Impact of meteorological predictions on real‐time spring flow forecasting

Abstract Meteorological predictions, such as precipitation and temperature, are commonly used to improve real‐time hydrologic forecasting, despite their inherent uncertainty and their absence in the model calibration stage. In this study, we quantify the effect of meteorological prediction errors on the accuracy of daily spring reservoir inflow forecasts using weather predictions in both the model calibration and testing phases. Different modelling experiments are compared using an operational conceptual model and nonlinear empirical models to assess the effects of using daily numerical weather predictions as opposed to the use of historical observations. It is found that, even with large prediction errors, meteorological forecasts can provide significant improvement of spring flow forecast for up to 7 days lead time, particularly for low flows. Spring flow prediction errors associated with the type of hydrological model used are significantly larger than those related to the meteorological predictions, particularly for 1 to 4 days ahead forecasts. The experimental results also indicate that multiple model‐based forecasting using an iterative prediction approach appears to be the most effective method for an adequate use of weather predictions. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.