Does global warming favour the occurrence of extreme floods in European Alps? First evidences from a NW Alps proglacial lake sediment record

Flood hazard is expected to increase in the context of global warming. However, long time-series of climate and gauge data at high-elevation are too sparse to assess reliably the rate of recurrence of such events in mountain areas. Here paleolimnological techniques were used to assess the evolution of frequency and magnitude of flash flood events in the North-western European Alps since the Little Ice Age (LIA). The aim was to document a possible effect of the post-19^th century global warming on torrential floods frequency and magnitude. Altogether 56 flood deposits were detected from grain size and geochemical measurements performed on gravity cores taken in the proglacial Lake Blanc (2170?m?a.s.l., Belledonne Massif, NW French Alps). The age model relies on radiometric dating (¹³⁷Cs and ²⁴¹Am), historic lead contamination and the correlation of major flood- and earthquake-triggered deposits, with recognized occurrences in historical written archives. The resulting flood calendar spans the last ca 270?years (AD 1740–AD 2007). The magnitude of flood events was inferred from the accumulated sediment mass per flood event and compared with reconstructed or homogenized datasets of precipitation, temperature and glacier variations. Whereas the decennial flood frequency seems to be independent of seasonal precipitation, a relationship with summer temperature fluctuations can be observed at decadal timescales. Most of the extreme flood events took place since the beginning of the 20^th century with the strongest occurring in 2005. Our record thus suggests climate warming is favouring the occurrence of high magnitude torrential flood events in high-altitude catchments.     

1876-1878年中国大范围持续干旱事件

研究1876-1878年中国持续3年的大范围严重干旱,这是发生在小冰期将结束、全球气候迅速变暖之前的寒冷气候背景下的重大气象灾害和极端气候事件。依据历史文献记载复原了干旱发生、发展的动态过程,统计逐年受旱县数,绘制了历年旱灾和伴生的饥荒、蝗灾、疫疾发生地域实况图。这次持续干旱范围广及13个省份,干旱的中心区域在山西、河南、陕西。旱区中心1877年连续无透雨时段超过200 d,跨年度的连续无透雨时段最长达340 d。其严重程度超过20世纪最严重的1928-1930年的干旱事件。该事件发生于太阳黑子第11活动周的下降时段和第12周的太阳黑子极小值年,又位于厄尔尼诺（El Nino）事件频繁期, 对应于极强的El Nino事件。     

Trends in flood seasonality of the River Ouse (Northern England) from archive and instrumental sources since AD 1600

The last decade has witnessed an increase in the application of historical records (historical and documentary) in developing a more complete understanding of high-magnitude flood frequency; but little consideration has been given to the additional information that documentary accounts contain, particularly relating to flood seasonality. This paper examines the methods and approaches available in long-term flood seasonality analysis and applies them to the River Ouse (Yorkshire) in Northern England since AD 1600. A detailed historical flood record is available for the City of York consisting of annual maxima flood levels since AD 1877, with documentary accounts prior to this. A detailed analysis of long-term flood seasonality requires confidence in the accuracy and completeness of flood records; as a result the augmented flood series are analysed using three strategies: firstly, considering all recorded floods since AD 1600; secondly, through detailed analysis of the more complete record since AD 1800; and finally, applying a threshold to focus on high-magnitude flood events since AD 1800. The results identify later winter flooding, particularly in the second half of the twentieth century, with a notable reduction in summer flood events at York during the twentieth century compared to previous centuries. Flood generating mechanisms vary little between the periods considered, with a general pattern of stability in the ratio of floods incorporating a snowmelt component.     

陕西关中及周边地区近500a来初夏旱涝事件初步分析

基于华山树轮宽度差值年表重建的陕西关中及周边地区近500a来的初夏干燥指数序列,对该地区初夏极端旱涝事件及其连续旱涝变化特征进行了初步分析.区域干燥指数与Palmer指数在变化上极为相似,可用于反映该地区的旱涝变化.结果表明:该地区近500a来初夏共发生18次极端干旱事件和11次极端洪涝事件,除公元1521年与历史文献记录的旱涝事件相反,公元1513年、1574年、1675年和1945年未发现历史记录外,其余年份均能找到相应记录;近500a来初夏存在9个显著的连续偏旱期和10个显著的连续偏涝期,并以16和19世纪发生的连续旱涝事件最为频繁,而17和18世纪发生的旱涝事件相对较少,20世纪发生的干旱事件明显多于洪涝事件.     

