Spatial and temporal characteristics in streamflow-related hydroclimatic variables over western Canada. Part 1: 1950–2010

2016 ◽  
Vol 48 (4) ◽  
pp. 915-931 ◽  
Author(s):  
H. C. L. O'Neil ◽  
T. D. Prowse ◽  
B. R. Bonsal ◽  
Y. B. Dibike

A large portion of the freshwater in western Canada originates as snowpack from the northern Rocky Mountains. Temperature and precipitation in the region control the amount of snow accumulated and stored throughout the winter, and the intensity and timing of melt during the spring freshet. Therefore, trends in temperature, precipitation, snow accumulation, and snowmelt over western Canada are examined using the Mann-Kendall non-parametric test and an original geographic information system (GIS)-based approach to trend analysis on a newly produced high-resolution gridded climate dataset for the period 1950–2010. Temporal and spatial analyses of these hydroclimatic variables reveal that daily minimum temperature has increased more than daily maximum temperature, particularly during the cold season, and at higher elevations, contributing to earlier spring melt. Precipitation has decreased throughout the cold season and increased in the warm season, particularly in the northern half of the study area. Snow accumulation has decreased through all months of the year while snowmelt results indicate slight increases in mid-winter melt events and an earlier onset of the spring freshet. This study provides a summary of detected trends in key hydroclimatic variables across western Canada regarding the effects these changes can have on the spring freshet and streamflow throughout the region.

2016 ◽  
Vol 48 (4) ◽  
pp. 932-944 ◽  
Author(s):  
H. C. L. O'Neil ◽  
T. D. Prowse ◽  
B. R. Bonsal ◽  
Y. B. Dibike

Much of the freshwater in western Canada originates in the Rocky Mountains as snowpack. Temperature and precipitation patterns throughout the region control the amount of snow accumulated and stored throughout the winter, and the intensity and timing of melt during the spring freshet. Therefore, changes in temperature, precipitation, snow depth, and snowmelt over western Canada are examined through comparison of output from the current and future periods of a series of regional climate models for the time periods 1971–2000 and 2041–2070. Temporal and spatial analyses of these hydroclimatic variables indicate that minimum temperature is likely to increase more than maximum temperature, particularly during the cold season, possibly contributing to earlier spring melt. Precipitation is projected to increase, particularly in the north. In the coldest months of the year snow depth is expected to increase in northern areas and decrease across the rest of study area. Snowmelt results indicate increases in mid-winter melt events and an earlier onset of the spring freshet. This study provides a summary of potential future climate using key hydroclimatic variables across western Canada with regard to the effects these changes may have on streamflow and the spring freshet, and thus water resources, throughout the study area.


2012 ◽  
Vol 42 (3) ◽  
pp. 227-242
Author(s):  
Tomáš Litschmann ◽  
Jaroslav Rožnovský ◽  
Tomáš Středa ◽  
Hana Středová ◽  
Jiří Hebelka

Abstract The paper deals with the evaluation of temperature and humidity measurements in the vertical profile of Macocha Abyss (Moravian Karst, South Moravia, Czech Republic). The measuring profile on a rock wall is made up of seven HOBO-PRO sensors. Two other meteorological stations are installed at the bottom and near the upper edge of the abyss. The evaluation was designed separately for warm season (June 1, 2008 to August 31, 2008) and cold season (November 1, 2008 to February 28, 2009). In the warm season, distribution of inverse temperatures dominated in the abyss. Temperature differences between the bottom of the abyss and its upper edge reached about 10 ◦ C. At the bottom of the abyss, the minimum temperatures proved to be higher than at its upper edge and in its vicinity. Thermal circulation is evident to the depth of about 60 m. The highest temperatures were observed in the deeper layers of the abyss in the warm period at around 10 a.m. of Central European Summer Time. Towards the upper edge of the abyss, the hour of daily maximum temperature shifts to 2 to 4 p.m. In the cold season, the minimum temperature was observed between 6 and 7 a.m. of Central European Time. A decrease in the accumulation of cold air (cold-air pool formation) was not found in the lower floors of the abyss. This phenomenon does not occur even during clear nights. The depth of 60 m from the upper edge of the area maintains a high relative humidity (above 95%) in the warm season. However, humidity decreases from this depth towards the top of the abyss. In the cold season, the whole abyss is filled with air with relative humidity of 90 to 95%.


