scholarly journals Monitoring and Predicting Drought Based on Multiple Indicators in an Arid Area, China

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (14) ◽  
pp. 2298
Author(s):  
Yunqian Wang ◽  
Jing Yang ◽  
Yaning Chen ◽  
Zhicheng Su ◽  
Baofu Li ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Lead Time ◽  
Standardized Precipitation Index ◽  
Arid Area ◽  
Lead Times ◽  
Moisture Index ◽  
Predictive Skill ◽  
Drought Prediction ◽  
Spatial Coverage ◽  
Soil Moisture Index ◽  
The Standardized Precipitation Index

Droughts are one of the costliest natural disasters. Reliable drought monitoring and prediction are valuable for drought relief management. This study monitors and predicts droughts in Xinjiang, an arid area in China, based on the three drought indicators, i.e., the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI), the Standardized Soil Moisture Index (SSMI) and the Multivariate Standardized Drought Index (MSDI). Results indicate that although these three indicators could capture severe historical drought events in the study area, the spatial coverage, persistence and severity of the droughts would vary regarding different indicators. The MSDI could best describe the overall drought conditions by incorporating the characteristics of the SPI and SSMI. For the drought prediction, the predictive skill of all indicators gradually decayed with the increasing lead time. Specifically, the SPI only showed the predictive skill at a 1-month lead time, the MSDI performed best in capturing droughts at 1- to 2-month lead times and the SSMI was accurate up to a 3-month lead time owing to its high persistence. These findings might provide scientific support for the local drought management.

scholarly journals Global meteorological drought – Part 2: Seasonal forecasts

2014 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 919-944 ◽  
Author(s):  
E. Dutra ◽  
W. Pozzi ◽  
F. Wetterhall ◽  
F. Di Giuseppe ◽  
L. Magnusson ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Lead Time ◽  
Initial Conditions ◽  
Standardized Precipitation Index ◽  
Meteorological Drought ◽  
Added Value ◽  
Lead Times ◽  
Seasonal Forecasts ◽  
Ensemble Forecasts ◽  
The World ◽  
The Standardized Precipitation Index

Abstract. Global seasonal forecasts of meteorological drought using the standardized precipitation index (SPI) are produced using two datasets as initial conditions: the Global Precipitation Climatology Center (GPCC) and the ECMWF ERA-Interim reanalysis (ERAI); and two seasonal forecasts of precipitation: the most current ECMWF seasonal forecast system and climatologically based ensemble forecasts. The forecast skill is concentrated on verification months where precipitation deficits are likely to have higher drought impacts and grouped over different regions in the world. Verification of the forecasts as a function of lead time revealed a reduced impact on skill for: (i) long lead times using different initial conditions, and (ii) short lead times using different precipitation forecasts. The memory effect of initial conditions was found to be 1 month lead time for the SPI-3, 3 to 4 months for the SPI-6 and 5 months for the SPI-12. Results show that dynamical forecasts of precipitation provide added value, a skill similar or better than climatological forecasts. In some cases, particularly for long SPI time scales, it is very difficult to improve on the use of climatological forecasts. Our results also support recent questions whether seasonal forecasting of global drought onset was essentially a stochastic forecasting problem. Results are presented regionally and globally, and our results point to several regions in the world where drought onset forecasting is feasible and skilful.

scholarly journals Seasonal forecasts of droughts in African basins using the Standardized Precipitation Index

2013 ◽  
Vol 17 (6) ◽  
pp. 2359-2373 ◽  
Author(s):  
E. Dutra ◽  
F. Di Giuseppe ◽  
F. Wetterhall ◽  
F. Pappenberger
Keyword(s):  
Real Time ◽  
Lead Time ◽  
Standardized Precipitation Index ◽  
Precipitation Index ◽  
Seasonal Forecasting ◽  
Monthly Precipitation ◽  
Seasonal Forecasts ◽  
Blue Nile ◽  
Forecasting System ◽  
The Standardized Precipitation Index

