Large-scale precipitation estimation using Kalpana-1 IR measurements and its validation using GPCP and GPCC data

Large-scale precipitation estimation is very important for climate science because precipitation is a major component of the earth's water and energy cycles. In the present study, the GOES precipitation index technique has been applied to the Kalpana-1 satellite infrared (IR) images of every three-hourly, i.e., of 0000, 0300, 0600,??., 2100?hours UTC, for rainfall estimation as a preparatory to the INSAT-3D. After the temperatures of all the pixels in a grid are known, they are distributed to generate a three-hourly 24-class histogram of brightness temperatures of IR (10.5?C12.5???m) images for a 1.0°?×?1.0° latitude/longitude box. The daily, monthly, and seasonal rainfall have been estimated using these three-hourly rain estimates for the entire south-west monsoon period of 2009 in the present study. To investigate the potential of these rainfall estimates, the validation of monthly and seasonal rainfall estimates has been carried out using the Global Precipitation Climatology Project and Global Precipitation Climatology Centre data. The validation results show that the present technique works very well for the large-scale precipitation estimation qualitatively as well as quantitatively. The results also suggest that the simple IR-based estimation technique can be used to estimate rainfall for tropical areas at a larger temporal scale for climatological applications.     

Influence of aerosol-radiative forcings on the diurnal and seasonal cycles of rainfall over West Africa and Eastern Atlantic Ocean using GCM simulations

Effects of aerosol radiative forcing on the diurnal and seasonal cycles of precipitation over West Africa and eastern Atlantic Ocean are investigated for the boreal summer season: June–July–August. An eight year (2000–2007) average of GCM simulated rainfall data is compared with the corresponding TRMM rainfall data. The comparison shows that the amplitude of the diurnal cycles of rainfall over land and ocean are reasonably well simulated. Over land, the phase of the simulated diurnal cycle of precipitation peaks several hours earlier than that of the TRMM data. Corresponding differences over the ocean(s) are relatively smaller. Some of the key features of the aerosol induced model simulated field anomalies are: (a) aerosol direct radiative forcing which increases the atmospheric stability and reduces the daytime moist convection and convective precipitation; (b) the aerosol induced changes in the diurnal cycle of precipitation are out of phase with those of the TRMM data over land, but are in-phase over the ocean; (c) aerosols reduce the amplitude of the diurnal cycle of precipitation over land and enhance it over ocean. However, the phase of the diurnal cycle is not affected much by the aerosol radiative forcing both over land and ocean. During the boreal summer, aerosol radiative forcing and induced circulation and precipitation cool the Sahel and the southern part of Sahara desert more than the adjacent areas to the north and south, thereby shifting the peak meridional temperature gradient northward. Consequently, an anomalous easterly jet is found north of its climatological location. This anomalous jet is associated with increased cyclonic circulation to the south of its axis, resulting in an anomalous monsoon rain belt in the Sahel.     

What spatial scales are believable for climate model projections of sea surface temperature?

Earth system models (ESMs) provide high resolution simulations of variables such as sea surface temperature (SST) that are often used in off-line biological impact models. Coral reef modellers have used such model outputs extensively to project both regional and global changes to coral growth and bleaching frequency. We assess model skill at capturing sub-regional climatologies and patterns of historical warming. This study uses an established wavelet-based spatial comparison technique to assess the skill of the coupled model intercomparison project phase 5 models to capture spatial SST patterns in coral regions. We show that models typically have medium to high skill at capturing climatological spatial patterns of SSTs within key coral regions, with model skill typically improving at larger spatial scales (≥4°). However models have much lower skill at modelling historical warming patters and are shown to often perform no better than chance at regional scales (e.g. Southeast Asian) and worse than chance at finer scales (<8°). Our findings suggest that output from current generation ESMs is not yet suitable for making sub-regional projections of change in coral bleaching frequency and other marine processes linked to SST warming.     

