Changing seasonality of moderate and extreme precipitation events in the Alps
Abstract
The intensity of precipitation events is expected to increase in the future.The rate of increase depends on the strength or rarity of the events; very strong and rare events tend to follow the Clausius–Clapeyron relation,whereas weaker events or precipitation averages increase at a smaller rate than expected from the Clausius–Clapeyron relation. An often overlooked aspect is seasonal occurrence of such events, which might change in the future. To address the impact of seasonality, we use a large ensemble of regional and global climate model simulations, comprising tens of thousands of model years of daily temperature and precipitation for the past, present,and future. In order to make the data comparable, they are quantile mapped to observation-based time series representative of the Aare catchment in Switzerland. Model simulations show no increase in annual maximum 1-day precipitation events (Rx1day) over the last 400 years and an increase of 10 %–20 % until the end of the century for a strong (RCP8.5) forcing scenario. This fits with a Clausius–Clapeyron scaling of temperature at the event day, which increases less than annual mean temperature. An important reason for this is a shift in seasonality. Rx1day events become less frequent in late summer and more frequent in early summermore »
- Authors:
-
- Univ. of Bern (Switzerland)
- ETH Zurich (Switzerland); Federal Office of Meteorology and Climatology MeteoSwiss, Zurich (Switzerland)
- ETH Zurich (Switzerland)
- Publication Date:
- Research Org.:
- Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States). Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility (OLCF)
- Sponsoring Org.:
- USDOE Office of Science (SC)
- OSTI Identifier:
- 1565712
- Resource Type:
- Accepted Manuscript
- Journal Name:
- Natural Hazards and Earth System Sciences (Online)
- Additional Journal Information:
- Journal Name: Natural Hazards and Earth System Sciences (Online); Journal Volume: 18; Journal Issue: 7; Journal ID: ISSN 1684-9981
- Publisher:
- European Geosciences Union
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
- Subject:
- 54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES; geology; meteorology & atmospheric sciences; water resources
Citation Formats
Brönnimann, Stefan, Rajczak, Jan, Fischer, Erich M., Raible, Christoph C., Rohrer, Marco, and Schär, Christoph. Changing seasonality of moderate and extreme precipitation events in the Alps. United States: N. p., 2018.
Web. doi:10.5194/nhess-18-2047-2018.
Brönnimann, Stefan, Rajczak, Jan, Fischer, Erich M., Raible, Christoph C., Rohrer, Marco, & Schär, Christoph. Changing seasonality of moderate and extreme precipitation events in the Alps. United States. https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-18-2047-2018
Brönnimann, Stefan, Rajczak, Jan, Fischer, Erich M., Raible, Christoph C., Rohrer, Marco, and Schär, Christoph. Fri .
"Changing seasonality of moderate and extreme precipitation events in the Alps". United States. https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-18-2047-2018. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1565712.