Abstract. Vast parts of Africa rely on the rainy season for livestock and agriculture. Droughts can have a severe impact in these areas, which often have a very low resilience and limited capabilities to mitigate drought impacts. This paper assesses the predictive capabilities of an integrated drought monitoring and seasonal forecasting system (up to 5 months lead time) based on the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI). The system is constructed by extending near-real-time monthly precipitation fields (ECMWF ERA-Interim reanalysis and the Climate Anomaly Monitoring System–Outgoing Longwave Radiation Precipitation Index, CAMS-OPI) with monthly forecasted fields as provided by the ECMWF seasonal forecasting system. The forecasts were then evaluated over four basins in Africa: the Blue Nile, Limpopo, Upper Niger, and Upper Zambezi. There are significant differences in the quality of the precipitation between the datasets depending on the catchments, and a general statement regarding the best product is difficult to make. The generally low number of rain gauges and their decrease in the recent years limits the verification and monitoring of droughts in the different basins, reinforcing the need for a strong investment on climate monitoring. All the datasets show similar spatial and temporal patterns in southern and north-western Africa, while there is a low correlation in the equatorial area, which makes it difficult to define ground truth and choose an adequate product for monitoring. The seasonal forecasts have a higher reliability and skill in the Blue Nile, Limpopo and Upper Niger in comparison with the Zambezi. This skill and reliability depend strongly on the SPI timescale, and longer timescales have more skill. The ECMWF seasonal forecasts have predictive skill which is higher than using climatology for most regions. In regions where no reliable near-real-time data is available, the seasonal forecast can be used for monitoring (first month of forecast). Furthermore, poor-quality precipitation monitoring products can reduce the potential skill of SPI seasonal forecasts in 2 to 4 months lead time.

scholarly journals Relationship between Rainfall Variability and the Predictability of Radar Rainfall Nowcasting Models

Atmosphere ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (8) ◽  
pp. 458 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zhenzhen Liu ◽  
Qiang Dai ◽  
Lu Zhuo
Keyword(s):  
Lead Time ◽  
Rainfall Variability ◽  
Ensemble Prediction ◽  
Lead Times ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Radar Rainfall ◽  
Ensemble Prediction System ◽  
Predictive Skill ◽  
Many Sources

Radar rainfall nowcasts are subject to many sources of uncertainty and these uncertainties change with the characteristics of a storm. The predictive skill of a radar rainfall nowcasting model can be difficult to understand as sometimes it appears to be perfect but at other times it is highly inaccurate. This hinders the decision making required for the early warning of natural hazards caused by rainfall. In this study we define radar spatial and temporal rainfall variability and relate them to the predictive skill of a nowcasting model. The short-term ensemble prediction system model is configured to predict 731 events with lead times of one, two, and three hours. The nowcasting skill is expressed in terms of six well-known indicators. The results show that the quality of radar rainfall nowcasts increases with the rainfall autocorrelation and decreases with the rainfall variability coefficient. The uncertainty of radar rainfall nowcasts also shows a positive connection with rainfall variability. In addition, the spatial variability is more important than the temporal variability. Based on these results, we recommend that the lead time for radar rainfall nowcasting models should change depending on the storm and that it should be determined according to the rainfall variability. Such measures could improve trust in the rainfall nowcast products that are used for hydrological and meteorological applications.

scholarly journals Assessment of spatiotemporal characteristics of agro-meteorological drought events based on comparing Standardized Soil Moisture Index, Standardized Precipitation Index and Multivariate Standardized Drought Index

2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (S1) ◽  
pp. 1-17 ◽  
Author(s):  
Muhammad Imran Khan ◽  
Xingye Zhu ◽  
Muhammad Arshad ◽  
Muhammad Zaman ◽  
Yasir Niaz ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Soil Moisture ◽  
Drought Index ◽  
Standardized Precipitation Index ◽  
Precipitation Index ◽  
Drought Indices ◽  
Moisture Index ◽  
Drought Characteristics ◽  
Soil Moisture Index ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Standardized Drought Index