Multi-decadal scenario simulation over Korea using a one-way double-nested regional climate model system. Part 1: recent climate simulation (1971–2000)

We present an analysis of a high resolution multi-decadal simulation of recent climate (1971–2000) over the Korean Peninsula with a regional climate model (RegCM3) using a one-way double-nested system. Mean climate state as well as frequency and intensity of extreme climate events are investigated at various temporal and spatial scales, with focus on surface air temperature and precipitation. The mother intermediate resolution model domain encompasses the eastern regions of Asia at 60 km grid spacing while the high resolution nested domain covers the Korean Peninsula at 20 km grid spacing. The simulation spans the 30-year period of January 1971 through December 2000, and initial and lateral boundary conditions for the mother domain are provided from ECHO-G fields based on the IPCC SRES B2 scenario. The model shows a good performance in reproducing the climatological and regional characteristics of surface variables, although some persistent biases are present. Main results are as follows: (1) The RegCM3 successfully simulates the fine-scale structure of the temperature field due to topographic forcing but it shows a systematic cold bias mostly due to an underestimate of maximum temperature. (2) The frequency distribution of simulated daily mean temperature agrees well with the observed seasonal and spatial patterns. In the summer season, however, daily variability is underestimated. (3) The RegCM3 simulation adequately captures the seasonal evolution of precipitation associated to the East Asia monsoon. In particular, the simulated winter precipitation is remarkably good, clearly showing typical precipitation patterns that occur on the northwestern areas of Japan during the winter monsoon. Although summer precipitation is underestimated, area-averaged time series of precipitation over Korea show that the RegCM3 agrees better with observations than ECHO-G both in terms of seasonal evolution and precipitation amounts. (4) Heavy rainfall phenomena exceeding 300 mm/day are simulated only at the high resolution of the double nested domain. (5) The model shows a tendency to overestimate the number of precipitation days and to underestimate the precipitation intensities. (6) A CSEOF analysis reveals that the model captures the strength of the annual cycle and the surface warming trend throughout the simulated period.     

基于K均值聚类的中国夏季降水日变化空间分布模式

为了获取降水日变化的空间分布模式,本文采用K均值聚类算法对中国陆地区域的夏季逐时格网降水数据进行了聚类。首先,采用K均值聚类算法对每个格网上的逐时降水数据进行聚类。然后,根据每一聚类的降水日变化峰值,将具有相似峰值时间的聚类合并成为一个分类。合并后的分类对应一种降水日变化类型,分类中的格网边界则构成了该类降水日变化的空间分布模式。研究结果表明,中国大部分地区的降水量日变化由降水频率日变化主导。此外,一些盛行夜雨区域在空间分布上表现出从西向东的分布模式,且降水日变化峰值时间表现出了从西向东逐渐延迟的现象。结合地形分析,研究发现一些夜雨区的降水峰值延迟现象与MPS环流效应导致的雨带移动现象较为一致,得出MPS(Mountain-Plain Solenoid)环流效应是导致这些地区盛行夜雨的结论。本文研究结果可为探索降水日变化的形成机理提供线索,也可为研究其他地区降水日变化提供参考。     

Simulating the diurnal cycle of rainfall in global climate models: resolution versus parameterization

The effects of horizontal resolution and the treatment of convection on simulation of the diurnal cycle of precipitation during boreal summer are analyzed in several innovative weather and climate model integrations. The simulations include: season-long integrations of the Non-hydrostatic Icosahedral Atmospheric Model (NICAM) with explicit clouds and convection; year-long integrations of the operational Integrated Forecast System (IFS) from the European Centre for Medium-range Weather Forecasts at three resolutions (125, 39 and 16 km); seasonal simulations of the same model at 10 km resolution; and seasonal simulations of the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) low-resolution climate model with and without an embedded two-dimensional cloud-resolving model in each grid box. NICAM with explicit convection simulates best the phase of the diurnal cycle, as well as many regional features such as rainfall triggered by advancing sea breezes or high topography. However, NICAM greatly overestimates mean rainfall and the magnitude of the diurnal cycle. Introduction of an embedded cloud model within the NCAR model significantly improves global statistics of the seasonal mean and diurnal cycle of rainfall, as well as many regional features. However, errors often remain larger than for the other higher-resolution models. Increasing resolution alone has little impact on the timing of daily rainfall in IFS with parameterized convection, yet the amplitude of the diurnal cycle does improve along with the representation of mean rainfall. Variations during the day in atmospheric prognostic fields appear quite similar among models, suggesting that the distinctive treatments of model physics account for the differences in representing the diurnal cycle of precipitation.     

