We explored why bridge foundations erode over time and why floods alone do not explain this risk. Using many simulated river flows linked to a model that includes erosion and sediment refilling, we found that scour is highly variable, persistent, and only weakly linked to flood extremes. Sediment coming from upstream strongly alters erosion patterns. These results show that common design methods can misjudge risk, highlighting the need to account for uncertainty in safer bridge design.

We introduce the ratio of uncertainty to mutual information (RUMI), a new metric to improve rainfall-runoff simulations. RUMI better captures the link between observed and simulated stream flows by considering uncertainty at a core computation step. Tested on 99 catchments and with the GR4J model, it outperforms traditional metrics by providing more reliable and consistent results. RUMI paves the way for more accurate hydrological predictions.

Daily and hourly rainfall observations were inputted to a Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) hydrological model to investigate the impacts of rainfall temporal resolution on a discharge simulation. Results indicated that groundwater flow parameters were more sensitive to daily time intervals, and channel routing parameters were more influential for hourly time intervals. This study suggests that the SWAT model appears to be a reliable tool to predict discharge in a mixed-land-use basin.

Since the problem of energy forecasting in SHPPs without storage capacity is little explored, we apply simple schemes to investigate: (a) the essential model structure and information; (b) the advantages of first using a flow forecasting model, instead of a direct energy forecasting; (c) the importance of rainfall data, as a proxy of the catchment state; (d) the training procedure and performance measure; and (e) the representation of predictive uncertainty and its practical interpretation.

This paper is the result of new research of ancient and early modern sources about the developments of the concept of the hydrological cycle and of hydrology in general. It shows that the flooding of the Nile was the first geophysical problem formulated in scientific terms in the cradle of natural philosophy and science in the 6th century BC. Aristotle was able to find the correct solution to the problem, which he tested through what it appears to be the first scientific expedition in history.