Magnitude and Frequency of Flooding in the Tagus Basin (Central Spain) over the Last Millennium

A relational database using Access, and an interface based on a Geographical Information System (GIS) with ArcView program, were created to allow spatial-temporal analysis of documentary flood data collected for the Tagus basin (Central Spain). High flood frequencies were registered in the periods: AD 1160–1210 (3%), 1540–1640 (11%; peak at 1590–1610), 1730–1760 (5%), 1780–1810 (4%), 1870–1900 (19%), 1930–1950 (17%) and 1960–1980 (12%). Flood magnitudes of those documentary events were estimated at four sites (Aranjuez, Toledo, Talavera and Alcántara) along the Tagus River using HEC-RAS Computer program, matching the calculated water surface profiles with historical references of flood stage. The largest floods took place during the periods AD 1168–1211 (Toledo and Talavera), AD 1658–1706 (Talavera), AD 1870–1900, and AD 1930–1950 (Aranjuez, Toledo, Talavera and Alcántara). The temporal distribution of flood magnitude and frequency is discussed within the context of climatic variability experienced by the Iberian Peninsula. Although flood producing mechanisms of Atlantic and Mediterranean basins of the Iberian Peninsula are related to different, independent atmospheric patterns, there is a clear coincidence between most periods showing high flood frequencies. These periods of high flooding seem to correspond to the initial and final decades of periods with climate deterioration described at the continental scale. This suggests that climatic variability over the last millennium has induced a response in hydrological extremes (positive or negative), irrespective of the flood-producing mechanism.     

Estimating the Impact of Global Change on Flood and Drought Risks in Europe: A Continental, Integrated Analysis

Most studies on the impact of climate change on regional water resources focus on long-term average flows or mean water availability, and they rarely take the effects of altered human water use into account. When analyzing extreme events such as floods and droughts, the assessments are typically confined to smaller areas and case studies. At the same time it is acknowledged that climate change may severely alter the risk of hydrological extremes over large regional scales, and that human water use will put additional pressure on future water resources. In an attempt to bridge these various aspects, this paper presents a first-time continental, integrated analysis of possible impacts of global change (here defined as climate and water use change) on future flood and drought frequencies for the selected study area of Europe. The global integrated water model WaterGAP is evaluated regarding its capability to simulate high and low-flow regimes and is then applied to calculate relative changes in flood and drought frequencies. The results indicate large ‘critical regions’ for which significant changes in flood or drought risks are expected under the proposed global change scenarios. The regions most prone to a rise in flood frequencies are northern to northeastern Europe, while southern and southeastern Europe show significant increases in drought frequencies. In the critical regions, events with an intensity of today's 100-year floods and droughts may recur every 10–50 years by the 2070s. Though interim and preliminary, and despite the inherent uncertainties in the presented approach, the results underpin the importance of developing mitigation and adaptation strategies for global change impacts on a continental scale.     

The "Little Ice Age" and its Geomorphological Consequences in Mediterranean Europe

Alpine glacier advances in the "Little Ice Age" took place in the decades around 1320, 1600, 1700 and 1810. They were the outcome of snowier winters and cooler summers than those of the twentieth century. Documentary records from Crete in particular, and also from Italy, southern France and southeast Spain point to a greater frequency in Mediterranean Europe's mountainous regions of severe floods, droughts and frosts at times of "Little Ice Age" Alpine glacier advances. Deluges, when more than 200 mm of rain fall within 24 hours, are most frequent on mountainous areas near the coast. An instance is given of the geomorphological consequences of a great deluge which struck the Tech valley in the eastern Pyrenees on 17 October 1940. An increased frequency of deluges, probably at times when Alpine glaciers were advancing in the "Little Ice Age" and earlier in the Holocene, in areas known to be tectonically unstable and underlain by soft sediments, could better explain the occurrence of fluvial terraces in Mediterranean Europe sometimes known as the "younger fill", than soil erosion resulting from deforestation.     