Simulations of precipitation using NRCM and comparisons with satellite observations and CAM: annual cycle

The accurate representation of rainfall in models of global climate has been a challenging task for climate modelers owing to its small space and time scales. Quantifying this variability is important for comparing simulations of atmospheric behavior with real time observations. In this regard, this paper compares both the statistical and dynamically forced aspects of precipitation variability simulated by the high-resolution (36?km) Nested Regional Climate Model (NRCM), with satellite observations from the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) 3B42 dataset and simulations from the Community Atmosphere Model (CAM) at T85 spatial resolution. Six years of rainfall rate data (2000?C2005) from within the Tropics (30°S?C30°N) have been used in the analysis and results are presented in terms of long-term mean rain rates, amplitude and phase of the annual cycle and seasonal mean maps of precipitation. Our primary focus is on characterizing the annual cycle of rainfall over four land regions of the Tropics namely, the Indian Monsoon, the Amazon, Tropical Africa and the North American monsoon. The lower tropospheric circulation patterns are analyzed in both the observations and the models to identify possible causes for biases in the simulated precipitation. The 6-year mean precipitation simulated by both models show substantial biases throughout the global Tropics with NRCM/CAM systematically underestimating/overestimating rainfall almost everywhere. The seasonal march of rainfall across the equator, following the motion of the sun, is clearly seen in the harmonic vector maps. The timing of peak rainfall (phase) produced by NRCM is in closer agreement with the observations compared to CAM. However like the long-time mean, the magnitude of seasonal mean rainfall is greatly underestimated by NRCM throughout the Tropical land mass. Some of these regional biases can be attributed to erroneous circulation and moisture surpluses/deficits in the lower troposphere in both models. Overall, the results seem to indicate that employing a higher spatial resolution (36?km) does not significantly improve simulation of precipitation. We speculate that a combination of several physics parameterizations and lack of model tuning gives rise to the observed differences between NRCM and the observations.     

中国近50a极端降水事件变化特征的季节性差异

利用中国419个测站1958-2007年逐日降水资料集,分析了近50a中国不同区域年和季节极端降水事件的基本变化特征。结果表明,多年平均极端降水事件的空间分布具有明显的纬向分布特征,并表现出显著的季节性差异。长江以南地区是春、冬季极端降水事件发生频次较高的区域;而年、夏季以及秋季极端降水事件发生频次在西南地区较高,在西北东部较低。年极端降水事件频次的长期变化趋势与夏季相似,华北和东北有增加趋势,其他地区为弱的减少趋势;其他季节的长期变化趋势存在明显的区域和季节性差异。年和季节极端降水事件的发生频次具有显著的年际和年代际变化特征。年极端降水事件时间序列的多项式拟合曲线的变化情况与夏季基本一致;而其他季节的变化则存在较大差异,表现出显著的季节性差异。     

Evaluation of a climate simulation in Europe based on the WRF–NOAH model system: precipitation in Germany

The Weather Research and Forecast (WRF) model with its land surface model NOAH was set up and applied as regional climate model over Europe. It was forced with the latest ERA-interim reanalysis data from 1989 to 2008 and operated with 0.33° and 0.11° resolution. This study focuses on the verification of monthly and seasonal mean precipitation over Germany, where a high quality precipitation dataset of the German Weather Service is available. In particular, the precipitation is studied in the orographic terrain of southwestern Germany and the dry lowlands of northeastern Germany. In both regions precipitation data is very important for end users such as hydrologists and farmers. Both WRF simulations show a systematic positive precipitation bias not apparent in ERA-interim and an overestimation of wet day frequency. The downscaling experiment improved the annual cycle of the precipitation intensity, which is underestimated by ERA-interim. Normalized Taylor diagrams, i.e., those discarding the systematic bias by normalizing the quantities, demonstrate that downscaling with WRF provides a better spatial distribution than the ERA interim precipitation analyses in southwestern Germany and most of the whole of Germany but degrades the results for northeastern Germany. At the applied model resolution of 0.11°, WRF shows typical systematic errors of RCMs in orographic terrain such as the windward–lee effect. A convection permitting case study set up for summer 2007 improved the precipitation simulations with respect to the location of precipitation maxima in the mountainous regions and the spatial correlation of precipitation. This result indicates the high value of regional climate simulations on the convection-permitting scale.     

