Signals of Climate Change and Spatio-temporal Analysis of Climate Extremes in the Homogeneous Climatic Zones of Pakistan During 1962-2019

Author(s):  
Firdos Khan ◽  
Shaukat Ali ◽  
Christoph Mayer ◽  
Hamd Ullah ◽  
Sher Muhammad

Abstract This study investigates contemporary climate change and spatio-temporal analysis of climate extremes in Pakistan (divided into five homogenous climate zones) using observed data, categorized between 1962–1990 and 1991–2019. The results show that on the average, the changes in temperature and precipitation are significant at 5 % significance level throughout Pakistan in most of the seasons. The spatio-temporal trend analysis of consecutive dry days (CDD) shows an increasing trend during 1991–2019 except in zone 4 indicating throughout decreasing trend. PRCPTOT (annual total wet-day precipitation), R10 (number of heavy precipitation days), R20 (number of very heavy precipitation days) and R25mm (extremely heavy precipitation days) are significantly decreasing (increasing) during 1962–1990 (1991–2019) in North Pakistan. Summer days (SU25) increased across the country, except in zone 4 with a decrease. TX10p (Cool days) decreased across the country except an increase in zone 1 and zone 2 during 1962–1990. TX90p (Warm days) has an increasing trend during 1991–2019 except zone 5 and decreasing trend during 1962–1990 except zone 2 and 5. The Mann-Kendal test indicates increasing precipitation (DJF) and decreasing maximum and minimum temperature (JJA) in the Karakoram region during 1962–1990. The decadal analysis suggests decreasing precipitation during 1991–2019 and increasing temperature (maximum and minimum) during 2010–2019 which is in line with the recently confirmed slight mass loss of glaciers against Karakoram Anomaly.

2017 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-59 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jian-Sheng Ye ◽  
Yan-Hong Gong ◽  
Feng Zhang ◽  
Jiao Ren ◽  
Xiao-Ke Bai ◽  
...  

Abstract Intensifying climate extremes are one of the major concerns with climate change. Using 100-yr (1911–2010) daily temperature and precipitation records worldwide, 28 indices of extreme temperature and precipitation are calculated. A similarity percentage analysis is used to identify the key indices for distinguishing how extreme warm and cold years (annual temperature above the 90th and below the 10th percentile of the 100-yr distribution, respectively) differ from one another and from average years, and how extreme wet and dry years (annual precipitation above the 90th and below the 10th percentile of the 100-yr distribution, respectively) differ from each other and from average years. The analysis suggests that extreme warm years are primarily distinguished from average and extreme cold years by higher occurrence of warm nights (annual counts when night temperature >90th percentile), which occur about six more counts in extreme warm years compared with average years. Extreme wet years are mainly distinguished from average and extreme dry years by more occurrences of heavy precipitation events (events with ≥10 mm and ≥20 mm precipitation). Compared with average years, heavy events occur 60% more in extreme wet years and 50% less in extreme dry years. These indices consistently differ between extreme and average years across terrestrial ecoregions globally. These key indices need to be considered when analyzing climate model projections and designing climate change experiments that focus on ecosystem response to climate extremes.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Zhe Yuan ◽  
Yongqiang Wang ◽  
Jijun Xu ◽  
Zhiguang Wu

AbstractThe ecosystem of the Source Region of Yangtze River (SRYR) is highly susceptible to climate change. In this study, the spatial–temporal variation of NPP from 2000 to 2014 was analyzed, using outputs of Carnegie–Ames–Stanford Approach model. Then the correlation characteristics of NPP and climatic factors were evaluated. The results indicate that: (1) The average NPP in the SRYR is 100.0 gC/m2 from 2000 to 2014, and it shows an increasing trend from northwest to southeast. The responses of NPP to altitude varied among the regions with the altitude below 3500 m, between 3500 to 4500 m and above 4500 m, which could be attributed to the altitude associated variations of climatic factors and vegetation types; (2) The total NPP of SRYR increased by 0.18 TgC per year in the context of the warmer and wetter climate during 2000–2014. The NPP was significantly and positively correlated with annual temperature and precipitation at interannual time scales. Temperature in February, March, May and September make greater contribution to NPP than that in other months. And precipitation in July played a more crucial role in influencing NPP than that in other months; (3) Climatic factors caused the NPP to increase in most of the SRYR. Impacts of human activities were concentrated mainly in downstream region and is the primary reason for declines in NPP.


