Climate change impacts on extreme events in the United States: an uncertainty analysis
This article is part of a Special Issue on “A Multi-Model Framework to Achieve Consistent Evaluation of Climate Change Impacts in the United States” edited by Jeremy Martinich, John Reilly, Stephanie Waldhoff, Marcus Sarofim, and James McFarland.
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Springer-Verlag
2016
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| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/103182 https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5533-6570 |
| _version_ | 1811077876640907264 |
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| author | Monier, Erwan Gao, Xiang |
| author2 | Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Center for Global Change Science |
| author_facet | Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Center for Global Change Science Monier, Erwan Gao, Xiang |
| author_sort | Monier, Erwan |
| collection | MIT |
| description | This article is part of a Special Issue on “A Multi-Model Framework to Achieve Consistent Evaluation of Climate Change Impacts in the United States” edited by Jeremy Martinich, John Reilly, Stephanie Waldhoff, Marcus Sarofim, and James McFarland. |
| first_indexed | 2024-09-23T10:49:41Z |
| format | Article |
| id | mit-1721.1/103182 |
| institution | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-09-23T10:49:41Z |
| publishDate | 2016 |
| publisher | Springer-Verlag |
| record_format | dspace |
| spelling | mit-1721.1/1031822022-09-27T15:18:58Z Climate change impacts on extreme events in the United States: an uncertainty analysis Monier, Erwan Gao, Xiang Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Center for Global Change Science Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Joint Program on the Science & Policy of Global Change Monier, Erwan Gao, Xiang This article is part of a Special Issue on “A Multi-Model Framework to Achieve Consistent Evaluation of Climate Change Impacts in the United States” edited by Jeremy Martinich, John Reilly, Stephanie Waldhoff, Marcus Sarofim, and James McFarland. In this study, we analyze changes in extreme temperature and precipitation over the US in a 60-member ensemble simulation of the 21st century with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Integrated Global System Model–Community Atmosphere Model (IGSM-CAM). Four values of climate sensitivity, three emissions scenarios and five initial conditions are considered. The results show a general intensification and an increase in the frequency of extreme hot temperatures and extreme precipitation events over most of the US. Extreme cold temperatures are projected to decrease in intensity and frequency, especially over the northern parts of the US. This study displays a wide range of future changes in extreme events in the US, even simulated by a single climate model. Results clearly show that the choice of policy is the largest source of uncertainty in the magnitude of the changes. The impact of the climate sensitivity is largest for the unconstrained emissions scenario and the implementation of a stabilization scenario drastically reduces the changes in extremes, even for the highest climate sensitivity considered. Finally, simulations with different initial conditions show conspicuously different patterns and magnitudes of changes in extreme events, underlining the role of natural variability in projections of changes in extreme events. United States. Environmental Protection Agency. Climate Change Division (Cooperative Agreement #XA-83600001) National Science Foundation (U.S.) (Macrosystems Biology Program Grant #EF1137306) 2016-06-21T22:31:39Z 2016-06-21T22:31:39Z 2014-02 2013-01 2016-05-23T09:36:03Z Article http://purl.org/eprint/type/JournalArticle 0165-0009 1573-1480 http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/103182 Monier, Erwan, and Xiang Gao. "Climate change impacts on extreme events in the United States: an uncertainty analysis." Climatic Change (July 2015) 131:1, pp.67-81. https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5533-6570 en http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10584-013-1048-1 Climatic Change Creative Commons Attribution http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ The Author(s) application/pdf Springer-Verlag Springer Netherlands |
| spellingShingle | Monier, Erwan Gao, Xiang Climate change impacts on extreme events in the United States: an uncertainty analysis |
| title | Climate change impacts on extreme events in the United States: an uncertainty analysis |
| title_full | Climate change impacts on extreme events in the United States: an uncertainty analysis |
| title_fullStr | Climate change impacts on extreme events in the United States: an uncertainty analysis |
| title_full_unstemmed | Climate change impacts on extreme events in the United States: an uncertainty analysis |
| title_short | Climate change impacts on extreme events in the United States: an uncertainty analysis |
| title_sort | climate change impacts on extreme events in the united states an uncertainty analysis |
| url | http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/103182 https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5533-6570 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT moniererwan climatechangeimpactsonextremeeventsintheunitedstatesanuncertaintyanalysis AT gaoxiang climatechangeimpactsonextremeeventsintheunitedstatesanuncertaintyanalysis |