The first multi-model ensemble of regional climate simulations at kilometer-scale resolution part 2: historical and future simulations of precipitation

This paper presents the first multi-model ensemble of 10-year, “convection-permitting” kilometer-scale regional climate model (RCM) scenario simulations downscaled from selected CMIP5 GCM projections for historical and end of century time slices. The technique is to first downscale the CMIP5 GCM projections to an intermediate 12–15 km resolution grid using RCMs, and then use these fields to downscale further to the kilometer scale. The aim of the paper is to provide an overview of the representation of the precipitation characteristics and their projected changes over the greater Alpine domain within a Coordinated Regional Climate Downscaling Experiment Flagship Pilot Study and the European Climate Prediction system project, tasked with investigating convective processes at the kilometer scale. An ensemble of 12 simulations performed by different research groups around Europe is analyzed. The simulations are evaluated through comparison with high resolution observations while the complementary ensemble of 12 km resolution driving models is used as a benchmark to evaluate the added value of the convection-permitting ensemble. The results show that the kilometer-scale ensemble is able to improve the representation of fine scale details of mean daily, wet-day/hour frequency, wet-day/hour intensity and heavy precipitation on a seasonal scale, reducing uncertainty over some regions. It also improves the representation of the summer diurnal cycle, showing more realistic onset and peak of convection. The kilometer-scale ensemble refines and enhances the projected patterns of change from the coarser resolution simulations and even modifies the sign of the precipitation intensity change and heavy precipitation over some regions. The convection permitting simulations also show larger changes for all indices over the diurnal cycle, also suggesting a change in the duration of convection over some regions. A larger positive change of frequency of heavy to severe precipitation is found. The results are encouraging towards the use of convection-permitting model ensembles to produce robust assessments of the local impacts of future climate change.

     

Recent trends in seasonal and annual precipitation indices in Tuscany (Italy)

Global warming alters the hydrological cycle since a rise in temperature leads to an increase in the moisture-holding capacity of the atmosphere at a rate of about 7 %/°C. This fact can influence the global, but also local characteristics of precipitation, such as total amount and intensity. Therefore, it is important to study changes in rainfall regime in regions with complex orography, like Tuscany, where there are strong spatial gradients in precipitation amounts. The aim of this study is to look for temporal change in precipitation from 1955 to 2007 searching for spatial differences. Daily data of 21 meteorological stations were analyzed to identify trends in seasonal and annual precipitation indices. Cluster analysis applied to principal components was applied to identify homogeneous groups of stations. A decrease in precipitation was observed at annual time scale, during winter and spring, especially in northwestern areas. Wet days highlighted a decrease in all of Tuscany, due to the same seasons. In northern Tuscany, the decrease in rainfall amount was mainly determined by a lower frequency of rainy events which in turn caused a decrease in the occurrence of extreme daily precipitation events (75th, 90th, and 95th percentile). In central-southern Tuscany, no significant changes were observed except for an increase in precipitation fraction, due to extreme events and in mean daily total amount for wet days. These results are consistent with recent findings for the Mediterranean area and confirm the usefulness of cluster analysis for the analysis of the spatial distribution of precipitation.     

The frequency, intensity, and diurnal cycle of precipitation in surface and satellite observations over low- and mid-latitudes

