Twenty-First-Century Changes in U.S. Regional Heavy Precipitation Frequency Based on Resolved Atmospheric Patterns
Precipitation-gauge observations and atmospheric reanalysis are combined to develop an analogue method for detecting heavy precipitation events based on prevailing large-scale atmospheric conditions. Combinations of atmospheric variables for circulation (geopotential height and wind vector) and mois...
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| Format: | Article |
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American Meteorological Society
2017
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| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/112933 https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1748-0816 https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5533-6570 https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8362-4761 |
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| author | Gao, Xiang Schlosser, Courtney Adam O'Gorman, Paul Monier, Erwan Entekhabi, Dara |
| author2 | Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Center for Global Change Science |
| author_facet | Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Center for Global Change Science Gao, Xiang Schlosser, Courtney Adam O'Gorman, Paul Monier, Erwan Entekhabi, Dara |
| author_sort | Gao, Xiang |
| collection | MIT |
| description | Precipitation-gauge observations and atmospheric reanalysis are combined to develop an analogue method for detecting heavy precipitation events based on prevailing large-scale atmospheric conditions. Combinations of atmospheric variables for circulation (geopotential height and wind vector) and moisture (surface specific humidity, column and up to 500-hPa precipitable water) are examined to construct analogue schemes for the winter [December-February (DJF)] of the "Pacific Coast California" (PCCA) region and the summer [June-August (JJA)] of the Midwestern United States (MWST). The detection diagnostics of analogue schemes are calibrated with 1979-2005 and validated with 2006-14 NASA Modern-Era Retrospective Analysis for Research and Applications (MERRA). All analogue schemes are found to significantly improve upon MERRA precipitation in characterizing the occurrence and interannual variations of observed heavy precipitation events in the MWST. When evaluated with the late twentieth-century climate model simulations from phase 5 of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP5), all analogue schemes produce model medians of heavy precipitation frequency that are more consistent with observations and have smaller intermodel discrepancies than model-based precipitation. Under the representative concentration pathways (RCP) 4.5 and 8.5 scenarios, the CMIP5-based analogue schemes produce trends in heavy precipitation occurrence through the twenty-first century that are consistent with model-based precipitation, but with smaller intermodel disparity. The median trends in heavy precipitation frequency are positive for DJF over PCCA but are slightly negative for JJA over MWST. Overall, the analyses highlight the potential of the analogue as a powerful diagnostic tool for model deficiencies and its complementarity to an evaluation of heavy precipitation frequency based on model precipitation alone. |
| first_indexed | 2024-09-23T15:17:09Z |
| format | Article |
| id | mit-1721.1/112933 |
| institution | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| last_indexed | 2024-09-23T15:17:09Z |
| publishDate | 2017 |
| publisher | American Meteorological Society |
| record_format | dspace |
| spelling | mit-1721.1/1129332022-09-29T13:54:53Z Twenty-First-Century Changes in U.S. Regional Heavy Precipitation Frequency Based on Resolved Atmospheric Patterns Gao, Xiang Schlosser, Courtney Adam O'Gorman, Paul Monier, Erwan Entekhabi, Dara Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Center for Global Change Science Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences Gao, Xiang Schlosser, Courtney Adam O'Gorman, Paul Monier, Erwan Entekhabi, Dara Precipitation-gauge observations and atmospheric reanalysis are combined to develop an analogue method for detecting heavy precipitation events based on prevailing large-scale atmospheric conditions. Combinations of atmospheric variables for circulation (geopotential height and wind vector) and moisture (surface specific humidity, column and up to 500-hPa precipitable water) are examined to construct analogue schemes for the winter [December-February (DJF)] of the "Pacific Coast California" (PCCA) region and the summer [June-August (JJA)] of the Midwestern United States (MWST). The detection diagnostics of analogue schemes are calibrated with 1979-2005 and validated with 2006-14 NASA Modern-Era Retrospective Analysis for Research and Applications (MERRA). All analogue schemes are found to significantly improve upon MERRA precipitation in characterizing the occurrence and interannual variations of observed heavy precipitation events in the MWST. When evaluated with the late twentieth-century climate model simulations from phase 5 of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP5), all analogue schemes produce model medians of heavy precipitation frequency that are more consistent with observations and have smaller intermodel discrepancies than model-based precipitation. Under the representative concentration pathways (RCP) 4.5 and 8.5 scenarios, the CMIP5-based analogue schemes produce trends in heavy precipitation occurrence through the twenty-first century that are consistent with model-based precipitation, but with smaller intermodel disparity. The median trends in heavy precipitation frequency are positive for DJF over PCCA but are slightly negative for JJA over MWST. Overall, the analyses highlight the potential of the analogue as a powerful diagnostic tool for model deficiencies and its complementarity to an evaluation of heavy precipitation frequency based on model precipitation alone. National Science Foundation (U.S.) (MacroSystems Biology Program Grant NSF-AES EF#1137306) United States. Department of Energy (Integrated Framework for Climate Change Assessment DE-FG02-94ER61937) National Science Foundation (U.S.) (NSF-AGS-1552195) United States. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (Energy and Water Cycle Study Research Announcement NNH07ZDA001N) 2017-12-22T16:17:21Z 2017-12-22T16:17:21Z 2017-03 2016-06 2017-12-22T13:26:57Z Article http://purl.org/eprint/type/JournalArticle 0894-8755 1520-0442 http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/112933 Gao, Xiang, et al. “Twenty-First-Century Changes in U.S. Regional Heavy Precipitation Frequency Based on Resolved Atmospheric Patterns.” Journal of Climate, vol. 30, no. 7, Apr. 2017, pp. 2501–21. © 2017 American Meteorological Society. https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1748-0816 https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5533-6570 https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8362-4761 http://dx.doi.org/10.1175/JCLI-D-16-0544.1 Journal of Climate Article is made available in accordance with the publisher's policy and may be subject to US copyright law. Please refer to the publisher's site for terms of use. application/pdf American Meteorological Society American Meteorological Society |
| spellingShingle | Gao, Xiang Schlosser, Courtney Adam O'Gorman, Paul Monier, Erwan Entekhabi, Dara Twenty-First-Century Changes in U.S. Regional Heavy Precipitation Frequency Based on Resolved Atmospheric Patterns |
| title | Twenty-First-Century Changes in U.S. Regional Heavy Precipitation Frequency Based on Resolved Atmospheric Patterns |
| title_full | Twenty-First-Century Changes in U.S. Regional Heavy Precipitation Frequency Based on Resolved Atmospheric Patterns |
| title_fullStr | Twenty-First-Century Changes in U.S. Regional Heavy Precipitation Frequency Based on Resolved Atmospheric Patterns |
| title_full_unstemmed | Twenty-First-Century Changes in U.S. Regional Heavy Precipitation Frequency Based on Resolved Atmospheric Patterns |
| title_short | Twenty-First-Century Changes in U.S. Regional Heavy Precipitation Frequency Based on Resolved Atmospheric Patterns |
| title_sort | twenty first century changes in u s regional heavy precipitation frequency based on resolved atmospheric patterns |
| url | http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/112933 https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1748-0816 https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5533-6570 https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8362-4761 |
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