Abstract Drought indices that compute drought events by their statistical properties are essential stratagems for the estimation of the impact of drought events on a region. This research presents a quantitative investigation of drought events by analyzing drought characteristics, considering agro-meteorological aspects in the Heilongjiang Province of China during 1980 to 2015. To examine these aspects, the Standardized Soil Moisture Index (SSI), Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI), and Multivariate Standardized Drought Index (MSDI) were used to evaluate the drought characteristics. The results showed that almost half of the extreme and exceptional drought events occurred during 1990–92 and 2004–05. The spatiotemporal analysis of drought characteristics assisted in the estimation of the annual drought frequency (ADF, 1.20–2.70), long-term mean drought duration (MDD, 5–11 months), mean drought severity (MDS, −0.9 to −2.9), and mild conditions of mean drought intensity (MDI, −0.2 to −0.80) over the study area. The results obtained by MSDI reveal the drought onset and termination based on the combination of SPI and SSI, with onset being dominated by SPI and drought persistence being more similar to SSI behavior. The results of this study provide valuable information and can prove to be a reference framework to guide agricultural production in the region.

scholarly journals Global meteorological drought – Part 2: Seasonal forecasts

2014 ◽  
Vol 18 (7) ◽  
pp. 2669-2678 ◽  
Author(s):  
E. Dutra ◽  
W. Pozzi ◽  
F. Wetterhall ◽  
F. Di Giuseppe ◽  
L. Magnusson ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Lead Time ◽  
Initial Conditions ◽  
Standardized Precipitation Index ◽  
Meteorological Drought ◽  
Added Value ◽  
Lead Times ◽  
Seasonal Forecasts ◽  
Ensemble Forecasts ◽  
Global Precipitation Climatology Centre ◽  
The World

Abstract. Global seasonal forecasts of meteorological drought using the standardized precipitation index (SPI) are produced using two data sets as initial conditions: the Global Precipitation Climatology Centre (GPCC) and the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) ERA-Interim reanalysis (ERAI); and two seasonal forecasts of precipitation, the most recent ECMWF seasonal forecast system and climatologically based ensemble forecasts. The forecast evaluation focuses on the periods where precipitation deficits are likely to have higher drought impacts, and the results were summarized over different regions in the world. The verification of the forecasts with lead time indicated that generally for all regions the least reduction on skill was found for (i) long lead times using ERAI or GPCC for monitoring and (ii) short lead times using ECMWF or climatological seasonal forecasts. The memory effect of initial conditions was found to be 1 month of lead time for the SPI-3, 4 months for the SPI-6 and 6 (or more) months for the SPI-12. Results show that dynamical forecasts of precipitation provide added value with skills at least equal to and often above that of climatological forecasts. Furthermore, it is very difficult to improve on the use of climatological forecasts for long lead times. Our results also support recent questions of whether seasonal forecasting of global drought onset was essentially a stochastic forecasting problem. Results are presented regionally and globally, and our results point to several regions in the world where drought onset forecasting is feasible and skilful.

scholarly journals Applying machine learning for drought prediction using data from a large ensemble of climate simulations

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elizaveta Felsche ◽  
Ralf Ludwig
Keyword(s):  
Machine Learning ◽  
Lead Time ◽  
Climate Model ◽  
Regional Climate ◽  
Standardized Precipitation Index ◽  
Machine Learning Algorithms ◽  
Large Ensemble ◽  
The North ◽  
Soil Variables ◽  
Drought Prediction

