Daily rainfall projections from general circulation models with a downscaling nonhomogeneous hidden Markov model (NHMM) for south‐eastern Australia

An ensemble of stochastic daily rainfall projections has been generated for 30 stations across south‐eastern Australia using the downscaling nonhomogeneous hidden Markov model, which was driven by atmospheric predictors from four climate models for three IPCC emissions scenarios (A1B, A2, and B1) and for two periods (2046–2065 and 2081–2100). The results indicate that the annual rainfall is projected to decrease for both periods for all scenarios and climate models, with the exception of a few scenarios of no statistically significant changes. However, there is a seasonal difference: two downscaled GCMs consistently project a decline of summer rainfall, and two an increase. In contrast, all four downscaled GCMs show a decrease of winter rainfall. Because winter rainfall accounts for two‐thirds of the annual rainfall and produces the majority of streamflow for this region, this decrease in winter rainfall would cause additional water availability concerns in the southern Murray–Darling basin, given that water shortage is already a critical problem in the region. In addition, the annual maximum daily rainfall is projected to intensify in the future, particularly by the end of the 21st century; the maximum length of consecutive dry days is projected to increase, and correspondingly, the maximum length of consecutive wet days is projected to decrease. These changes in daily sequencing, combined with fewer events of reduced amount, could lead to drier catchment soil profiles and further reduce runoff potential and, hence, also have streamflow and water availability implications. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Downscaling a twentieth century global climate simulation to the North Sea

The regional ocean model system (ROMS) is used to downscale a 26-year period of the twentieth century 20C3M experiment from the global coupled Bergen climate model (BCM) for the North Sea. Compared to an observational-based climatology, BCM have good results on the mean temperature, except for too low winter temperature. This is connected to a too weak inflow of Atlantic water. The downscaling gives added value to the BCM results by providing regional details, doubling the Atlantic inflow, and improving the mean winter temperature. For mean salinity, BCM has values very close to the climatology, whereas the downscaling becomes too fresh. The downscaling, however, improves the sea surface salinity, the vertical structure, and the Norwegian Coastal Current. It is concluded that the downscaling procedure as presented here is a suitable tool for assessing the future Atlantic inflow and sea temperature in the North Sea based on a global climate projection.     

Statistical Downscaling Based on Dynamically DownscaledPredictors： Application to Monthly Precipitation in Sweden

A prerequisite of a successful statistical downscaling is that large-scale predictors simulated by the General Circulation Model (GCM) must be realistic. It is assumed here that features smaller than the GCM resolution are important in determining the realism of the large-scale predictors. It is tested whether a three-step method can improve conventional one-step statistical downscaling. The method uses predictors that are upscaled from a dynamical downscaling instead of predictors taken directly from a GCM simulation. The method is applied to downscaling of monthly precipitation in Sweden. The statistical model used is a multiple regression model that uses indices of large-scale atmospheric circulation and 850-hPa specific humidity as predictors. Data from two GCMs (HadCM2 and ECHAM4) and two RCM experiments of the Rossby Centre model (RCA1) driven by the GCMs are used. It is found that upscaled RCA1 predictors capture the seasonal cycle better than those from the GCMs, and hence increase the reliability of the downscaled precipitation. However, there are only slight improvements in the simulation of the seasonal cycle of downscaled precipitation. Due to the cost of the method and the limited improvements in the downscaling results, the three-step method is not justified to replace the one-step method for downscaling of Swedish precipitation.     

