On the climatic dependence of the IUH: A rainfall‐runoff analysis of the Nash Model and the geomorphoclimatic theory

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Abstract
The geomorphoclimatic theory of the IUH is compared with the results obtained through derivation of the IUH's from a series of rainfall‐runoff experiments conducted via simulation for one basin and three different climates. The theoretical distributions of the peak and time to peak of the IUH compare very well with those obtained in the experiments. The peak and time to peak of the response hydrograph estimated through simple formulas which assume a triangular IUH also have a good agreement with the values obtained through the rainfall‐runoff model. It is shown that the uncertainty due to the variability of the IUH with the rainfall input may produce a sizable variance of estimation in the outflow hydrograph when working under the assumed nonlinear framework. The analysis is carried out with constant roughness and rectangular channels, characteristics which are taken independent of the size of the discharge.