@article{osti_1565712,
title = {Changing seasonality of moderate and extreme precipitation events in the Alps},
author = {Brönnimann, Stefan and Rajczak, Jan and Fischer, Erich M. and Raible, Christoph C. and Rohrer, Marco and Schär, Christoph},
abstractNote = {The intensity of precipitation events is expected to increase in the future.The rate of increase depends on the strength or rarity of the events; very strong and rare events tend to follow the Clausius–Clapeyron relation,whereas weaker events or precipitation averages increase at a smaller rate than expected from the Clausius–Clapeyron relation. An often overlooked aspect is seasonal occurrence of such events, which might change in the future. To address the impact of seasonality, we use a large ensemble of regional and global climate model simulations, comprising tens of thousands of model years of daily temperature and precipitation for the past, present,and future. In order to make the data comparable, they are quantile mapped to observation-based time series representative of the Aare catchment in Switzerland. Model simulations show no increase in annual maximum 1-day precipitation events (Rx1day) over the last 400 years and an increase of 10 %–20 % until the end of the century for a strong (RCP8.5) forcing scenario. This fits with a Clausius–Clapeyron scaling of temperature at the event day, which increases less than annual mean temperature. An important reason for this is a shift in seasonality. Rx1day events become less frequent in late summer and more frequent in early summer and early autumn, when it is cooler. The seasonality shift is shown to be related to summer drying. Models with decreasing annual mean or summer mean precipitation show this behaviour more strongly. The highest Rx1day per decade, in contrast, shows no change in seasonality in the future. This discrepancy implies that decadal-scale extremes are thermodynamically limited; conditions conducive to strong events still occur during the hottest time of the year on a decadal scale. In contrast, Rx1day events are also limited by other factors. Conducive conditions are not reached every summer in the present, and even less so in the future. Finally, results suggest that changes in the seasonal cycle need to be accounted for when preparing for moderately extreme precipitation events and assessing their socio-economic impacts.},
doi = {10.5194/nhess-18-2047-2018},
journal = {Natural Hazards and Earth System Sciences (Online)},
number = 7,
volume = 18,
place = {United States},
year = {Fri Jul 27 00:00:00 EDT 2018},
month = {Fri Jul 27 00:00:00 EDT 2018}
}
Web of Science
Works referenced in this record:
What precipitation is extreme?
journal, June 2018
- Pendergrass, Angeline G.
- Science, Vol. 360, Issue 6393
Bias correction of regional climate model simulations for hydrological climate-change impact studies: Review and evaluation of different methods
journal, August 2012
- Teutschbein, Claudia; Seibert, Jan
- Journal of Hydrology, Vol. 456-457
Multi-variable error correction of regional climate models
journal, August 2013
- Wilcke, Renate Anna Irma; Mendlik, Thomas; Gobiet, Andreas
- Climatic Change, Vol. 120, Issue 4
An ensemble-based approach to climate reconstructions
journal, January 2012
- Bhend, J.; Franke, J.; Folini, D.
- Climate of the Past, Vol. 8, Issue 3
Observed heavy precipitation increase confirms theory and early models
journal, October 2016
- Fischer, E. M.; Knutti, R.
- Nature Climate Change, Vol. 6, Issue 11
Does Quantile Mapping of Simulated Precipitation Correct for Biases in Transition Probabilities and Spell Lengths?
journal, March 2016
- Rajczak, Jan; Kotlarski, Sven; Schär, Christoph
- Journal of Climate, Vol. 29, Issue 5
Regional climate modeling on European scales: a joint standard evaluation of the EURO-CORDEX RCM ensemble
journal, January 2014
- Kotlarski, S.; Keuler, K.; Christensen, O. B.
- Geoscientific Model Development, Vol. 7, Issue 4
Sensitivity experiments on the response of Vb cyclones to sea surface temperature and soil moisture changes
journal, January 2017
- Messmer, Martina; Gómez-Navarro, Juan José; Raible, Christoph C.
- Earth System Dynamics, Vol. 8, Issue 3
CERA-20C: A Coupled Reanalysis of the Twentieth Century
journal, May 2018
- Laloyaux, Patrick; de Boisseson, Eric; Balmaseda, Magdalena
- Journal of Advances in Modeling Earth Systems, Vol. 10, Issue 5
Climatology of Vb cyclones, physical mechanisms and their impact on extreme precipitation over Central Europe
journal, January 2015
- Messmer, M.; Gómez-Navarro, J. J.; Raible, C. C.
- Earth System Dynamics, Vol. 6, Issue 2
Percentile indices for assessing changes in heavy precipitation events
journal, April 2016
- Schär, Christoph; Ban, Nikolina; Fischer, Erich M.
- Climatic Change, Vol. 137, Issue 1-2
An Overview of CMIP5 and the Experiment Design
journal, April 2012
- Taylor, Karl E.; Stouffer, Ronald J.; Meehl, Gerald A.
- Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, Vol. 93, Issue 4
Enhanced summer convective rainfall at Alpine high elevations in response to climate warming
journal, July 2016
- Giorgi, Filippo; Torma, Csaba; Coppola, Erika
- Nature Geoscience, Vol. 9, Issue 8
Technical Note: Downscaling RCM precipitation to the station scale using statistical transformations – a comparison of methods
journal, January 2012
- Gudmundsson, L.; Bremnes, J. B.; Haugen, J. E.
- Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, Vol. 16, Issue 9
Climate and carbon cycle dynamics in a CESM simulation from 850 to 2100 CE
journal, January 2015
- Lehner, F.; Joos, F.; Raible, C. C.
- Earth System Dynamics, Vol. 6, Issue 2
Emerging trends in heavy precipitation and hot temperature extremes in Switzerland: Trends in Swiss Climate Extremes
journal, March 2016
- Scherrer, S. C.; Fischer, E. M.; Posselt, R.
- Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, Vol. 121, Issue 6
Separating climate change signals into thermodynamic, lapse-rate and circulation effects: theory and application to the European summer climate
journal, July 2016
- Kröner, Nico; Kotlarski, Sven; Fischer, Erich
- Climate Dynamics, Vol. 48, Issue 9-10
Robust climate scenarios for sites with sparse observations: a two-step bias correction approach: TWO-STEP BIAS CORRECTION
journal, July 2015
- Rajczak, Jan; Kotlarski, Sven; Salzmann, Nadine
- International Journal of Climatology, Vol. 36, Issue 3
The Twentieth Century Reanalysis Project
journal, January 2011
- Compo, G. P.; Whitaker, J. S.; Sardeshmukh, P. D.
- Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society, Vol. 137, Issue 654
Weather patterns and hydro-climatological precursors of extreme floods in Switzerland since 1868 [Weather patterns and hydro-climatological precursors of extreme floods in Switzerland since 1868]
journal, December 2012
- Stucki, Peter; Rickli, Ralph; Brönnimann, Stefan
- Meteorologische Zeitschrift, Vol. 21, Issue 6
A review on regional convection‐permitting climate modeling: Demonstrations, prospects, and challenges
journal, May 2015
- Prein, Andreas F.; Langhans, Wolfgang; Fosser, Giorgia
- Reviews of Geophysics, Vol. 53, Issue 2
Evaluation of delta change and bias correction methods for future daily precipitation: intermodel cross-validation using ENSEMBLES simulations
journal, April 2014
- Räty, Olle; Räisänen, Jouni; Ylhäisi, Jussi S.
- Climate Dynamics, Vol. 42, Issue 9-10
Constraints on future changes in climate and the hydrologic cycle
journal, September 2002
- Allen, Myles R.; Ingram, William J.
- Nature, Vol. 419, Issue 6903
Comparing precipitation bias correction methods for high-resolution regional climate simulations using COSMO-CLM: Effects on extreme values and climate change signal
journal, February 2013
- Gutjahr, Oliver; Heinemann, Günther
- Theoretical and Applied Climatology, Vol. 114, Issue 3-4
Assessing distribution-based climate model bias correction methods over an alpine domain: added value and limitations: ASSESSMENT OF DISTRIBUTION-BASED CLIMATE MODEL BIAS CORRECTION METHODS
journal, September 2016
- Ivanov, Martin A.; Kotlarski, Sven
- International Journal of Climatology, Vol. 37, Issue 5
EURO-CORDEX: new high-resolution climate change projections for European impact research
journal, July 2013
- Jacob, Daniela; Petersen, Juliane; Eggert, Bastian
- Regional Environmental Change, Vol. 14, Issue 2
Understanding the regional pattern of projected future changes in extreme precipitation
journal, May 2017
- Pfahl, S.; O’Gorman, P. A.; Fischer, E. M.