基于降水数据的云南省近61年旱涝特性研究

选择标准化降水指数(SPI)刻画旱涝特征,基于云南省1954—2014年间32个气象站点逐月降水量资料,采用经验正交函数(EOF)方法、径向基函数(RBF)空间插值法、小波分析法,分析了近61年来云南省SPI序列、旱涝情态的时间特征和空间格局。结果表明:近61年来,云南省整体呈现干旱趋势(SPI变率为-0.009 1),SPI序列在2000年之后变化更加剧烈、速率加快。旱涝等级时间序列中,偏涝至偏旱年份占88.52%,大旱占4.92%,重旱和大涝均占3.28%,且自2003年以后,发生干旱的次数和强度明显增加。旱灾易发区主要分布于2个片区:景洪-思茅-元江站片区,以及沾益站东北地区;洪涝易发区主要分布于3个片区:临沧-大理-华坪沿线的西部片区,昭通站北部区域,及云南省东南部片区。干旱与洪涝事件发生的频率具有较好的对应性,但干旱事件发生的频率要略高于洪涝事件。EOF分析的第一个模态表明云南省整体呈现一致性的变涝或变旱特征,可能受到大尺度气候特征影响,第二模态可能受到地形因素的控制,第三模态可能与季风、大气环流等多种因素的影响有关;相应的时间系数也印证了云南省整体具有干旱趋势。SPI序列存在准2 a、准6 a、准8 a、准18 a、准28 a的周期性特征,且以准28 a为主周期。      

中国小冰期气候研究综述

通过对小冰期研究文献进行综述,并对已发表的小冰期温度和降水数据进行综合对比分析,探讨小冰期时期中国气候特征的区域性.结果表明,小冰期在中国地区不同区域代用指标记录中均存在,但是小冰期的起讫及持续时间具有区域差异性,温湿配置也不尽相同.小冰期的起始时间主要呈现出由西向东推移的趋势,即青藏高原最早,华北地区次之而东部地区最晚.温湿配置的差异主要体现在东部季风区小冰期时期总体上是冷干的气候环境,而西部地区气候变化则呈现冷湿的气候特征.     

Trends in evaporation of a large subtropical lake

In order to further investigate the capability of the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) to identify flood/drought events, monthly precipitation data from 26 precipitation stations and monthly discharge data from four hydrological stations from 1960 to 2006 in the Minjiang River basin were used to analyze the correlations between multiple time scales of the SPI and river discharge. The SPI series that had a maximum correlation with discharge was chosen to detect flood/drought events in the basin, and the results were compared to historical flood/drought events. The results indicated the following. (1) High Pearson correlations between the SPI and discharge were identified at shorter time scales (1 to 3 months), and the maximum correlation was found on the time scale of 2 months. (2) Five floods among the six largest historical flood events in the Minjiang River basin were identified with the 2-month SPI, but the SPI does have shortcomings in identifying more general floods. The SPI also identified major drought events that were consistent with historical data. This demonstrates that the 2-month SPI is an effective indicator for the identification of major flood/drought events in the Minjiang River basin.     

"Little Ice Age" Research: A Perspective from Iceland

The development during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries of the sciences of meteorology and climatology and their subdisciplines has made possible an ever-increasing understanding of the climate of the past. In particular, the refinement of palaeoclimatic proxy data has meant that the climate of the past thousand years has begun to be extensively studied. In the context of this research, it has often been suggested that a warm epoch occurred in much of northern Europe, the north Atlantic, and other parts of the world, from around the ninth through the fourteenth centuries, and that this was followed by a decline in temperatures culminating in a "Little Ice Age" from about 1550 to 1850 (see e.g. Lamb, 1965, 1977; Flohn, 1978). The appelations "Medieval Warm Period" and "Little Ice Age" have entered the literature and are frequently used without clear definition. More recently, however, these terms have come under closer scrutiny (see, e.g. Ogilvie, 1991, 1992; Bradley and Jones, 1992; Mikami, 1992; Briffa and Jones, 1993; Bradley and Jones, 1993; Hughes and Diaz, 1994; Jones et al., 1998; Mann et al., 1999; Crowley and Lowery, 2000). As research continues into climatic fluctuations over the last 1000 to 2000 years, a pattern is emerging which suggests a far more complex picture than early research into the history of climate suggested. In this paper, the origins of the term "Little Ice Age" are considered. Because of the emphasis on the North Atlantic in this volume, the prime focus is on research that has been undertaken in this region, with a perspective on the historiography of historical climatology in Iceland as well as on the twentieth-century climate of Iceland. The phrase "Little Ice Age" has become part of the scientific and popular thinking on the climate of the past thousand years. However, as knowledge of the climate of the Holocene continues to grow, the term now seems to cloud rather than clarify thinking on the climate of the past thousand years. It is hoped that the discussion here will encourage future researchers to focus their thinking on exactly and precisely what is meant when the term "Little Ice Age" is used.     