Global precipitation data sets with high spatial and temporal resolution are needed for many applications, but they were unavailable before the recent creation of several such satellite products. Here, we evaluate four different satellite data sets of hourly or 3-hourly precipitation (namely CMORPH, PERSIANN, TRMM 3B42 and a microwave-only product referred to as MI) by comparing the spatial patterns in seasonal mean precipitation amount, daily precipitation frequency and intensity, and the diurnal and semidiurnal cycles among them and with surface synoptic weather reports. We found that these high-resolution products show spatial patterns in seasonal mean precipitation amount comparable to other monthly products for the low- and mid-latitudes, and the mean daily precipitation frequency and intensity maps are similar among these pure satellite-based precipitation data sets and consistent with the frequency derived using weather reports over land. The satellite data show that spatial variations in mean precipitation amount come largely from precipitation frequency rather than intensity, and that the use of satellite infrared (IR) observations to improve sampling does not change the mean frequency, intensity and the diurnal cycle significantly. Consistent with previous studies, the satellite data show that sub-daily variations in precipitation are dominated by the 24-h cycle, which has an afternoon–evening maximum and mean-to-peak amplitude of 30–100% of the daily mean in precipitation amount over most land areas during summer. Over most oceans, the 24-h harmonic has a peak from midnight to early morning with an amplitude of 10–30% during both winter and summer. These diurnal results are broadly consistent with those based on the weather reports, although the time of maximum in the satellite precipitation is a few hours later (especially for TRMM and PERSIANN) than that in the surface observations over most land and ocean, and it is closer to the phase of showery precipitation from the weather reports. The TRMM and PERSIANN precipitation shows a spatially coherent time of maximum around 0300–0600 local solar time (LST) for a weak (amplitude <20%) semi-diurnal (12-h) cycle over most mid- to high-latitudes, comparable to 0400–0600 LST in the surface data. The satellite data also confirm the notion that the diurnal cycle of precipitation amount comes mostly from its frequency rather than its intensity over most low and mid-latitudes, with the intensity has only about half of the strength of the diurnal cycle in the frequency and amount. The results suggest that these relatively new precipitation products can be useful for many applications.     

Analyse régionale des simulations climatiques du modèle canadien de circulation générale de l'atmosphère pour le territoire québécois

Abstract

Current understanding of the possible nature of climatic change at the regional scale is limited by the spatial resolution of General Circulation Models (GCM). The use of GCM outputs without correction linked to the spatial variability of the variables can bring significant errors in their utilization at the regional scale. The potential of the Canadian GCM for regional applications in Quebec has been analysed by comparison to the climatic normals of temperature and precipitation, measured over the Quebec climatological network, on an annual and seasonal basis. This analysis has been undertaken with the support of a geographical information system (GIS) (PAMAP). In summary, a difference between the climatic normal and the GCM output has been estimated at 20% for temperature and 30% for precipitation. We present an analysis of a corrected regionalized scenario for the province of Quebec of the possible climatic change simulated by the Canadian GCM under the hypothesis of a doubling of atmospheric CO₂. Results show an increase of the annual average temperature of 4° C for summer and 6°C for winter, associated with an average increase of 80 mm (10%) in annual precipitation, reaching 25% in some regions.     

A simple soil moisture scheme for regional climate simulations in the tropics

Summary A regional climate model (RCM) is described which incorporates an improved scheme for soil moisture availability (SMA) compared to an earlier version. The improvement introduces a sensitivity of SMA to soil type, vegetation cover and ground albedo, making the model more adaptable to divers regions. In addition, the interactive SMA depends on past precipitation, ground temperature and terrain relief. Six RCM simulations of the monthly mean climate over southern Africa are performed at 0.5° grid spacing. Improvements in the RCM climate simulations compared to control runs are attributed to the newer SMA scheme. Only a slight improvement in skill results from driving the RCM with observational analyses as opposed to GCM “predicted” lateral boundary conditions. The high spatial resolution of the RCM provides a distinct advantage in the simulated spatial distribution of precipitation compared with a global model run at an effective grid spacing of 2.8°. The mesoscale precipitation signal in the RCM simulations is more dominant during the rather dry December 1982 than during December 1988. The improved SMA scheme contributed to a realistic partition between latent and sensible heat fluxes at the ground-atmosphere boundary and consequently a realistic diurnal cycle of ground temperature. Simulated differences in the spatial distribution of rainfall between December 1982 and December 1988 are more realistic with the improved scheme. Received June 28, 2001 Revised August 27, 2001     

Spatial and temporal variability of summer rainfall over Ethiopia from observations and a regional climate model experiment