- Nature Climate Change, Vol. 7, Issue 6
Models are likely to underestimate increase in heavy rainfall in the extratropical regions with high rainfall intensity: Heavy Rainfall Intensification
journal, July 2017
- Borodina, Aleksandra; Fischer, Erich M.; Knutti, Reto
- Geophysical Research Letters, Vol. 44, Issue 14
Empirical-statistical downscaling and error correction of regional climate models and its impact on the climate change signal
journal, September 2011
- Themeßl, Matthias Jakob; Gobiet, Andreas; Heinrich, Georg
- Climatic Change, Vol. 112, Issue 2
Heavy precipitation in a changing climate: Does short-term summer precipitation increase faster?
journal, February 2015
- Ban, Nikolina; Schmidli, Juerg; Schär, Christoph
- Geophysical Research Letters, Vol. 42, Issue 4
Complexity in estimating past and future extreme short-duration rainfall
journal, March 2017
- Zhang, Xuebin; Zwiers, Francis W.; Li, Guilong
- Nature Geoscience, Vol. 10, Issue 4
Empirical-statistical downscaling and error correction of daily precipitation from regional climate models
journal, June 2010
- Jakob Themeßl, Matthias; Gobiet, Andreas; Leuprecht, Armin
- International Journal of Climatology, Vol. 31, Issue 10
Evaluation of the convection-resolving regional climate modeling approach in decade-long simulations
journal, July 2014
- Ban, Nikolina; Schmidli, Juerg; Schär, Christoph
- Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, Vol. 119, Issue 13
Anthropogenic contribution to global occurrence of heavy-precipitation and high-temperature extremes
journal, April 2015
- Fischer, E. M.; Knutti, R.
- Nature Climate Change, Vol. 5, Issue 6
Technical Note: Downscaling RCM precipitation to the station scale using statistical transformations – a comparison of methods
text, January 2012
- Gudmundsson, Lukas; Bremnes, John Bjørnar; Haugen, Jan Erik
- ETH Zurich
Separating climate change signals into thermodynamic, lapse-rate and circulation effects: theory and application to the European summer climate
text, January 2017
- Kröner, Nico; Kotlarski, Sven; Fischer, Erich M.
- ETH Zurich
Bias correction of regional climate model simulations for hydrological climate-change impact studies: Review and evaluation of different methods
text, January 2012
- Teutschbein, Claudia; Seibert, Jan
- Elsevier
Sensitivity experiments on the response of Vb cyclones to sea surface temperature and soil moisture changes
text, January 2017
- Messmer, Martina Barbara; Gómez-Navarro, Juan José; Raible, Christoph
- Copernicus Publications
CERA-20C: A coupled reanalysis of the Twentieth Century
text, January 2018
- Laloyaux, Patrick; De Boisseson, Eric; Balmaseda, Magdalena
- American Geophysical Union
The Twentieth Century Reanalysis Project
text, January 2011
- Compo, Gilbert P.; Whitaker, Jeffrey S.; Sardeshmudh, Prashant D.
- Royal Meteorological Society
Regional climate modeling on European scales: a joint standard evaluation of the EURO-CORDEX RCM ensemble
text, January 2014
- Kotlarski, Sven; Keuler, Klaus G.; Christensen, Ole B.
- ETH Zurich
EURO-CORDEX: new high-resolution climate change projections for European impact research
text, January 2014
- Jacob, Daniela; Petersen, Juliane; Eggert, Bastian
- Karlsruhe
Representation of Extratropical Cyclones, Blocking Anticyclones, and Alpine Circulation Types in Multiple Reanalyses and Model Simulations
text, January 2018
- Rohrer, Marco; Brönnimann, Stefan; Martius, Olivia
- American Meteorological Society
Daily precipitation and temperature time series from multiple climate model simulations for the Aare river catchment (Switzerland)
dataset, January 2018
- Rajczak, Jan; Brönnimann, Stefan; Fischer, Erich M.
- PANGAEA - Data Publisher for Earth & Environmental Science
An ensemble-based approach to climate reconstructions
text, January 2012
- Bhend, Jonas; Franke, Jörg; Folini, Doris
- ETH Zurich
Climatology of Vb cyclones, physical mechanisms and their impact on extreme precipitation over Central Europe
text, January 2015
- Messmer, M.; Gómez-Navarro, J. J.; Raible, C. C.