1730年夏季黄淮地区暴雨极端事件研究

1730年（清雍正八年）7—8月,我国黄淮地区连续暴雨17 d,引起黄河、大运河和淮河暴涨、决堤的大范围洪涝灾害。这是小冰期中相对温暖时段气候背景下的极端气候事件。本文依据历史文献记载复原了1730年夏季暴雨时段的天气实况,绘制了暴雨区域图显示强降雨中心移动动态和水灾地域分布图,概述当年气候特点,指出暴雨事件与台风活动的关联。1730年是太阳活动周极小年的前3年、有重大火山活动,是极强的厄尔尼诺事件后的第2年。这些天气特点和背景条件与现代罕见的1975年河南“75?8暴雨”相似。     

长江流域及三峡库区近542年旱涝演变特征

选取长江流域沿线及三峡库区12个代表站,根据中国500年旱涝图集等级和各站建站以来5—9月降水量资料,按照旱涝等级标准,分别得到长江全流域、上游流域、中游流域、下游流域及其三峡库区1470—2011年旱涝等级序列。结果表明:长江各流域及其三峡库区均呈现较为明显的旱涝交替阶段,20世纪偏旱频率强烈增加,19世纪和20世纪偏涝频率明显增加。长江流域和三峡库区偏旱以上等级具有准160年周期震荡,全流域偏涝以上存在准140年的周期震荡,但20世纪后有所减弱,三峡库区偏涝以上等级存在准百年的周期震荡。三峡建坝蓄水前后库区降水EOF时空分布呈一致减少趋势,与此同时长江上游降水呈下降趋势,反映了长江上游流域及三峡库区气候趋旱;M-K突变检验显示水库蓄水前后流域上游和库区降水均未发生显著变化。在全球气候变化的背景下,三峡库区旱涝演变并不是孤立事件,而是与长江上游乃至整个长江流域旱涝背景密不可分。     

清代华南地区低温灾害与旱涝灾害的相关性分析

收集并整理了清代（1644—1911年）华南地区对雪灾、冰冻、霜、霜冻、寒潮等低温事件的记载,探讨了低温灾害与旱涝灾害在空间上和时间上的相关关系。华南低温灾害频次总体东部高于西部。广州府、肇庆府以及东部潮州府为低温灾害多发的地区,这与旱灾、涝灾多发的地区一致。分析了低温冷害的周期性,华南低温冷害发生存在着6年、10年、17年、29年、54年、130年的周期,其中29年周期为第一主周期。探究了每30年低温、洪涝和干旱灾害发生的县次,发现低温灾害与旱灾具有显著相关性;并发现低温灾害与旱灾、涝灾具有相似的趋势,清前期和清后期低温灾害多发,清后期尤为严重。研究揭示了清代灾害多发的特征,探索了我国清代华南地区气候灾害的时空规律,为现代气候灾害的预测研究提供依据。      

An integrated socio-environmental framework for glacier hazard management and climate change adaptation: lessons from Lake 513, Cordillera Blanca, Peru

Glacier hazards threaten societies in mountain regions worldwide. Glacial lake outburst floods (GLOFs) pose risks to exposed and vulnerable populations and can be linked in part to long-term post-Little Ice Age climate change because precariously dammed glacial lakes sometimes formed as glaciers generally retreated after the mid-1800s. This paper provides an interdisciplinary and historical analysis of 40?years of glacier hazard management on Mount Hualcán, at glacial Lake 513, and in the city of Carhuaz in Peru’s Cordillera Blanca mountain range. The case study examines attempted hazard zoning, glacial lake evolution and monitoring, and emergency engineering projects to drain Lake 513. It also analyzes the 11 April 2010 Hualcán rock-ice avalanche that triggered a Lake 513 GLOF; we offer both a scientific assessment of the possible role of temperature on slope stability and a GIS spatial analysis of human impacts. Qualitative historical analysis of glacier hazard management since 1970 allows us to identify and explain why certain actions and policies to reduce risk were implemented or omitted. We extrapolate these case-specific variables to generate a broader socio-environmental framework identifying factors that can facilitate or impede disaster risk reduction and climate change adaptation. Facilitating factors are technical capacity, disaster events with visible hazards, institutional support, committed individuals, and international involvement. Impediments include divergent risk perceptions, imposed government policies, institutional instability, knowledge disparities, and invisible hazards. This framework emerges from an empirical analysis of a coupled social-ecological system and offers a holistic approach for integrating disaster risk reduction and climate change adaptation.     