2014 ◽  
Vol 53 (9) ◽  
pp. 2148-2162 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bárbara Tencer ◽  
Andrew Weaver ◽  
Francis Zwiers

AbstractThe occurrence of individual extremes such as temperature and precipitation extremes can have a great impact on the environment. Agriculture, energy demands, and human health, among other activities, can be affected by extremely high or low temperatures and by extremely dry or wet conditions. The simultaneous or proximate occurrence of both types of extremes could lead to even more profound consequences, however. For example, a dry period can have more negative consequences on agriculture if it is concomitant with or followed by a period of extremely high temperatures. This study analyzes the joint occurrence of very wet conditions and high/low temperature events at stations in Canada. More than one-half of the stations showed a significant positive relationship at the daily time scale between warm nights (daily minimum temperature greater than the 90th percentile) or warm days (daily maximum temperature above the 90th percentile) and heavy-precipitation events (daily precipitation exceeding the 75th percentile), with the greater frequencies found for the east and southwest coasts during autumn and winter. Cold days (daily maximum temperature below the 10th percentile) occur together with intense precipitation more frequently during spring and summer. Simulations by regional climate models show good agreement with observations in the seasonal and spatial variability of the joint distribution, especially when an ensemble of simulations was used.


2005 ◽  
Vol 18 (23) ◽  
pp. 5011-5023 ◽  
Author(s):  
L. A. Vincent ◽  
T. C. Peterson ◽  
V. R. Barros ◽  
M. B. Marino ◽  
M. Rusticucci ◽  
...  

Abstract A workshop on enhancing climate change indices in South America was held in Maceió, Brazil, in August 2004. Scientists from eight southern countries brought daily climatological data from their region for a meticulous assessment of data quality and homogeneity, and for the preparation of climate change indices that can be used for analyses of changes in climate extremes. This study presents an examination of the trends over 1960–2000 in the indices of daily temperature extremes. The results indicate no consistent changes in the indices based on daily maximum temperature while significant trends were found in the indices based on daily minimum temperature. Significant increasing trends in the percentage of warm nights and decreasing trends in the percentage of cold nights were observed at many stations. It seems that this warming is mostly due to more warm nights and fewer cold nights during the summer (December–February) and fall (March–May). The stations with significant trends appear to be located closer to the west and east coasts of South America.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mastawesha Misganaw Engdaw ◽  
Andrew Ballinger ◽  
Gabriele Hegerl ◽  
Andrea Steiner

<p>In this study, we aim at quantifying the contribution of different forcings to changes in temperature extremes over 1981–2020 using CMIP6 climate model simulations. We first assess the changes in extreme hot and cold temperatures defined as days below 10% and above 90% of daily minimum temperature (TN10 and TN90) and daily maximum temperature (TX10 and TX90). We compute the change in percentage of extreme days per season for October-March (ONDJFM) and April-September (AMJJAS). Spatial and temporal trends are quantified using multi-model mean of all-forcings simulations. The same indices will be computed from aerosols-, greenhouse gases- and natural-only forcing simulations. The trends estimated from all-forcings simulations are then attributed to different forcings (aerosols-, greenhouse gases-, and natural-only) by considering uncertainties not only in amplitude but also in response patterns of climate models. The new statistical approach to climate change detection and attribution method by Ribes et al. (2017) is used to quantify the contribution of human-induced climate change. Preliminary results of the attribution analysis show that anthropogenic climate change has the largest contribution to the changes in temperature extremes in different regions of the world.</p><p><strong>Keywords:</strong> climate change, temperature, extreme events, attribution, CMIP6</p><p> </p><p><strong>Acknowledgement:</strong> This work was funded by the Austrian Science Fund (FWF) under Research Grant W1256 (Doctoral Programme Climate Change: Uncertainties, Thresholds and Coping Strategies)</p>


