scholarly journals Analysis for Spatio-Temporal Variation Characteristics of Droughts in Different Climatic Regions of the Mongolian Plateau Based on SPEI

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (20) ◽  
pp. 5767 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jin ◽  
Zhang ◽  
Wang ◽  
Zhang ◽  
Bao ◽  
...  

Continuous climate warming in the last few decades has led to global climate anomalies, resulting in frequent drought events in arid/semiarid regions with fragile and sensitive ecological environment. The Mongolian Plateau (MP) is located at the mid-latitude arid/semiarid climate region, which is deemed as the most sensitive region in response to global climate change. In order to understand the spatiotemporal characteristics of droughts in Mongolian Plateau under changing climate, we divided the study area into three climatic regions via Köppen climate classification. Then, the seasonal and annual drought trends were analyzed by standardized precipitation evaporation index (SPEI), which is a function of monthly mean temperatures, highest temperatures, lowest temperatures and precipitations, collected from the 184 meteorological stations from 1980 to 2015. Mann–Kendall (MK) test was employed to detect if there is an abrupt change of annual drought, while the empirical orthogonal function method (EOF) was adopted to investigate the spatiotemporal characteristics of droughts across the Mongolian Plateau. Results from MK test illustrated that the SPEI-12 exhibited statistically significant downward trends (a < 0.05) for all three climatic regions of the Mongolian Plateau.EOF spatial analysis indicated that Region III experienced the most severe drought from 1980 to 2015. During the 35 years period, an abrupt change of drought was detected in 1999. Before year 1999, the climate was relatively humid. However, the entire region became more arid after year 1999, reflected by remarkably increased frequency and intensity of drought. SPEI-3 revealed the trend of drought at seasonal scale. We found that drought became more severe in spring, summer, and fall seasons for the entire MP. However, winter became more humid. Different climate regions exhibited quite different drought seasonality: Region I experienced a severe arid trend in summer and fall. For Region II and III, summer became more arid. All three regions became more humid in winter season, especially for Region I, with the Sen’s slope of 0.0241/a.

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yingying Xia ◽  
Xi Chun ◽  
Dan Dan ◽  
Haijun Zhou ◽  
Zhiqiang Wan

Abstract Studying the abrupt temperature change in winter over the Mongolian Plateau (MP) is of great significance for understanding the spatiotemporal distribution of temperature and the mechanism of global climate change. Monthly temperature data of MP were collected during 1961–2017, the abrupt-change point was determined by the Mann–Kendall test and sliding t-test to analyze the characteristics and causes of abrupt temperature change in winter. The results showed that (a) The increase rate of winter temperature was 0.41 ℃/10a, with a contribution rate of 30.7 % to annual temperature change, which was significantly higher than that of mainland China, indicating that climate change in the MP was more sensitive to global warming. (b) The abrupt-change point occurred in 1988, with temperatures of -15.5 ℃ and − 14.1°C before and after 1988, respectively, the increasing range was 9%. The abrupt temperature change in high latitudes was 1–3 years later than that in low latitudes. (c) The isotherms of different temperatures in winter moved northward by 10–200 km, especially − 16°C isotherm moved approximately 200 km northward after 1988, thereby the MP warmed significantly. (d) there was a good coupling relationship between the Arctic Oscillation (AO) and winter temperature. AO affects temperature change by influencing the Mongolia–Siberian High, therefore, it may be an important factor to drive the abrupt temperature change in winter.


Insects ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 135
Author(s):  
Keng-Lou James Hung ◽  
Sara S. Sandoval ◽  
John S. Ascher ◽  
David A. Holway

Global climate change is causing more frequent and severe droughts, which could have serious repercussions for the maintenance of biodiversity. Here, we compare native bee assemblages collected via bowl traps before and after a severe drought event in 2014 in San Diego, California, and examine the relative magnitude of impacts from drought in fragmented habitat patches versus unfragmented natural reserves. Bee richness and diversity were higher in assemblages surveyed before the drought compared to those surveyed after the drought. However, bees belonging to the Lasioglossum subgenus Dialictus increased in abundance after the drought, driving increased representation by small-bodied, primitively eusocial, and generalist bees in post-drought assemblages. Conversely, among non-Dialictus bees, post-drought years were associated with decreased abundance and reduced representation by eusocial species. Drought effects were consistently greater in reserves, which supported more bee species, than in fragments, suggesting that fragmentation either had redundant impacts with drought, or ameliorated effects of drought by enhancing bees’ access to floral resources in irrigated urban environments. Shifts in assemblage composition associated with drought were three times greater compared to those associated with habitat fragmentation, highlighting the importance of understanding the impacts of large-scale climatic events relative to those associated with land use change.


2021 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 77-79
Author(s):  
Sandesh Paudel ◽  
Netra Prasad Pokharel ◽  
Susmita Adhikari ◽  
Sarah Poudel

Bread wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) belonging to family Poaceae is the most important cereal crop as it contributes major portion to the world food for the world’s population. Similarly, it is the third most cultivated cereal crop in Nepal in terms of production and area. Wheat is a winter season crop which is usually grown within a temperature range of 15-250C in cold and dry weather. However frequent irrigations are crucial for proper growth of the plant, high yield and high quality of the grain. The annual productivity of wheat has been reported to be 2.49 tons per hectare. Water is found to be one of the most important factors in wheat production and by far not a single water stress tolerant variety has been introduced thus water management is necessary. In Nepal around 35% of the total wheat is cultivated under rainfed condition annually and in Terai this is around 19%. This cultivated area faces a severe drought stress during growing stage and heat stress during anthesis stage. Various studies have suggested that the combined impacts of drought and heat stress had a significant harmful effect on wheat than individual stresses (Stress and Review, 2017). Under drought stress days to anthesis and days to maturity were reduced by 10% and 14% while under heat stress these were reduced by 16% and 20% respectively. Combined effect of drought and heat stress caused reduction in DTA by 25% DTH by and 31%.


