Response of precipitation extremes to idealized global warming in an aqua-planet climate model: Towards robust projection across different horizontal resolutions

Li, F; Collins, W D; Wehner, M F; Williamson, D L; Olson, J G

doi:10.1111/j.1600-0870.2011.00543.x

Response of precipitation extremes to idealized global warming in an aqua-planet climate model: Towards robust projection across different horizontal resolutions

Journal Article · Fri Apr 15 04:00:00 EDT 2011 · Tellus. Series A, Dynamic Meteorology and Oceanography

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1600-0870.2011.00543.x· OSTI ID:1039923

Li, F; Collins, W D; Wehner, M F; Williamson, D L; Olson, J G

Current climate models produce quite heterogeneous projections for the responses of precipitation extremes to future climate change. To help understand the range of projections from multimodel ensembles, a series of idealized 'aquaplanet' Atmospheric General Circulation Model (AGCM) runs have been performed with the Community Atmosphere Model CAM3. These runs have been analysed to identify the effects of horizontal resolution on precipitation extreme projections under two simple global warming scenarios. We adopt the aquaplanet framework for our simulations to remove any sensitivity to the spatial resolution of external inputs and to focus on the roles of model physics and dynamics. Results show that a uniform increase of sea surface temperature (SST) and an increase of low-to-high latitude SST gradient both lead to increase of precipitation and precipitation extremes for most latitudes. The perturbed SSTs generally have stronger impacts on precipitation extremes than on mean precipitation. Horizontal model resolution strongly affects the global warming signals in the extreme precipitation in tropical and subtropical regions but not in high latitude regions. This study illustrates that the effects of horizontal resolution have to be taken into account to develop more robust projections of precipitation extremes.

View Journal Article

Research Organization:: Ernest Orlando Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA (US)

Sponsoring Organization:: Earth Sciences Division

DOE Contract Number:: AC02-05CH11231

OSTI ID:: 1039923

Report Number(s):: LBNL-4758E

Journal Information:: Tellus. Series A, Dynamic Meteorology and Oceanography, Journal Name: Tellus. Series A, Dynamic Meteorology and Oceanography Journal Issue: 5 Vol. 63; ISSN 0280-6495; ISSN TSAOD8

Country of Publication:: United States

Language:: English

References (31)