2013 ◽  
Vol 52 (10) ◽  
pp. 2363-2372 ◽  
Author(s):  
John R. Christy

AbstractThe International Surface Temperature Initiative is a worldwide effort to locate weather observations, digitize them for public access, and attach provenance to them. As part of that effort, this study sought documents of temperature observations for the nation of Uganda. Although scattered reports were found for the 1890s, consistent record keeping appears to have begun in 1900. Data were keyed in from images of several types of old forms as well as accessed electronically from several sources to extend the time series of 32 stations with at least 4 yr of data back as far as data were available. Important gaps still remain; 1979–93 has virtually no observations from any station. Because many stations were represented by more than one data source, a scheme is described to extract the “best guess” values for each station of monthly averages of the daily maximum, minimum, and mean temperature. A preliminary examination of the national time series indicates that, since the early twentieth century, it appears that Uganda experienced essentially no change in monthly-average daily maximum temperature but did experience a considerable rise in monthly-average daily minimum temperature, concentrated in the last three decades. Because there are many gaps in the data, it is hoped that readers with information on extant data that were not discovered for this study will contact the author or the project so that the data may be archived.


2009 ◽  
Vol 6 (8) ◽  
pp. 1361-1370 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. Xia ◽  
Y. Han ◽  
Z. Zhang ◽  
Z. Zhang ◽  
S. Wan

Abstract. The magnitude of daily minimum temperature increase is greater than that of daily maximum temperature increase under climate warming. This study was conducted to examine whether changes in soil respiration under diurnal warming are equal to the summed changes under day and night warming in a temperate steppe in northern China. A full factorial design with day and night warming was used in this study, including control, day (06:00 a.m.–06:00 p.m., local time) warming, night (06:00 p.m.–06:00 a.m.) warming, and diurnal warming. Day warming showed no effect on soil respiration, whereas night warming significantly increased soil respiration by 7.1% over the 3 growing seasons in 2006–2008. The insignificant effect of day warming on soil respiration could be attributable to the offset of the direct positive effects of increased temperature by the indirect negative effects via aggravating water limitation and suppressing ecosystem C assimilation. The positive effects of night warming on soil respiration were largely due to the stimulation of ecosystem C uptake and substrate supply via overcompensation of plant photosynthesis. Changes in both soil respiration (+20.7 g C m−2 y−1) and GEP (−2.8 g C m−2 y−1) under diurnal warming are smaller than their summed changes (+40.0 and +24.6 g C m−2 y−1, respectively) under day and night warming. Our findings that the effects of diurnal warming on soil respiration and gross ecosystem productivity are not equal to the summed effects of day and night warming are critical for model simulation and projection of climate-carbon feedback.


1989 ◽  
Vol 37 (3) ◽  
pp. 239 ◽  
Author(s):  
BA Myers ◽  
WC Morgan

The responses -of germination of the salt-tolerant grass Diplachne fusca (L.) Beauv. to salinity and various temperature regimes are described. At temperatures of 30/20°C (12 h light and dark periods), final germination was 70% in distilled water, decreased to 50% in 175 mol m-3 NaCl (π = - 0.8 MPa) and 7% in 380 mol m-3 NaCl (π = -1.8 MPa). Increasing salinity from 0-130mol m-3 NaCl decreased the final germination percentage, but did not modify the threshold temperatures (day or night temperature > 27°C) at which germination occurred. Presoaking in distilled water or 1% CaCl2· 2H20 solution did not significantly affect the final germination percentage of seeds which were subsequently placed in solutions with a range of salinities from 0-210 mol m-3 NaCl (*#960 = 0 to - 1.0 MPa). How- ever, addition of CaCl2 to NaCl solution increased the final germination percentage compared with that in pure NaCl solution. Presoaking in concentrated (400 mol m-3) NaCl solution caused a decrease in subsequent germinability of 20 or 40% in 0 and 40 mol m-3 NaCl, respectively. Under field conditions (in soil with mean daily maximum temperature of 33°C and mean daily minimum temperature of 15°C), rates of seedling establishment were similar (16% of seed sown) in soils irrigated with 0 or 50 mol m-3 NaCl, and were 1% in those irrigated with 100 mol m-3 NaCl. The inhibition of germination in NaCl solution was largely an osmotic effect since there was a similar reduction in the final germination percentage in iso-osmotic solutions of NaCl and mannitol. However, the proportion of seeds germinating in NaCl solution was enhanced by adding calcium. The inhibition of germination was greater in sulfate solutions compared with that in chloride solutions and, to a lesser degree, in potassium compared with sodium solutions. The practical implications of our results are discussed. The incorporation of gypsum into the soil and measures to leach salts from the topsoil are recommended before D. fusca is sown on saline land.