- Copernicus Publications
A review on regional convection‐permitting climate modeling: Demonstrations, prospects, and challenges
text, January 2015
- F., Prein, Andreas; Wolfgang, Langhans,; Giorgia, Fosser,
- ETH Zurich
Weather patterns and hydro-climatological precursors of extreme floods in Switzerland since 1868
text, January 2012
- Stucki, Peter; Luterbacher, Jürg; Wanner, Heinz
- Borntraeger
Climate and carbon cycle dynamics in a CESM simulation from 850–2100 CE
text, January 2015
- Born, A.; Mignot, J.; Stocker, T. F.
- Copernicus Publications
Assessing distribution-based climate model bias correction methods over an alpine domain: added value and limitations: ASSESSMENT OF DISTRIBUTION-BASED CLIMATE MODEL BIAS CORRECTION METHODS
journal, September 2016
- Ivanov, Martin A.; Kotlarski, Sven
- International Journal of Climatology, Vol. 37, Issue 5
Separating climate change signals into thermodynamic, lapse-rate and circulation effects: theory and application to the European summer climate
journal, July 2016
- Kröner, Nico; Kotlarski, Sven; Fischer, Erich
- Climate Dynamics, Vol. 48, Issue 9-10
EURO-CORDEX: new high-resolution climate change projections for European impact research
journal, July 2013
- Jacob, Daniela; Petersen, Juliane; Eggert, Bastian
- Regional Environmental Change, Vol. 14, Issue 2
Multi-variable error correction of regional climate models
journal, August 2013
- Wilcke, Renate Anna Irma; Mendlik, Thomas; Gobiet, Andreas
- Climatic Change, Vol. 120, Issue 4
Percentile indices for assessing changes in heavy precipitation events
journal, April 2016
- Schär, Christoph; Ban, Nikolina; Fischer, Erich M.
- Climatic Change, Vol. 137, Issue 1-2
Anthropogenic contribution to global occurrence of heavy-precipitation and high-temperature extremes
journal, April 2015
- Fischer, E. M.; Knutti, R.
- Nature Climate Change, Vol. 5, Issue 6
Enhanced summer convective rainfall at Alpine high elevations in response to climate warming
journal, July 2016
- Giorgi, Filippo; Torma, Csaba; Coppola, Erika
- Nature Geoscience, Vol. 9, Issue 8
Daily precipitation and temperature time series from multiple climate model simulations for the Aare river catchment (Switzerland)
dataset, January 2018
- Rajczak, Jan; Brönnimann, Stefan; Fischer, Erich M.
- PANGAEA - Data Publisher for Earth & Environmental Science
A review on regional convection‐permitting climate modeling: Demonstrations, prospects, and challenges
text, January 2015
- F., Prein, Andreas; Wolfgang, Langhans,; Giorgia, Fosser,
- ETH Zurich
The 1978 Heavy Precipitation and Flood Event in Switzerland
text, January 2017
- Stucki, Peter; Baumann, Aline; Bucher, Dominique
- Geographica Bernensia
Works referencing / citing this record:
The Changing Seasonality of Extreme Daily Precipitation
journal, October 2018
- Marelle, Louis; Myhre, Gunnar; Hodnebrog, Øivind
- Geophysical Research Letters, Vol. 45, Issue 20
Projected Changes in the Probability Distributions, Seasonality, and Spatiotemporal Scaling of Daily and Subdaily Extreme Precipitation Simulated by a 50‐Member Ensemble Over Northeastern North America
journal, October 2019
- Innocenti, S.; Mailhot, A.; Leduc, M.
- Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, Vol. 124, Issue 19
Future shifts in extreme flow regimes in Alpine regions
journal, January 2019
- Brunner, Manuela I.; Farinotti, Daniel; Zekollari, Harry
- Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, Vol. 23, Issue 11
Future shifts in extreme flow regimes in Alpine regions
text, January 2019
- Brunner, Manuela I.; Farinotti, Daniel; Zekollari, Harry
- ETH Zurich