Abstract. There is strong scientific and social interest to understand the factors leading to extreme events in order to improve the management of risks associated with hazards like droughts. In this study, artificial neural networks are applied to predict the occurrence of a drought in two contrasting European domains, Munich and Lisbon, with a lead time of one month. The approach takes into account a list of 30 atmospheric and soil variables as input parameters from a single-model initial condition large ensemble (CRCM5-LE). The data was produced the context of the ClimEx project by Ouranos with the Canadian Regional Climate Model (CRCM5) driven by 50 members of the Canadian Earth System Model (CanESM2). Drought occurrence was defined using the Standardized Precipitation Index. The best performing machine learning algorithms managed to obtain a correct classification of drought or no drought for a lead time of one month for around 55–60 % of the events of each class for both domains. Explainable AI methods like SHapley Additive exPlanations (SHAP) were applied to gain a better understanding of the trained algorithms. Variables like the North Atlantic Oscillation Index and air pressure one month before the event proved to be of high importance for the prediction. The study showed that seasonality has a high influence on goodness of drought prediction, especially for the Lisbon domain.

scholarly journals Drought monitoring and prediction using SPI, SPEI, and random forest model in various climates of Iran

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Morteza Lotfirad ◽  
Hassan Esmaeili-Gisavandani ◽  
Arash Adib
Keyword(s):  
Random Forest ◽  
Correlation Coefficient ◽  
Potential Evapotranspiration ◽  
Standardized Precipitation Index ◽  
Monthly Precipitation ◽  
Model Combination ◽  
The North ◽  
Drought Prediction ◽  
Lag Times ◽  
The Standardized Precipitation Index

Abstract The aim of this study is to select the best model (combination of different lag times) for predicting the standardized precipitation index (SPI) and the standardized precipitation and evapotranspiration index (SPEI) in next time. Monthly precipitation and temperature data from 1960 to 2019 were used. In temperate climates, such as the north of Iran, the correlation coefficient of SPI and SPEI was 0.94, 0.95, and 0.81 at the time scales of 3, 12, and 48 months, respectively. Besides, this correlation coefficient was 0.47, 0.35, and 0.44 in arid and hot climates, such as the southwest of Iran because potential evapotranspiration (PET) depends on temperature more than rainfall. Drought was predicted using the random forest (RF) model and applying 1–12 months lag times for next time. By increasing of time scale, the prediction accuracy of SPI and SPEI will improve. The ability of SPEI is more than SPI for drought prediction, because the overall accuracy (OA) of prediction will increase, and the errors (i.e., overestimate (OE) and underestimate (UE)) will reduce. It is recommended for future studies (1) using wavelet analysis for improving accuracy of predictions and (2) using the Penman–Monteith method if ground-based data are available.

Comparison of wavelet and machine learning methods for regional drought prediction

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gilbert Hinge ◽  
Ashutosh Sharma
Keyword(s):  
Machine Learning ◽  
Lead Time ◽  
Early Warning Systems ◽  
Support Vector ◽  
Lead Times ◽  
Model Parameters ◽  
Coupled Models ◽  
Drought Prediction ◽  
Forecasting Performance ◽  
Grid Points

