Soil & Water Res., X:X | DOI: 10.17221/76/2026-SWR

Segmented characteristics of precipitation-runoff response structure relationship in the Yellow River Basin over the past 20 yearsOriginal Paper

Xin Huang ORCID...1, Chunwen Wei2, Lin Qiu1
1 College of Water Resources, North China University of Water Resources and Electric Power; Zhengzhou, Henan, P.R. China
2 Qinyang Flood and Drought Disaster Prevention Service Center, Qingyang, Henan, P.R. China

Under a changing environment, the characteristics of precipitation-runoff hydrological response relationship and the analysis of synchronous and asynchronous encounter frequency in large river basins play a crucial role in the water resources planning and management. Under the precipitation and runoff bivariate hydrological framework, segmented joint distribution models for precipitation and runoff of the Yellow River Basin (YRB) are constructed using the copula function. The wet and dry synchronous-asynchronous encounter frequency of precipitation and runoff is quantitatively analysed, and the driving factors underlying the variations in the precipitation-runoff relationship are discussed. The results show that from 2005 to 2024, precipitation and runoff for Lanzhou (upper reaches), Longmen (middle reaches), and Lijin (lower reaches) hydrological station of the YRB exhibited an upward trend. The wet and dry synchronous frequencies between precipitation and runoff at these three stations were 55.24%, 58.26% and 57.67%, respectively, all higher than the asynchronous frequencies, indicating that the whole basin is likely to experience synchronous wet or dry hydrological regimes. Furthermore, in the YRB, the explanatory power of precipitation on natural runoff gradually decreases from upstream to downstream. Land use and land cover change induced by grain-for-green projects and urbanisation are likely the main causes of natural runoff variation and the alteration of the hydrological response mechanism in the YRB.

Keywords: copula; runoff; precipitation; wet and dry encounter frequency; YRB

Received: June 11, 2026; Accepted: August 3, 2026; Prepublished online: August 31, 2026 

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