2017 ◽  
Vol 56 (9) ◽  
pp. 2393-2409 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rick Lader ◽  
John E. Walsh ◽  
Uma S. Bhatt ◽  
Peter A. Bieniek

AbstractClimate change is expected to alter the frequencies and intensities of at least some types of extreme events. Although Alaska is already experiencing an amplified response to climate change, studies of extreme event occurrences have lagged those for other regions. Forced migration due to coastal erosion, failing infrastructure on thawing permafrost, more severe wildfire seasons, altered ocean chemistry, and an ever-shrinking season for snow and ice are among the most devastating effects, many of which are related to extreme climate events. This study uses regional dynamical downscaling with the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) Model to investigate projected twenty-first-century changes of daily maximum temperature, minimum temperature, and precipitation over Alaska. The forcing data used for the downscaling simulations include the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) interim reanalysis (ERA-Interim; 1981–2010), Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory Climate Model, version 3 (GFDL CM3), historical (1976–2005), and GFDL CM3 representative concentration pathway 8.5 (RCP8.5; 2006–2100). Observed trends of temperature and sea ice coverage in the Arctic are large, and the present trajectory of global emissions makes a continuation of these trends plausible. The future scenario is bias adjusted using a quantile-mapping procedure. Results indicate an asymmetric warming of climate extremes; namely, cold extremes rise fastest, and the greatest changes occur in winter. Maximum 1- and 5-day precipitation amounts are projected to increase by 53% and 50%, which is larger than the corresponding increases for the contiguous United States. When compared with the historical period, the shifts in temperature and precipitation indicate unprecedented heat and rainfall across Alaska during this century.


2019 ◽  
Vol 65 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 166-179 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vladimir A. Usoltsev ◽  
Katarína Merganičová ◽  
Bohdan Konôpka ◽  
Anna A. Osmirko ◽  
Ivan S. Tsepordey ◽  
...  

Abstract Climate change, especially modified courses of temperature and precipitation, has a significant impact on forest functioning and productivity. Moreover, some alterations in tree biomass allocation (e.g. root to shoot ratio, foliage to wood parts) might be expected in these changing ecological conditions. Therefore, we attempted to model fir stand biomass (t ha−1) along the trans-Eurasian hydrothermal gradients using the data from 272 forest stands. The model outputs suggested that all biomass components, except for the crown mass, change in a common pattern, but in different ratios. Specifically, in the range of mean January temperature and precipitation of −30°C to +10°C and 300 to 900 mm, fir stand biomass increases with both increasing temperature and precipitation. Under an assumed increase of January temperature by 1°C, biomass of roots and of all components of the aboveground biomass of fir stands increased (under the assumption that the precipitation level did not change). Similarly, an assumed increase in precipitation by 100 mm resulted in the increased biomass of roots and of all aboveground components. We conclude that fir seems to be a perspective taxon from the point of its productive properties in the ongoing process of climate change.


2019 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 73 ◽  
Author(s):  
Juan Torres-Batlló ◽  
Belén Martí-Cardona ◽  
Ramiro Pillco-Zolá

Lake Poopó is located in the Andean Mountain Range Plateau or Altiplano. A general decline in the lake water level has been observed in the last two decades, coinciding roughly with an intensification of agriculture exploitation, such as quinoa crops. Several factors have been linked with the shrinkage of the lake, including climate change, increased irrigation, mining extraction and population growth. Being an endorheic catchment, evapotranspiration (ET) losses are expected to be the main water output mechanism and previous studies demonstrated ET increases using Earth observation (EO) data. In this study, we seek to build upon these earlier findings by analyzing an ET time series dataset of higher spatial and temporal resolution, in conjunction with land cover and precipitation data. More specifically, we performed a spatio-temporal analysis, focusing on wet and dry periods, that showed that ET changes occur primarily in the wet period, while the dry period is approximately stationary. An analysis of vegetation trends performed using 500 MODIS vegetation index products (NDVI) also showed an overall increasing trend during the wet period. Analysis of NDVI and ET across land cover types showed that only croplands had experienced an increase in NDVI and ET losses, while natural covers showed either constant or decreasing NDVI trends together with increases in ET. The larger increase in vegetation and ET losses over agricultural regions, strongly suggests that cropping practices exacerbated water losses in these areas. This quantification provides essential information for the sustainable planning of water resources and land uses in the catchment. Finally, we examined the spatio-temporal trends of the precipitation using the newly available Climate Hazards Group Infrared Precipitation with Stations (CHIRPS-v2) product, which we validated with onsite rainfall measurements. When integrated over the entire catchment, precipitation and ET showed an average increasing trend of 5.2 mm yr−1 and 4.3 mm yr−1, respectively. This result suggests that, despite the increased ET losses, the catchment-wide water storage should have been offset by the higher precipitation. However, this result is only applicable to the catchment-wide water balance, and the location of water may have been altered (e.g., by river abstractions or by the creation of impoundments) to the detriment of the Lake Poopó downstream.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sunil Subba ◽  
Yaoming Ma ◽  
Weiqiang Ma

