Projected Changes in Precipitation Extremes over Shaanxi Province, China, in the 21st Century

Extreme precipitation events, which have intensified with global warming, will have a pernicious influence on society. It would be desirable to understand how they will evolve in the future as global warming becomes more serious with time. Thus, the primary objective of this study is to provide a co...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Advances in meteorology 2020, Vol.2020 (2020), p.1-13
Main Authors: Yang, Aili, Luo, Shuxiang, Xiao, Ziniu, Li, Ling
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
21st century
Analysis
Arid regions
Climate
Climate change
Climate models
Emergency communications systems
Extreme weather
Global climate
Global climate models
Global warming
Heavy rainfall
Hydrology
Precipitation
Precipitation (Meteorology)
Rain
Regional climate models
Regional climates
Regions
Simulation
Spatial variability
Spatial variations
Trends
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Summary:Extreme precipitation events, which have intensified with global warming, will have a pernicious influence on society. It would be desirable to understand how they will evolve in the future as global warming becomes more serious with time. Thus, the primary objective of this study is to provide a comprehensive understanding of the changing characteristics of the precipitation extremes in the 21st century over Shaanxi Province, a climate-sensitive and environmentally fragile area located in the east of northwestern China, based on a consecutive simulation of the 21st century conducted by the regional climate model RegCM4 forced by the global climate model HadGEM2-ES at high resolution under middle emission scenario of the Representative Concentration Pathway 4.5 (RCP4.5). Basic validation of the model performance was carried out, and six extreme precipitation indices (EPIs) were used to assess the intensity and frequency of the extreme precipitation events over Shaanxi Province. The results show that RegCM4 reproduces the observed characteristics of extreme precipitation events over Shaanxi Province well. Overall for the domain, the EPIs excluding consecutive dry days (CDD) have a growing tendency during 1980–2098 although they exhibit spatial variability over Shaanxi Province. Some areas in the arid northern Shaanxi may have more heavy rainfalls by the middle of the 21st century but less wet extreme events by the end of the 21st century. And the humid central and southern regions would suffer more precipitation-related natural hazards in the future.
ISSN:1687-9309
1687-9317
DOI:10.1155/2020/1808404