Geomorphological approach to the river runoff evaluation in the geological past (рaper 5. Comparison of the estimates by different methods)

Abstract

The estimates of water flow in the paleorivers with known paleochannel morphometry was compared with basic hydrological and climatic indicators found by paleogeographic analogy in the regions-analogues, determined by fossil flora analysis from the Holocene (from the present to 10 thousand years ago), the Late Valday (17–18 thousand years ago) and before the Eemian (~140 thousand years ago) deposits. Comparison of annual runoff depth obtained by regime equations and equations of hydraulics and taken from the hydrological maps in the regions-analogues, showed quite satisfactory compliance. Relative error of comparison for the different objects is in the range of ±11–23%, which does not exceed the average error of water flow estimation by each of these techniques separately. However, the error of ±20% is significant and geomorphological approaches can be applied only for the cases of sufficient changes in the water flow of ancient rivers (twice or more) and for long-term periods. Nevertheless, the use of geomorphological approaches and the method of paleogeographic analogy is now one of the main ways to reconstruct water resources in the past and to construct water resources scenarios for possible future climate changes.