<p>Droughts are considered as one of the most catastrophic natural disasters that affect humans and their surroundings at a larger spatial scale compared to other disasters. Rajasthan, one of India's semiarid states, is drought inclined and has experienced many drought events in the past. In this study, we evaluated different preprocessing and Machine Learning (ML) approaches for drought predictions in Rajasthan for a lead-time of up to 6 months. The Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) was used as the drought quantifying measure to identify the drought events. SPI was calculated for 3, 6, and 12-month timescales over the last 115-year using monthly rainfall data at 119 grid stations.  ML techniques, namely Artificial Neural Network (ANN), Support Vector Regression (SVR), and Linear Regression (LR), were used to evaluate their accuracy in drought forecasting over different lead times. Furthermore, two data processing methods, namely the Wavelet Packet Transform (WPT) and Discrete Wavelet Transform (DWT), have also been used to enhance the aforementioned ML models' predictability. At the outset, the preprocessed SPI data from both the methods were used as inputs for LR, SVR, and ANN to form a hybrid model. The hybrid models' drought predictability for a different lead-time was evaluated and compared with the standalone ML models. The forecasting performance of all the models for all 119 grid points was assessed with three statistical indices: Mean Absolute Error (MAE), Root Mean Square Error (RMSE), and Nash-Sutcliffe Efficiency (NSE). RMSE was used to select the optimal model parameters, such as the number of hidden neurons and the number of inputs in ANN, and the level of decomposition and mother wavelet in wavelet analysis.  Based on these measures, the coupled model showed better forecasting performance than the standalone ML models. The coupled WPT-ANN model shows superior predictability for most of the grid points than other coupled models and standalone models.  All models' performance improved as the timescale increased from 3 to 12 months for all the lead times. However, the model performance decreased as the lead time increased.  These findings indicate the necessity of processing the data before the application of any machine learning technique. The hybrid model's prediction performance also shows that it can be used for drought early warning systems in the state.</p>

Exploring winter predictability in Europe using the ECMWF hindcasts

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniele Mastrangelo ◽  
Ignazio Giuntoli ◽  
Piero Malguzzi
Keyword(s):  
Lead Time ◽  
High Impact ◽  
Temperature Fields ◽  
Lead Times ◽  
Economic Sectors ◽  
Ensemble Forecasts ◽  
Modes Of Variability ◽  
Predictive Skill ◽  
Extended Range ◽  
Impact Events

<p>The accuracy and reliability in predicting winter anomalies, particularly high-impact events, is crucial for economic sectors like energy production and trade. Sub-seasonal predictions can provide a useful tool for early detection of these events. In this context, this study aims to target atmospheric patterns leading to skillful winter predictions at S2S lead times.</p><p>With a focus on Europe, we explore extended range predictability (up to 35 days) in the ECMWF hindcast dataset (1999-2018). This dataset provides a sizable sample for assessing the winter months predictive skill of the model and can be considered as a preparatory step to the use of the more comprehensive real-time ensemble forecasts.</p><p>The verification is performed on geopotential and temperature fields against the ERA5 reanalysis. We first identify the most skillful predictions both in terms of lead-time and period of initialization. Later we assess whether these skillful predictions correspond to high-impact events, especially cold spells. Finally, in the attempt to identify the potential drivers of improved predictability, we track back to the dominant Euro-Atlantic modes of variability present in the initial atmospheric states of the well predicted events.</p>

scholarly journals Drought forecasting using new machine learning methods / Prognozowanie suszy z wykorzystaniem automatycznych samouczących się metod

2013 ◽  
Vol 18 (9) ◽  
pp. 3-12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anteneh Belayneh ◽  
Jan Adamowski
Keyword(s):  
Machine Learning ◽  
River Basin ◽  
Standardized Precipitation Index ◽  
Machine Learning Techniques ◽  
Support Vector ◽  
Lead Times ◽  
Drought Forecasting ◽  
Awash River Basin ◽  
Ann Models ◽  
The Standardized Precipitation Index

Abstract In order to have effective agricultural production the impacts of drought must be mitigated. An important aspect of mitigating the impacts of drought is an effective method of forecasting future drought events. In this study, three methods of forecasting short-term drought for short lead times are explored in the Awash River Basin of Ethiopia. The Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) was the drought index chosen to represent drought in the basin. The following machine learning techniques were explored in this study: artificial neural networks (ANNs), support vector regression (SVR), and coupled wavelet-ANNs, which pre-process input data using wavelet analysis (WA). The forecast results of all three methods were compared using two performance measures (RMSE and R2). The forecast results of this study indicate that the coupled wavelet neural network (WA-ANN) models were the most accurate models for forecasting SPI 3 (3-month SPI) and SPI 6 (6-month SPI) values over lead times of 1 and 3 months in the Awash River Basin in Ethiopia.

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