Diverging hydrological drought traits over Europe with global warming
<p>Climate change is anticipated to alter the demand and supply of water at the earth's surface. Since many societal impacts from a lack of water happen under drought conditions, it is important to understand how droughts may develop with climate change. This study shows how hydrological...
| Main Authors: | , , , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Copernicus Publications
2020-12-01
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| Series: | Hydrology and Earth System Sciences |
| Online Access: | https://hess.copernicus.org/articles/24/5919/2020/hess-24-5919-2020.pdf |
| Summary: | <p>Climate change is anticipated to alter the demand and supply of water at the earth's surface. Since many societal impacts from a lack of water
happen under drought conditions, it is important to understand how droughts may develop with climate change. This study shows how hydrological
droughts will change across Europe with increasing global warming levels (GWLs of 1.5, 2, and 3 <span class="inline-formula">K</span> above pre-industrial temperature). We
employed a low-flow analysis based on river discharge simulations of the LISFLOOD (De Roo et al., 2000) spatially distributed physically based hydrological and water use
model, which was forced with a large ensemble of regional climate model projections under high emissions (RCP8.5) and moderate mitigation (RCP4.5)
Representative Concentration Pathways. Different traits of drought, including severity, duration, and frequency, were investigated using the threshold level method. The projected
changes in these traits identify four main sub-regions in Europe that are characterized by somehow homogeneous and distinct behaviours with a clear
south-west–north-east contrast. The Mediterranean and Boreal sub-regions (defined in Sect. <a href="#Ch1.S3.SS1.SSS1">3.1.1</a>) of Europe show strong but opposite changes at all three GWLs, with the
former area mostly characterized by stronger droughts (with larger differences at 3 <span class="inline-formula">K</span>), while the latter is expected to experience a
reduction in all drought traits. In the Atlantic and Continental sub-regions, the changes are expected to be less marked and characterized by a
larger uncertainty, especially at the 1.5 and 2 <span class="inline-formula">K</span> GWLs. Combining the projections in drought hazard with population and agricultural
information shows that with 3 <span class="inline-formula">K</span> global warming an additional 11 <span class="inline-formula">million</span> people and 4.5 <span class="inline-formula">×10<sup>6</sup></span><span class="inline-formula"> ha</span> of agricultural land are
projected to be exposed to droughts every year, on average, with the most affected areas located in the Mediterranean and Atlantic regions of
Europe.</p> |
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| ISSN: | 1027-5606 1607-7938 |