The spatial and temporal variability of rainfall over Ethiopia during the summer (JJAS) season is studied using observations (both station and satellite based) and model simulation data. The simulation dataset is generated using the fourth version of the International Center for Theoretical Physics Regional Climate Model (RegCM4) for the period 1989–2005. Ethiopia is first divided into 12 homogeneous regions using criteria including rotated empirical orthogonal function (REOF), spatial correlation, seasonal cycles, and topographical features. Spatially averaged observed and simulated rainfall time series are then generated and analyzed for each region. Standardized rainfall anomalies of the observations and the simulated data are highly correlated over the northern, western, northeastern, central, and southwestern regions, while a weak correlation is found over the border regions of the country. The dominant modes of rainfall variability are identified using REOF, while time–frequency variations of different dominant modes are described by wavelet analysis. The first leading patterns of rainfall and upper wind (averaged between 100 and 300 hPa) are highly correlated and exhibit similar features between simulation and observations over the northern, western, southwestern, and eastern regions of Ethiopia. The second loading pattern of rainfall and the first loading pattern of low-level wind (averaged between 850 and 1,000 hPa) exhibit a dipole structure across the southwestern and northeastern regions of the country. The dominant signals in the first rotated principal component (RPC) of rainfall and upper level wind fields show a period of 4–5 and 2–3 years, while the dominant signals in the second RPC show a period of 2–3 years at a 0.05 significance level. The correlations of significant RPCs across gauge, gridded, and model rainfall fields with that of low and upper level winds show the presence of a significant relationship (correlation exceeding ～0.6). Overall, the RegCM4 shows a good performance in simulating the spatial and temporal variability of precipitation over Ethiopia.     

Simulation of the annual and diurnal cycles of rainfall over South Africa by a regional climate model

The capability of a current state-of-the-art regional climate model for simulating the diurnal and annual cycles of rainfall over a complex subtropical region is documented here. Hourly rainfall is simulated over Southern Africa for 1998–2006 by the non-hydrostatic model weather research and forecasting (WRF), and compared to a network of 103 stations covering South Africa. We used five simulations, four of which consist of different parameterizations for atmospheric convection at a 0.5 × 0.5° resolution, performed to test the physic-dependency of the results. The fifth experiment uses explicit convection over tropical South Africa at a 1/30° resolution. WRF simulates realistic mean rainfall fields, albeit wet biases over tropical Africa. The model mean biases are strongly modulated by the convective scheme used for the simulations. The annual cycle of rainfall is well simulated over South Africa, mostly influenced by tropical summer rainfall except in the Western Cape region experiencing winter rainfall. The diurnal cycle shows a timing bias, with atmospheric convection occurring too early in the afternoon, and causing too abundant rainfall. This result, particularly true in summer over the northeastern part of the country, is weakly physic-dependent. Cloud-resolving simulations do not clearly reduce the diurnal cycle biases. In the end, the rainfall overestimations appear to be mostly imputable to the afternoon hours of the austral summer rainy season, i.e., the periods during which convective activity is intense over the region.     

Decadal long convection-permitting regional climate simulations over eastern China: evaluation of diurnal cycle of precipitation

With a decadal long period (1998–2010) climate simulation using the Weather Research and Forecasting model at convection-permitting resolution (4 km) (WRF_CPM), the diurnal cycles of precipitation amount (PA), frequency (PF) and intensity (PI) and their related large-scale atmospheric circulations over eastern China are analyzed. The simulations are further compared against the CN05.1, CMORPH v1.0 and the ECMWF Re-Analysis Interim (ERAIN). Results show that WRF_CPM can reasonably represent the observed seasonal rainfall and the atmospheric circulations. As for the features at a sub-daily scale, WRF_CPM is superior at reproducing the diurnal amplitude of PF that is similar to PA in terms of the spatial distribution. Moreover, the diurnal peak timing of summer PF and PA over the three sub-regions, i.e., North China (NC), Yangtze-Huaihe River basin (YHR) and South China (SC), can be properly reproduced by WRF_CPM. The observed precipitation systems exhibit obvious eastward propagation from the Plateau to its downstream, which may be due to the solenoid circulations associated with the low-level anomalous wind and moisture convergence. However, they are almost overestimated by WRF_CPM and in turn causing overestimated precipitation along YHR. The early morning precipitation in WRF_CPM has a larger fraction than CMORPH, which is related to the overestimated nocturnal low-level jet. Whereas, due to the solar heating and the land-sea breezes, the late-afternoon precipitation peak is mainly located along the coasts of eastern China, which matches well with the vertical motion in WRF_CPM.     

