The application of a dynamic OpenMI coupling between a regional climate model and a distributed surface water-groundwater model

To support climate adaptation measures for water resources, we have developed and evaluated a dynamic coupling between a comprehensive distributed hydrological modelling system, MIKE SHE, and a regional climate modelling system, HIRHAM. The coupled model enables two-way interaction between the atmosphere and the groundwater via the soil and land surface and can represent the lateral movement of water in both the surface and subsurface and their interactions as well as human interventions. The coupled model is applied to one-way and two-way coupled simulations for a managed groundwater-dominated catchment, the Skjern River, Denmark. The 2500 km2 catchment model is embedded in a meso-scale (4000 km x 2800 km) climate modelling domain. By using the ERA Interim reanalysis as boundary conditions the coupling performance is evaluated against measurements of both climatic and hydrological variables, including local measurements of energy fluxes. The results presented here suggest that there may be important differences in the simulated water balances for this catchment created by introducing an alternative hydrological model into the RCM.