Climate change and North Sea storm surge extremes: an ensemble study of storm surge extremes expected in a changed climate projected by four different regional climate models

The coastal zones are facing the prospect of changing storm surge statistics due to anthropogenic climate change. In the present study, we examine these prospects for the North Sea based on numerical modelling. The main tool is the barotropic tide-surge model TRIMGEO (Tidal Residual and Intertidal Mudflat Model) to derive storm surge climate and extremes from atmospheric conditions. The analysis is carried out by using an ensemble of four 30-year atmospheric regional simulations under present-day and possible future-enhanced greenhouse gas conditions. The atmospheric regional simulations were prepared within the EU project PRUDENCE (Prediction of Regional scenarios and Uncertainties for Defining EuropeaN Climate change risks and Effects). The research strategy of PRUDENCE is to compare simulations of different regional models driven by the same global control and climate change simulations. These global conditions, representative for 1961–1990 and 2071–2100 were prepared by the Hadley Center based on the IPCC A2 SRES scenario. The results suggest that under future climatic conditions, storm surge extremes may increase along the North Sea coast towards the end of this century. Based on a comparison between the results of the different ensemble members as well as on the variability estimated from a high-resolution storm surge reconstruction of the recent decades it is found that this increase is significantly different from zero at the 95% confidence level for most of the North Sea coast. An exception represents the East coast of the UK which is not affected by this increase of storm surge extremes.     

DOWNSCALING FORECAST OF MONTHLY PRECIPITATION OVER GUANGXI BASED ON BP NEURAL NETWORK MODEL

Variables fields such as enstrophy, meridional-wind and zonal-wind variables are derived from monthly 500 hPa geopotential height anomalous fields. In this work, we select original predictors from monthly 500-hPa geopotential height anomalous fields and their variables in June of 1958 - 2001, and determine comprehensive predictors by conducting empirical orthogonal function (EOF) respectively with the original predictors. A downscaling forecast model based on the back propagation (BP) neural network is built by use of the comprehensive predictors to predict the monthly precipitation in June over Guangxi with the monthly dynamic extended range forecast products. For comparison, we also build another BP neural network model with the same predictands by using the former comprehensive predictors selected from 500-hPa geopotential height anomalous fields in May to December of 1957 - 2000 and January to April of 1958 - 2001. The two models are tested and results show that the precision of superposition of the downscaling model is better than that of the one based on former comprehensive predictors, but the prediction accuracy of the downscaling model depends on the output of monthly dynamic extended range forecast.     

未来黄、东海营养盐浓度变化情景预测

本文基于FGOALS(Flexible Global Ocean-Atmosphere-Land System model)对未来气候情景的预测结果,结合千年生态评估的未来两个情景下的河流营养盐载荷特征,利用黄、东海水动力模型和生态模型并采用降尺度的方法对未来黄、东海营养盐的分布特征进行情景预测。结果表明,两个情景下未来河口邻近海区营养盐浓度将显著增加,富营养化加剧;GO(Global Orchestration)情景下,河流无机氮载荷增幅较大,夏季黄海中部无机氮浓度明显升高;AM(Adapting mosaic)情景下,由于河流无机磷载荷增幅较大,海区氮磷比有所下降,夏季黄海中部表层无机氮浓度降低,而在底层升高。通过敏感性实验并结合收支分析对各海区水动力条件未来变化、河流载荷变化的相对贡献进行了评估:相对于水温和水动力环境改变,河流营养盐排放量的增长是未来营养盐浓度增加的主要原因。营养盐收支分析表明,未来对流和混合输运的变化有助于黄海营养盐浓度的增加,夏季生物量升高造成更多碎屑沉降并在底层矿化使得层化季节冷水团底部营养盐浓度增长;长江口邻近海区营养盐浓度增长主要受冲淡水羽流的影响;净初级生产增加加剧了营养盐的消耗。     

华东地区月平均气温统计降尺度方法比较

用中国地面气象观测站的逐日气温观测资料和NCEP/NCAR再分析资料,分别使用基于多元线性回归(MLR)和3种主成分分析(PCA)的统计降尺度方法,对1959-2008年的华东地区的月平均气温分两个时段进行统计降尺度分析并加以检验,比较了不同降尺度方法的结果。结果表明:对于华东地区气温的统计降尺度预报,基于MLR的统计降尺度方法相对于3种PCA方法而言,对单站年际变化模拟方面有一定优势。PCA方法应用于统计降尺度时,预报因子的区域选择是影响统计降尺度结果的重要因素之一。对于温度进行统计降尺度分析时,预报因子中包含温度因子是非常必要的;所试验的4种降尺度方法,对各站点多年平均情况的模拟要好于对区域平均的年际变化的模拟。     