Progress in Studies of the Precipitation Diurnal Variation over Contiguous China

This paper summarizes the recent progress in studies of the diurnal variation of precipitation over con- tiguous China. The main results are as follows. （1） The rainfall diurnal variation over contiguous China presents distinct regional features. In summer, precipitation peaks in the late afternoon over the south- ern inland China and northeastern China, while it peaks around midnight over southwestern China. In the upper and middle reaches of Yangtze River valley, precipitation occurs mostly in the early morning. Summer precipitation over the central eastern China （most regions of the Tibetan Plateau） has two diurnal peaks, i.e., one in the early morning （midnight） and the other in the late afternoon. （2） The rainfall diurnal variation experiences obvious seasonal and sub-seasonal evolutions. In cold seasons, the regional contrast of rainfall diurnal peaks decreases, with an early morning maximum over most of the southern China. Over the central eastern China, diurnal monsoon rainfall shows sub-seasonal variations with the movement of summer monsoon systems. The rainfall peak mainly occurs in the early morning （late afternoon） during the active （break） monsoon period. （3） Cloud properties and occurrence time of rainfall diurnal peaks are different for long- and short-duration rainfall events. Long-duration rainfall events are dominated by strat- iform precipitation, with the maximum surface rain rate and the highest profile occurring in the late night to early morning, while short-duration rainfall events are more related to convective precipitation, with the maximum surface rain rate and the highest profile occurring between the late afternoon and early night. （4） The rainfall diurnal variation is influenced by multi-scale mountain-valley and land-sea breezes as well as large-scale atmospheric circulation, and involves complicated formation and evolution of cloud and rainfall systems. The diurnal cycle of winds in the lower troposphere also contributes to the regional differences     

Validation of satellite rainfall products over Greece

Six widely available satellite precipitation products were extensively validated and intercompared on monthly-to-seasonal timescales and various spatial scales, for the period 1998–2006, using a dense station network over Greece. Satellite products were divided into three groups according to their spatial resolution. The first group had high spatial (0.5°) resolution and consists only of Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) products: the TRMM Microwave Imager (TMI) precipitation product (3A12) and the TRMM multisatellite precipitation analysis products (3B42 and 3B43). The second group comprised products with medium spatial (1°) resolution. These products included the TRMM 3B42 and 3B43 estimates (remapped to 1° resolution) and the Global Precipitation Climatology Project one-degree daily (GPCP-1DD) analysis. The third group consisted of low spatial (2.5°) resolution products and included the 3B43 product (remapped to 2.5° resolution), the GPCP Satellite and Gauge (GPCP-SG) product, and the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration Climate Prediction Center (NOAA-CPC) Merged Analysis (CMAP). Rain gauge data were first gridded and then compared with monthly and seasonal precipitation totals as well as with long-term averages of the six satellite products at different spatial resolutions (2.5°, 1°, and 0.5°). The results demonstrated the excellent performance of the 3B43 product over Greece in all three spatial scales. 3B42 from the first and second group and CMAP from the third exhibited a reasonable skill.     

Evaluation of an ensemble of regional climate model simulations over South America driven by the ERA-Interim reanalysis: model performance and uncertainties

The capability of a set of 7 coordinated regional climate model simulations performed in the framework of the CLARIS-LPB Project in reproducing the mean climate conditions over the South American continent has been evaluated. The model simulations were forced by the ERA-Interim reanalysis dataset for the period 1990–2008 on a grid resolution of 50 km, following the CORDEX protocol. The analysis was focused on evaluating the reliability of simulating mean precipitation and surface air temperature, which are the variables most commonly used for impact studies. Both the common features and the differences among individual models have been evaluated and compared against several observational datasets. In this study the ensemble bias and the degree of agreement among individual models have been quantified. The evaluation was focused on the seasonal means, the area-averaged annual cycles and the frequency distributions of monthly means over target sub-regions. Results show that the Regional Climate Model ensemble reproduces adequately well these features, with biases mostly within ±2 °C and ±20 % for temperature and precipitation, respectively. However, the multi-model ensemble depicts larger biases and larger uncertainty (as defined by the standard deviation of the models) over tropical regions compared with subtropical regions. Though some systematic biases were detected particularly over the La Plata Basin region, such as underestimation of rainfall during winter months and overestimation of temperature during summer months, every model shares a similar behavior and, consequently, the uncertainty in simulating current climate conditions is low. Every model is able to capture the variety in the shape of the frequency distribution for both temperature and precipitation along the South American continent. Differences among individual models and observations revealed the nature of individual model biases, showing either a shift in the distribution or an overestimation or underestimation of the range of variability.