历史寒冬极端气候事件的复原研究——1670/1671 年冬季严寒事件

1670/1671 年冬季中国东部地区异常严寒。本文依据历史文献记载复原该寒冬实况,绘制了雪、冰、冻雨和动植物冻害的地域分布图,连续降雪日数分布图和最大积雪深度分布图,可见河流封冻南界达27°N,是小冰期我国河流封冻的最南位置。依据各地寒冷记录和江河封冻、树木冻死的临界温度条件定量推断各地极端最低温度值,指出1671年1 月湖南衡山县的最低气温低至-15 ℃,比现代（1951—2000 年）极端最低气温记录低7 ℃。1670/1671 年寒冬之后华北、长江中下游地区夏季高温酷暑。这是小冰期寒冷阶段的典型寒冬之一,又是冬季严寒、夏季异常炎热的罕见个例。     

塔里木河流域冰川洪水对气候变暖的响应

In past 50 years, the air temperature fluctuation was raising trend in Tarim River Basin. The annual mean temperature has increased by 0.3℃ in the whole Tarim River Basin, and by 0.6℃ in the mountain areas. With global warming, the frequency of unstable and extreme climatic events increased, glaciers retreating accelerated and snow meltwater increased have resulted in the more frequency of snow-ice disasters such as glacier debrisflow and glacier flash flood etc. Since 1980s, in the process of intense climate warming, glaciers melting intensified, ice temperature rose and glaciers flows accelerated, and lead to more glacial lakes and extending water storage capacity and stronger glacial lake outburst floods occurrence. It is proposed that the monitoring and evaluating of the impact of climate change on water resources and floods should be enhanced.     

Detecting abrupt climate changes on different time scales

Two concepts are introduced for detecting abrupt climate changes. In the first case, the sampling frequency of climate data is high as compared to the frequency of climate events examined. The method is based on a separation of trend and noise in the data and is applicable to any dataset that satisfies some mild smoothness and statistical dependence conditions for the trend and the noise, respectively. We say that an abrupt change occurs when the first derivative of the trend function has a discontinuity and the task is to identify such points. The technique is applied to Northern Hemisphere temperature data from 1850 to 2009, Northern Hemisphere temperature data from proxy data, a.d. 200?C1995 and Holocene ??¹⁸O values going back to 11,700 years BP. Several abrupt changes are detected that are, among other things, beneficial for determining the Medieval Warm Period, Little Ice Age and Holocene Climate Optimum. In the second case, the sampling frequency is low relative to the frequency of climate events studied. A typical example includes Dansgaard?COeschger events. The methodology used here is based on a refinement of autoregressive conditional heteroscedastic models. The key element of this approach is the volatility that characterises the time-varying variance, and abrupt changes are defined by high volatilities. The technique applied to ??¹⁸O values going back to 122,950 years BP is suitable for identifying DO events. These two approaches for the two cases are closely related despite the fact that at first glance, they seem quite different.     

Development of flood exposure in the Netherlands during the 20th and 21st century

Flood risks of deltaic areas increase because of population growth, economic development, land subsidence and climatic changes such as sea-level rise. In this study, we analyze trends in flood exposure by combining spatially explicit historical, present, and future land-use data with detailed information on the maximum flood inundation in the Netherlands. We show that the total amount of urban area that can potentially become inundated due to floods from the sea or main rivers has increased six-fold during the 20th century, and may double again during the 21st century. Moreover, these developments took, and probably will take, place in areas with progressively higher potential inundation depths. Potential flood damage has increased exponentially over the 20th century (16 times) and is expected to continue to increase exponentially (∼ten-fold by 2100 with respect to 2000) assuming a high economic growth scenario. Flood damages increase more moderately (two- to three-fold by 2100 with respect to 2000) assuming a low growth scenario. The capacity to deal with catastrophic flood losses - expressed as the ratio damage/GDP - will, however, decrease slightly in the low growth scenario (by about 20%). This trend deviates from the historical trend of the 20th century, which shows an increasing capacity to cope with flood damage (almost doubling). Under the high growth scenario the capacity to deal with such losses eventually increases slightly (by about 25%). These findings illustrate that, despite higher projections of potential flood damage, high economic growth scenarios may not necessarily be worse than low growth scenarios in terms of the impact of floods.     

极端降水与干旱同步频发的研究进展

全球气候变暖已是不争的事实,其导致的极端气候事件增多、增强已成为全球性趋势。近年来全球多个区域存在旱涝并存、旱涝频发的趋势。研究表明,长期旱涝频发的主要原因是全球气温升高致使水循环在时间尺度上产生更强的非均匀性以及人为排放气溶胶粒子增多,短期旱涝急转的主要原因是大气环流形势、暖湿气流输送异常的耦合作用。现阶段对于极端降水和干旱事件同步频发的观测、诊断和模拟较少,不同气候地理条件下两者之间的关系及引起区域降水强度变化的关键性因子等方面亟需深入研究。