pomeroy J.W. (2018)
    Recent changes in the hydrological cycle of an Arctic basin at the tundra-taiga transition
    Hydrology and Earth System Sciences: 22, pp. 3993-4014
    DOI: 10.5194/hess-22-3993-2018 (5.5Mb PDF)
     
  • Cordeiro M.R.C., Wilson H.F., Vanrobaeys J., Pomeroy J.W., Fang X., and The Red-Assiniboine Project Biophysical Modelling Team (2017)
    Simulating cold-region hydrology in an intensively drained agricultural watershed in Manitoba, Canada, using the Cold Regions Hydrological Model
    Hydrology and Earth System Sciences: 21, pp. 3783-3506
    DOI: 10.5194/hess-21-3483-2017 
    (4.9Mb PDF)
     
  • Fang X. and Pomeroy J.W. (2016)
    Impact of antecedent conditions on simulations of a flood in a mountain headwater basin
    Hydrology and Earth System Sciences: 21, pp. 3783-3506
    DOI: 10.1002/hyp.10910
    (1.64Mb PDF)
     
  • Pomeroy J.W., Fang X. and Marks D.G. (2016)
    The cold rain-on-snow event of June 2013 in the Canadian Rockies - characteristics and diagnosis
    Hydrological Processes: 30, pp. 2899-2914
    DOI: 10.1002/hyp.10905 
    (1.92Mb PDF)
     
  • Weber M. Bernhardt M., Pomeroy J.W., Fang X., Härer S. and Schulz K. (2016)
    Description of current and future snow processes in a small basin in the Bavarian Alps 
    Environmental Earth Sciences: 75, pp. 1-18 
    DOI: 10.1007/s12665-016-6027-1 
    ( 1.62Mb PDF)
     
  • Fang X., Pomeroy J.W., Ellis C.R., MacDonald M.K., DeBeer C.M. and Brown T. (2013)
    Multi-variable evaluation of hydrological model predictions for a headwater basin in the Canadian Rocky Mountains
    Hydrology and Earth System Sciences 17: pp. 1635–1659
    DOI:10.5194/hess-17-1635-2013
    (3.07Mb PDF)
     
  • Quinton W.L. and Baltzer J.L. 2013)
    Changing surface water systems in the discontinuous permafrost zone: implications for streamflow
    Cold and Mountain Region Hydrological Systems Under Climate Change - Towards Improved Projections: Proceedings of H02, IAHS-IAPSO-IASPEI Assembly, Gothenburg, Sweden, July 2013IAHS Publ. 360: pp. 85-92
    (1.31Mb PDF)
     
  • Quinton W.L. and Baltzer J.L. (2013)
    The active-layer hydrology of a peat plateau with thawing permafrost (Scotty Creek, Canada)
    Hydrogeology Journal 21(1): pp. 201-220
    DOI 10.1007/s10040-012-0935-2
    (1.35Mb PDF)
     
  • López-Moreno J.I., Pomeroy J.W., Revuelto J. and Vicente-Serrano S.M. (2012)
    Response of snow processes to climate change: spatial variability in a small basin in the Spanish Pyrenees
    Hydrological Processes
    DOI: 10.1002/hyp.9408
    (577kb PDF)
     
  • Pomeroy J., Fang X. and Ellis C. (2012)
    Sensitivity of snowmelt hydrology in Marmot Creek, Alberta, to forest cover disturbance
    Hydrological Processes 26: pp. 1891–1904
    DOI: 10.1002/hyp.9248
    (661kb PDF)
     
  • Armstrong R.W., Pomeroy J.W. and Martz L.W. (2010)
    Estimating Evaporation in a Prairie Landscape under Drought Conditions
    Canadian Water Resources Journal 35(2): pp. 173–186
    (1.39Mb PDF)
     
  • Ellis C.R., Pomeroy J.W., Brown T. and MacDonald J. (2010)
    Simulation of snow accumulation and melt in needleleaf forest environments
    Hydrology and Earth System Sciences 14: pp. 925-940
    (2.02Mb PDF)
     
  • Fang X., Pomeroy J.W., Westbrook C.J., Guo X., Minke A.G. and Brown T. (2010)
    Prediction of snowmelt derived streamflow in a wetland dominated prairie basin
    Hydrology and Earth System Sciences 14: pp. 1–16
    DOI:10.5194/hess-14-1-2010
    (799kb PDF)
     
  • Essery R, Rutter N, Pomeroy J., Baxter R., Stähli M., Gustafsson D., Barr A., Bartlett P. and Elder K. (2009)
    SNOWMIP2: an Evaluation of Forest snow Process simulations
    Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society 90: pp. 1120 1135
    DOI: 10.1175/2009BAMS2629.1
    (Online PDF)
     
  • Quinton W.L., Bemrose R.K., Zhang Y. and Carey S.K. (2009)
    The influence of spatial variability in snowmelt and active layer thaw on hillslope drainage for an alpine tundra hillslope
    Hydrological Processes
    DOI: 10.1002/hyp.7327
    (448kb PDF)
     
  • Rutter N., et al. (2009)
    Evaluation of forest snow processes models (SnowMIP2)
    Journal of Geophysical Research - Atmospheres 114: D06111
    DOI: 10.1029/2008JD011063.
    (WWW)
     
  • Dornes P.F., Pomeroy J.W., Pietroniro A., Carey S.K. and Quniton W.L. (2008)
    Influence of landscape aggregation in modelling snow-cover ablation and snowmelt runoff in a sub-arctic mountainous environment
    Hydrological Sciences 53(4): pp. 725-740
    (461kb PDF)
     
  • Fang X. and Pomeroy J.W. (2008)
    Drought impacts on Canadian prairie wetland snow hydrology
    Hydrological Processes
    DOI: 10.1002/hyp.7074
    (680kb PDF)
     
  • Pomeroy J.W., Gray D.M., Brown T., Hedstrom N.R., Quinton W.L., Granger R.J. and Carey S.K. (2007)
    The cold regions hydrological model: a platform for basing process representation and model structure on physical evidence
    Hydrological Processes 21: pp. 2650–2667
    DOI: 10.1002/hyp.6787
    (330kb PDF)
     
  • Quinton W.L., Carey S.K. and Goeller N.T. (2004)
    Snowmelt Runoff from Northern Alpine Tundra Hillslopes: Major Processes and Methods of Simulation
    Hydrology and Earth System Sciences 8(5): pp. 877-890
    (748kb PDF)