Dynamic and thermodynamic changes in mean and extreme precipitation under changed climate: MEAN AND EXTREME PRECIPITATION CHANGES Emori, S.; Brown, S. J. Geophysical Research Letters, Vol. 32, Issue 17 https://doi.org/10.1029/2005gl023272	journal	September 2005
Scaling of Precipitation Extremes over a Wide Range of Climates Simulated with an Idealized GCM O’Gorman, Paul A.; Schneider, Tapio Journal of Climate, Vol. 22, Issue 21 https://doi.org/10.1175/2009jcli2701.1	journal	November 2009
Detecting trends in tropical rainfall characteristics, 1979–2003 Lau, K. -M.; Wu, H. -T. International Journal of Climatology, Vol. 27, Issue 8 https://doi.org/10.1002/joc.1454	journal	January 2007
Changes in Temperature and Precipitation Extremes in the IPCC Ensemble of Global Coupled Model Simulations Kharin, Viatcheslav V.; Zwiers, Francis W.; Zhang, Xuebin Journal of Climate, Vol. 20, Issue 8 https://doi.org/10.1175/JCLI4066.1	journal	April 2007
Robust Responses of the Hydrological Cycle to Global Warming Held, Isaac M.; Soden, Brian J. Journal of Climate, Vol. 19, Issue 21 https://doi.org/10.1175/JCLI3990.1	journal	November 2006
Scaling of Precipitation Extremes over a Wide Range of Climates Simulated with an Idealized GCM O’Gorman, Paul A.; Schneider, Tapio Journal of Climate, Vol. 22, Issue 21 https://doi.org/10.1175/2009JCLI2701.1	journal	November 2009
Towards Direct Simulation of Future Tropical Cyclone Statistics in a High-Resolution Global Atmospheric Model Wehner, Michael F.; Bala, G.; Duffy, Phillip Advances in Meteorology, Vol. 2010 https://doi.org/10.1155/2010/915303	journal	January 2010
The Changing Character of Precipitation Trenberth, Kevin E.; Dai, Aiguo; Rasmussen, Roy M. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, Vol. 84, Issue 9 https://doi.org/10.1175/bams-84-9-1205	journal	September 2003
The Frequency of Extreme Rain Events in Satellite Rain-Rate Estimates and an Atmospheric General Circulation Model Wilcox, Eric M.; Donner, Leo J. Journal of Climate, Vol. 20, Issue 1 https://doi.org/10.1175/JCLI3987.1	journal	January 2007
How Often Will It Rain? Sun, Ying; Solomon, Susan; Dai, Aiguo Journal of Climate, Vol. 20, Issue 19 https://doi.org/10.1175/JCLI4263.1	journal	October 2007
Impact of horizontal resolution on climate model forecasts of tropical precipitation and diabatic heating for the TWP-ICE period Boyle, James; Klein, Stephen A. Journal of Geophysical Research, Vol. 115, Issue D23 https://doi.org/10.1029/2010jd014262	journal	January 2010
Testing the Clausius–Clapeyron constraint on changes in extreme precipitation under CO2 warming Pall, P.; Allen, M. R.; Stone, D. A. Climate Dynamics, Vol. 28, Issue 4 https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-006-0180-2	journal	August 2006
How Often Will It Rain? Sun, Ying; Solomon, Susan; Dai, Aiguo Journal of Climate, Vol. 20, Issue 19 https://doi.org/10.1175/jcli4263.1	journal	October 2007
Dynamic and thermodynamic changes in mean and extreme precipitation under changed climate: MEAN AND EXTREME PRECIPITATION CHANGES Emori, S.; Brown, S. J. Geophysical Research Letters, Vol. 32, Issue 17 https://doi.org/10.1029/2005GL023272	journal	September 2005
Constraints on future changes in climate and the hydrologic cycle Allen, Myles R.; Ingram, William J. Nature, Vol. 419, Issue 6903 https://doi.org/10.1038/nature01092	journal	September 2002
Increasing Trend of Extreme Rain Events Over India in a Warming Environment Goswami, B. N.; Venugopal, V.; Sengupta, D. Science, Vol. 314, Issue 5804 https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1132027	journal	December 2006
Global observed changes in daily climate extremes of temperature and precipitation Alexander, L. V.; Zhang, X.; Peterson, T. C. Journal of Geophysical Research, Vol. 111, Issue D5 https://doi.org/10.1029/2005jd006290	journal	January 2006
The Changing Character of Precipitation Trenberth, Kevin E.; Dai, Aiguo; Rasmussen, Roy M. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, Vol. 84, Issue 9 https://doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-84-9-1205	journal	September 2003
Robust Responses of the Hydrological Cycle to Global Warming Held, Isaac M.; Soden, Brian J. Journal of Climate, Vol. 19, Issue 21 https://doi.org/10.1175/jcli3990.1	journal	November 2006
An efficient and accurate correlated-k parameterization of infrared radiative transfer for troposphere–stratosphere–mesosphere GCMs Zhong, W. Atmospheric Science Letters, Vol. 1, Issue 2 https://doi.org/10.1006/asle.2000.0022	journal	July 2000
The Frequency of Extreme Rain Events in Satellite Rain-Rate Estimates and an Atmospheric General Circulation Model Wilcox, Eric M.; Donner, Leo J. Journal of Climate, Vol. 20, Issue 1 https://doi.org/10.1175/jcli3987.1	journal	January 2007
Dependence of aqua-planet simulations on time step Williamson, David L.; Olson, Jerry G. Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society, Vol. 129, Issue 591 https://doi.org/10.1256/qj.02.62	journal	April 2003
Atmospheric Moisture Recycling: Role of Advection and Local Evaporation Trenberth, Kevin E. Journal of Climate, Vol. 12, Issue 5 https://doi.org/10.1175/1520-0442(1999)012<1368:AMRROA>2.0.CO;2	journal	May 1999
Human contribution to more-intense precipitation extremes Min, Seung-Ki; Zhang, Xuebin; Zwiers, Francis W. Nature, Vol. 470, Issue 7334 https://doi.org/10.1038/nature09763	journal	February 2011
Changes in Temperature and Precipitation Extremes in the IPCC Ensemble of Global Coupled Model Simulations Kharin, Viatcheslav V.; Zwiers, Francis W.; Zhang, Xuebin Journal of Climate, Vol. 20, Issue 8 https://doi.org/10.1175/jcli4066.1	journal	April 2007
Atmospheric Moisture Recycling: Role of Advection and Local Evaporation Trenberth, Kevin E. Journal of Climate, Vol. 12, Issue 5 https://doi.org/10.1175/1520-0442(1999)012<1368:amrroa>2.0.co;2	journal	May 1999
On the Verification and Comparison of Extreme Rainfall Indices from Climate Models Chen, Cheng-Ta; Knutson, Thomas Journal of Climate, Vol. 21, Issue 7 https://doi.org/10.1175/2007JCLI1494.1	journal	April 2008
Convergence of aqua-planet simulations with increasing resolution in the Community Atmospheric Model, Version 3 Williamson, David L. Tellus A: Dynamic Meteorology and Oceanography, Vol. 60, Issue 5 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1600-0870.2008.00339.x	journal	January 2008
On the Verification and Comparison of Extreme Rainfall Indices from Climate Models Chen, Cheng-Ta; Knutson, Thomas Journal of Climate, Vol. 21, Issue 7 https://doi.org/10.1175/2007jcli1494.1	journal	April 2008
Observed coherent changes in climatic extremes during the second half of the twentieth century Frich, P.; Alexander, Lv; Della-Marta, P. Climate Research, Vol. 19 https://doi.org/10.3354/cr019193	journal	January 2002
�ber die partiellen Differenzengleichungen der mathematischen Physik Courant, R.; Friedrichs, K.; Lewy, H. Mathematische Annalen, Vol. 100, Issue 1 https://doi.org/10.1007/bf01448839	journal	December 1928

