Understanding trends in hydrologic extremes across Australia

Abstract

Changes in the hydrologic cycle have far reaching impacts on agricultural productivity, water resources availability, riverine ecosystems, and our ability to manage environmental assets, bushfire risk, and flood hazard. For example, declining rainfall in the southeast of Australia has led to a prolonged period of drought, with serious impacts on agriculture, the environment, and water supply to urban and rural towns. Here, using the continental wide Australian Water Resources Assessment Landscape model (AWRA-L), we evaluate historical trends from 1960 to 2017 in rainfall, soil moisture, evapotranspiration, and runoff to explain changing drought and flooding. Northern parts of Australia have ..