<p>In recent days there have been discussions regarding the impact of climate change and its vagaries of the weather, particularly concerning extreme events. Nepal, being a mountainous country, is more susceptible to precipitation extreme events and related hazards, which hinder the socioeconomic<br>development of the nation. In this regard, this study aimed to address this phenomenon for one of the most naturally and socioeconomically important regions of Nepal, namely, Eastern Nepal. The data were collected for the period of 1997 to 2016. The interdecadal comparison for two periods<br>(1997–2006 and 2007–2016) was maintained for the calculation of extreme precipitation indices as per recommended by Expert Team on Climate Change Detection and Indices. Linear trends were calculated by using Mann‐Kendall and Sen's Slope estimator. The average annual precipitation was found to be decreasing at an alarming rate of −20 mm/year in the last two decades' tenure. In case of extreme precipitation events, consecutive dry days, one of the frequency indices, showed a solo increase in its trend (mostly significant). Meanwhile, all the intensity indices of extreme precipitation showed decreasing trends (mostly insignificant). Thus, it can be concluded that Eastern Nepal has witnessed some significant drier days in the last two decades, as the events of heavy, very heavy, extremely heavy precipitation events, and annual wet day precipitation (PRCPTOT) were found to be decreasing. The same phenomena were also seen in the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission 3B42 V7 satellite precipitation product for whole Nepal.</p>


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Quarban Aliyar ◽  
Santosh Dhungana ◽  
Sangam Shrestha

Abstract The civil war, harsh climate, tough topography and lack of accurate meteorological stations has limited observed data across Afghanistan. In order to fulfill the gap, this study analyzed the trend in precipitation and its extremes using Asian Precipitation Highly Resolved Observational Data Integration Towards Evaluation (APHRODITE) daily dataset between 1951 to 2010 at the spatial resolution of 0.25˚˟0.25˚. Non-parametric modified Mann-Kendall test and Sen’s slope estimator were employed to detect trend and quantify it at the significance level of 5%. Significant decreasing trends were observed only in small clusters of southwestern regions ranging between 0 to -1.5mm/year and northeastern region between -1.5 to -6 mm/year for the annual time series. Similar trend pattern was observed in spring season decreasing at the rate of -0.15 to 0.54 mm/year in northeastern and 0 to -0.15 mm/year southwestern region. Decrease in spring precipitation is expected to affect crop production especially in northeastern region which host 22 % of the arable area. Increasing trend in eastern region at maximum of 0.16 mm/year was observed which could intensify the flooding events. Trend analysis of extreme precipitation indices indicated similar spatial distribution to the mean precipitation, concentrated around southwestern, northeastern, and eastern regions. Increasing frequency of consecutive dry days in western region and very heavy precipitation (R10mm) and extremely heavy precipitation (R20mm) in eastern region are fueling the occurrence of droughts and floods respectively. Taking these findings of erratic nature of rainfall and extreme events into consideration for sustainable management of water resources would be fruitful.


2019 ◽  
Vol 08 (02) ◽  
pp. 237-262
Author(s):  
Manirakiza Célestin ◽  
Lawin Agnidé Emmanuel ◽  
Lamboni Batablinlè ◽  
Niyongendako Marc

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
José Ignacio Nazif-Munoz ◽  
Pablo Martínez ◽  
Augusta Williams ◽  
John Spengler

Abstract Background There remains a dearth of cross-city comparisons on the impact of climate change through extreme temperature and precipitation events on road safety. We examined trends in traffic fatalities, injuries and property damage associated with high temperatures and heavy rains in Boston (USA) and Santo Domingo (Dominican Republic). Methods Official publicly available data on daily traffic outcomes and weather conditions during the warm season (May to September) were used for Boston (2002–2015) and Santo Domingo (2013–2017). Daily maximum temperatures and mean precipitations for each city were considered for classifying hot days, warm days, and warm nights, and wet, very wet, and extremely wet days. Time-series analyses were used to assess the relationship between temperature and precipitation and daily traffic outcomes, using a quasi-Poisson regression. Results In Santo Domingo, the presence of a warm night increased traffic fatalities with a rate ratio (RR) of 1.31 (95% CI [confidence interval]: 1.00,1.71). In Boston, precipitation factors (particularly, extremely wet days) were associated with increments in traffic injuries (RR 1.25, 95% CI: 1.18, 1.32) and property damages (RR 1.42, 95% CI: 1.33, 1.51). Conclusion During the warm season, mixed associations between weather conditions and traffic outcomes were found across Santo Domingo and Boston. In Boston, increases in heavy precipitation events were associated with higher traffic injuries and property damage. As climate change-related heavy precipitation events are projected to increase in the USA, the associations found in this study should be of interest for road safety planning in a rapidly changing environment.


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