2016 ◽  
Vol 55 (3) ◽  
pp. 811-826 ◽  
Author(s):  
John R. Christy ◽  
Richard T. McNider

AbstractThree time series of average summer [June–August (JJA)] daily maximum temperature (TMax) are developed for three interior regions of Alabama from stations with varying periods of record and unknown inhomogeneities. The time frame is 1883–2014. Inhomogeneities for each station’s time series are determined from pairwise comparisons with no use of station metadata other than location. The time series for the three adjoining regions are constructed separately and are then combined as a whole assuming trends over 132 yr will have little spatial variation either intraregionally or interregionally for these spatial scales. Varying the parameters of the construction methodology creates 333 time series with a central trend value based on the largest group of stations of −0.07°C decade−1 with a best-guess estimate of measurement uncertainty from −0.12° to −0.02°C decade−1. This best-guess result is insignificantly different (0.01°C decade−1) from a similar regional calculation using NOAA’s divisional dataset based on daily data from the Global Historical Climatology Network (nClimDiv) beginning in 1895. Summer TMax is a better proxy, when compared with daily minimum temperature and thus daily average temperature, for the deeper tropospheric temperature (where the enhanced greenhouse signal is maximized) as a result of afternoon convective mixing. Thus, TMax more closely represents a critical climate parameter: atmospheric heat content. Comparison between JJA TMax and deep tropospheric temperature anomalies indicates modest agreement (r2 = 0.51) for interior Alabama while agreement for the conterminous United States as given by TMax from the nClimDiv dataset is much better (r2 = 0.86). Seventy-seven CMIP5 climate model runs are examined for Alabama and indicate no skill at replicating long-term temperature and precipitation changes since 1895.


Atmosphere ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (11) ◽  
pp. 1171
Author(s):  
Junju Zhou ◽  
Jumei Huang ◽  
Xi Zhao ◽  
Li Lei ◽  
Wei Shi ◽  
...  

The increase in the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events around the world has led to the frequent occurrence of global disasters, which have had serious impacts on the society, economic and ecological environment, especially fragile arid areas. Based on the daily maximum temperature and daily minimum temperature data of four meteorological stations in Shiyang River Basin (SRB) from 1960 to 2015, the spatio-temporal variation characteristics of extreme temperature indices were analyzed by means of univariate linear regression analysis, Mann–Kendall test and correlation analysis. The results showed that the extreme temperatures warming indices and the minimum of daily maximum temperature (TXn) and the minimum of daily minimum temperature (TNn) of cold indices showed an increasing trend from 1960 to 2016, especially since the 1990s, where the growth rate was fast and the response to global warming was sensitive. Except TXn and TNn, other cold indices showed a decreasing trend, especially Diurnal temperature (DTR) range, which decreased rapidly, indicating that the increasing speed of daily min-temperature were greater than of daily max-temperature in SRB. In space, the change tendency rate of the warm index basically showed an obvious altitude gradient effect that decreased with the altitude, which was consistent with Frost day (FD0) and Cool nights (TN10p) in the cold index, while Ice days (ID0) and Cool days (TX10p) are opposite. The mutation of the cold indices occurred earlier than the warm indices, illustrating that the cold indices in SRB were more sensitive to global warming. The change in extreme temperatures that would have a significant impact on the vegetation and glacier permafrost in the basin was the result of the combined function of different atmospheric circulation systems, which included the Arctic polar vortex, Western Pacific subtropical high and Qinghai-tibet Plateau circulation.


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