Seasonal prediction of June rainfall over South China: Model assessment and statistical downscaling

The performances of various dynamical models from the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation(APEC) Climate Center(APCC) multi-model ensemble(MME) in predicting station-scale rainfall in South China(SC) in June were evaluated.It was found that the MME mean of model hindcasts can skillfully predict the June rainfall anomaly averaged over the SC domain.This could be related to the MME's ability in capturing the observed linkages between SC rainfall and atmospheric large-scale circulation anomalies in the Indo-Pacific region.Further assessment of station-scale June rainfall prediction based on direct model output(DMO) over 97 stations in SC revealed that the MME mean outperforms each individual model.However,poor prediction abilities in some in-land and southeastern SC stations are apparent in the MME mean and in a number of models.In order to improve the performance at those stations with poor DMO prediction skill,a station-based statistical downscaling scheme was constructed and applied to the individual and MME mean hindcast runs.For several models,this scheme can outperform DMO at more than 30 stations,because it can tap into the abilities of the models in capturing the anomalous Indo-Paciric circulation to which SC rainfall is considerably sensitive.Therefore,enhanced rainfall prediction abilities in these models should make them more useful for disaster preparedness and mitigation purposes.     

黄淮地区夏季日降水分区概率预报方法研究

利用我国黄淮地区1961—2010年50年6—8月的日降水资料,采用REOF和t检验的方法,将中国黄淮地区夏季降水分成Ⅰ—Ⅴ区。5个区域进行差异性t检验表明5个区域之间（彼此）差异显著,说明了区域划分的正确性。在此基础上利用1999—2007年6—8月站点日降水资料以及CFSv2模式后预报的日降水资料建立了5个区域内共5个代表站点的夏季日降水概率预报方程,并进行了确定性、概率性预报检验和业务试用检验。对各区域内5个代表站日降水量的确定性预报检验表明：Logistic回归降水概率预报方程的TS评分要高于CFSv2模式预报和T213的集合预报平均,空报率也低于CFSv2模式预报和T213集合预报平均,但是漏报率却略高。各区域代表站日降水量的概率预报Brier评分检验表明：Brier评分均不超过0.2,大大低于T213集合预报所得概率预报的Brier评分分值,说明本文Logistic回归方程的概率预报较为可靠。Brier技巧评分表明：Logistic回归降水概率预报方程各站的BSS技巧评分都大于0.0,说明各站的预报技巧高于检验样本气候概率的预报技巧,且高于T213集合预报的Brier技巧评分,说明在分区基础上建立Logistic回归降水概率预报方程的方法是有预报意义的。     

Using a Bayesian estimator to combine information from a cluster analysis and remote sensing data to estimate high-resolution data for agricultural production in Germany

In Germany, a county-resolution data set that consists of 35 land-use and animal-stock categories has been used extensively to assess the impact of agriculture on the environment. However, because such environmental effects as emission or nutrient surplus depend on the location, even a county resolution might produce misleading results. The aim of this article is to propose a Bayesian approach which combines two sorts of information, with one being treated as defining the prior and the other the data to form a posterior, used to estimate a data set at a municipality resolution. We define the joint prior density function based on (i) remote sensing data, thus accounting for differences in county data and missing data at the municipality level, and (ii) the results of a cluster analysis that was previously applied to the micro-census, whereas the data are defined by official statistics at the county level. This approach results in a fairly accurate data set at the municipality level. The results, using the proposed method, are validated by the national research data centre by comparing the estimates to actual observations. The test statistics presented here demonstrate that the proposed approach adequately estimates the production activities.