2020 ◽  
Vol 63 (3) ◽  
pp. 316-356
Author(s):  
Zozan Pehlivan

Abstract This article explores the impacts of environmental crises on pastoral nomads in Ottoman Kurdistan/Armenia in the late nineteenth-century. It demonstrates that the climatic fluctuations characterizing these environmental crises were synchronized with global climatic oscillations, specifically the El Niño Southern Oscillation. Recurrent episodes of severe drought and cold dramatically affected these groups, who were unable to withstand extreme changes in temperature and precipitation. Back-to-back drought episodes created a shortage of water, dried up pastures and damaged forage, while severe cold resulted in high rates of premature death among herd animals. These climatic events thus had devastating economic and social consequences.


Sci ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 38
Author(s):  
Mohan Bahadur Chand ◽  
Bikas Chandra Bhattarai ◽  
Prashant Baral ◽  
Niraj Shankar Pradhananga

Study of spatiotemporal dynamics of temperature is vital to assess changes in climate, especially in the Himalayan region where livelihoods of billions of people living downstream depends on water coming from the melting of snow and glacier ice. To this end, temperature trend analysis is carried out in Narayani river basin, a major river basin of Nepal characterized by three climatic regions: tropical, subtropical and alpine. Temperature data from six stations located within the basin were analyzed. The elevation of these stations ranges from 460 to 3800 m a.s.l. and the time period of available temperature data ranges from 1960–2015. Multiple regression and empirical mode decomposition (EMD) methods were applied to fill in missing data and to detect trends. Annual as well as seasonal trends were analyzed and a Mann-Kendall test was employed to test the statistical significance of detected trends. Results indicate significant cooling trends before 1970s, and warming trends after 1970s in the majority of the stations. The warming trends range from 0.028 °C year−1 to 0.035 °C year−1 with a mean increasing trend of 0.03 °C year−1 after 1971. Seasonal trends show highest warming trends in the monsoon season followed by winter, pre-monsoon, and the post-monsoon season. However, difference in warming rates between different seasons was not significant. An average temperature lapse rate of −0.006 °C m−1 with the steepest value (−0.0064 °C m−1) in pre-monsoon season and least negative (−0.0052 °C m−1) in winter season was observed for this basin. A comparative analysis of the gap-filled data with freely available global climate datasets shows reasonable correlation thus confirming the suitability of the gap filling methods.


Water ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (9) ◽  
pp. 1855 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ali ◽  
Kuriqi ◽  
Abubaker ◽  
Kisi

Trend analysis of streamflow provides practical information for better management of water resources on the eve of climate change. Thus, the objective of this study is to evaluate the presence of possible trends in the annual, seasonal, maximum, and minimum flow of Yangtze River at Cuntan and Zhutuo stations in China for the period 1980 to 2015. The assessment was carried out using the Mann–Kendall trend test, and the innovative trend analysis, while Sen’s slope is used to estimate the magnitude of the changes. The results of the study revealed that there were increasing and decreasing trends at Cuntan and Zhutuo stations in different months. The mean annual flow was found to decrease at a rate of −26.76 m3/s and −17.37 m3/s at both stations. The minimum flow was found to significantly increase at a rate of 30.57 m3/s and 16.37 m3/s, at a 95% level of confidence. Maximum annual flows showed an increasing trend in both regions of the Yangtze River. On the seasonal scale, the results showed that stations are more sensitive to seasonal flow variability suggesting a probable flooding aggravation. The winter season showed an increasing flow trend, while summer showed a decreasing trend. The spring flow was found to have an increasing trend by the Mann–Kendall test at both stations, but in the Zhutuo Station, a decreasing trend was found by way of the innovative trend analysis method. However, the autumn flow indicated a decreasing trend over the region by the Mann–Kendall (MK) test at both stations while it had an increasing trend in Cuntan by the innovative trend analysis method. The result showed nonstationary increasing and decreasing flow trends over the region. Innovative trend analysis method has the advantage of detecting the sub-trends in the flow time series because of its ability to present the results in graphical format. The results of the study indicate that decreasing trends may create water scarcity if proper adaptation measures are not taken.


2020 ◽  
Vol 24 (5) ◽  
pp. 2671-2686 ◽  
Author(s):  
Els Van Uytven ◽  
Jan De Niel ◽  
Patrick Willems

Abstract. In recent years many methods for statistical downscaling of the precipitation climate model outputs have been developed. Statistical downscaling is performed under general and method-specific (structural) assumptions but those are rarely evaluated simultaneously. This paper illustrates the verification and evaluation of the downscaling assumptions for a weather typing method. Using the observations and outputs of a global climate model ensemble, the skill of the method is evaluated for precipitation downscaling in central Belgium during the winter season (December to February). Shortcomings of the studied method have been uncovered and are identified as biases and a time-variant predictor–predictand relationship. The predictor–predictand relationship is found to be informative for historical observations but becomes inaccurate for the projected climate model output. The latter inaccuracy is explained by the increased importance of the thermodynamic processes in the precipitation changes. The results therefore question the applicability of the weather typing method for the case study location. Besides the shortcomings, the results also demonstrate the added value of the Clausius–Clapeyron relationship for precipitation amount scaling. The verification and evaluation of the downscaling assumptions are a tool to design a statistical downscaling ensemble tailored to end-user needs.


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