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Title: High-end climate change impact on European runoff and low flows – exploring the effects of forcing biases

Journal Article · · Hydrology and Earth System Sciences (Online)
 [1];  [1];  [1];  [2]
  1. Technical Univ. of Crete, Chania (Greece)
  2. Technical Univ. of Crete, Chania (Greece); McMaster Univ., Hamilton, ON (Canada)

Climate models project a much more substantial warming than the 2 °C target under the more probable emission scenarios, making higher-end scenarios increasingly plausible. Freshwater availability under such conditions is a key issue of concern. In this study, an ensemble of Euro-CORDEX projections under RCP8.5 is used to assess the mean and low hydrological states under +4 °C of global warming for the European region. Five major European catchments were analysed in terms of future drought climatology and the impact of +2 °C versus +4 °C global warming was investigated. The effect of bias correction of the climate model outputs and the observations used for this adjustment was also quantified. Projections indicate an intensification of the water cycle at higher levels of warming. Even for areas where the average state may not considerably be affected, low flows are expected to reduce, leading to changes in the number of dry days and thus drought climatology. The identified increasing or decreasing runoff trends are substantially intensified when moving from the +2 to the +4° of global warming. Bias correction resulted in an improved representation of the historical hydrology. Moreover, it is also found that the selection of the observational data set for the application of the bias correction has an impact on the projected signal that could be of the same order of magnitude to the selection of the Global Climate Model (GCM).

Research Organization:
Office of Scientific and Technical Information, Oak Ridge, TN (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Science (SC)
Grant/Contract Number:
603864
OSTI ID:
1375769
Journal Information:
Hydrology and Earth System Sciences (Online), Vol. 20, Issue 5; ISSN 1607-7938
Publisher:
European Geosciences Union (EGU)Copyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 42 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

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The impact of future climate change and potential adaptation methods on Maize yields in West Africa journal September 2018
Mapping the vulnerability of European summer tourism under 2 °C global warming journal September 2018
What can we learn from the projections of changes of flow patterns? Results from Polish case studies journal July 2017
Yellow River water rebalanced by human regulation journal July 2019
Climate change impact on the hydrological budget of a large Mediterranean island journal July 2019
Changes in climate extremes, fresh water availability and vulnerability to food insecurity projected at 1.5°C and 2°C global warming with a higher-resolution global climate model
  • Betts, Richard A.; Alfieri, Lorenzo; Bradshaw, Catherine
  • Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences, Vol. 376, Issue 2119 https://doi.org/10.1098/rsta.2016.0452
journal April 2018
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