Future Hydrologic Extremes of the Red River Basin

Hydrologic extremes of drought and flooding stress water resources and damage communities in the Red River basin, located in the south-central United States. For example, the summer of 2011 was the third driest summer in Oklahoma state history and the driest in Texas state history. When the long-term drought conditions ended in the spring of 2015 as El Niño brought record precipitation to the region, there were also catastrophic floods that caused loss of life and property. Hydrologic extremes such as these have occurred throughout the historical record, but decision-makers need to know how the frequency of these events is expected to vary in a changing climate so that they can mitigate these impacts and losses. Therefore, the goals of this study focus on how these hydrologic extremes impact water resources in the Red River basin, how the frequency of such events is expected to change in the future, and how this study can aid local water-resource managers and decision-makers. Heavy-precipitation events were defined at the historical 90th and 99th percentiles, and severe-drought events were identified at a threshold of the standardized precipitation evapotranspiration index’s value of less than or equal to −1. The results show an increase in the frequency of severe-drought events in the western Red River basin and a rise in heavy-rainfall events in the east by the end of the century, especially under RCP 8.5. Therefore, decision-makers and water-resource managers will likely need to prepare for both hydrologic extremes depending on their location within the basin.