Cited By (12)

How well are daily intense rainfall events captured by current climate models over Africa? Crétat, Julien; Vizy, Edward K.; Cook, Kerry H. Climate Dynamics, Vol. 42, Issue 9-10 https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-013-1796-7	journal	May 2013
On the range of future Sahel precipitation projections and the selection of a sub-sample of CMIP5 models for impact studies Monerie, Paul-Arthur; Sanchez-Gomez, Emilia; Boé, Julien Climate Dynamics, Vol. 48, Issue 7-8 https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-016-3236-y	journal	June 2016
A multimodel intercomparison of resolution effects on precipitation: simulations and theory Rauscher, Sara A.; O’Brien, Travis A.; Piani, Claudio Climate Dynamics, Vol. 47, Issue 7-8 https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-015-2959-5	journal	February 2016
GCMs with implicit and explicit representation of cloud microphysics for simulation of extreme precipitation frequency Kang, In-Sik; Yang, Young-Min; Tao, Wei-Kuo Climate Dynamics, Vol. 45, Issue 1-2 https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-014-2376-1	journal	October 2014
Tropical precipitation extremes: Response to SST-induced warming in aquaplanet simulations: PRECIP. EXTREMES Bhattacharya, Ritthik; Bordoni, Simona; Teixeira, João Geophysical Research Letters, Vol. 44, Issue 7 https://doi.org/10.1002/2017gl073121	journal	April 2017
Evidence for added value of convection-permitting models for studying changes in extreme precipitation: EXTREME RAINFALL RESPONSE TO SST CHANGES Meredith, Edmund P.; Maraun, Douglas; Semenov, Vladimir A. Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, Vol. 120, Issue 24 https://doi.org/10.1002/2015jd024238	journal	December 2015
A Review of Historical and Future Changes of Extratropical Cyclones and Associated Impacts Along the US East Coast Colle, Brian A.; Booth, James F.; Chang, Edmund K. M. Current Climate Change Reports, Vol. 1, Issue 3 https://doi.org/10.1007/s40641-015-0013-7	journal	July 2015
Changes in intense rainfall events and dry periods across Africa in the twenty-first century Han, Fan; Cook, Kerry H.; Vizy, Edward K. Climate Dynamics, Vol. 53, Issue 5-6 https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-019-04653-z	journal	January 2019
An examination of extratropical cyclone response to changes in baroclinicity and temperature in an idealized environment Tierney, Gregory; Posselt, Derek J.; Booth, James F. Climate Dynamics, Vol. 51, Issue 9-10 https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-018-4115-5	journal	February 2018
State-of-the-art climate modeling of extreme precipitation over Africa: analysis of CORDEX added-value over CMIP5 Gibba, Peter; Sylla, Mouhamadou Bamba; Okogbue, Emmanuel Chilekwu Theoretical and Applied Climatology, Vol. 137, Issue 1-2 https://doi.org/10.1007/s00704-018-2650-y	journal	October 2018
Future changes to the intensity and frequency of short-duration extreme rainfall: FUTURE INTENSITY OF SUB-DAILY RAINFALL Westra, S.; Fowler, H. J.; Evans, J. P. Reviews of Geophysics, Vol. 52, Issue 3 https://doi.org/10.1002/2014rg000464	journal	August 2014
Midlatitude storms in a moister world: lessons from idealized baroclinic life cycle experiments Booth, James F.; Wang, Shuguang; Polvani, Lorenzo Climate Dynamics, Vol. 41, Issue 3-4 https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-012-1472-3	journal	August 2012

Similar Records

Response of precipitation extremes to idealized global warming in an aqua-planet climate model: towards a robust projection across different horizontal resolutions

Journal Article · Wed Dec 14 19:00:00 EST 2016 · Tellus. Series A, Dynamic Meteorology and Oceanography (Online) · OSTI ID:1671756

Impact of horizontal resolution on simulation of precipitation extremes in an aqua-planet version of the Community Atmosphere Model (CAM)

Journal Article · Mon Feb 28 23:00:00 EST 2011 · Tellus A · OSTI ID:1050658

Impact of horizontal resolution on simulation of precipitation extremes in an aqua-planet version of Community Atmospheric Model (CAM3)

Journal Article · Wed Dec 14 19:00:00 EST 2016 · Tellus. Series A, Dynamic Meteorology and Oceanography (Online) · OSTI ID:1671755

Related Subjects

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES
58 GEOSCIENCES
CLIMATE MODELS
CLIMATES
GENERAL CIRCULATION MODELS
GREENHOUSE EFFECT
PHYSICS
PRECIPITATION
RESOLUTION
SEAS
SENSITIVITY
SPATIAL RESOLUTION

Response of precipitation extremes to idealized global warming in an aqua-planet climate model: Towards robust projection across different horizontal resolutions

Citation Formats

References (31)

Cited By (12)

Similar Records

Related Subjects