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Assessing future climatic changes of rainfall extremes at small spatio-temporal scales

Author

Listed:
  • Ida Gregersen
  • Hjalte Sørup
  • Henrik Madsen
  • Dan Rosbjerg
  • Peter Mikkelsen
  • Karsten Arnbjerg-Nielsen

Abstract

Climate change is expected to influence the occurrence and magnitude of rainfall extremes and hence the flood risks in cities. Major impacts of an increased pluvial flood risk are expected to occur at hourly and sub-hourly resolutions. This makes convective storms the dominant rainfall type in relation to urban flooding. The present study focuses on high-resolution regional climate model (RCM) skill in simulating sub-daily rainfall extremes. Temporal and spatial characteristics of output from three different RCM simulations with 25 km resolution are compared to point rainfall extremes estimated from observed data. The applied RCM data sets represent two different models and two different types of forcing. Temporal changes in observed extreme point rainfall are partly reproduced by the RCM RACMO when forced by ERA40 re-analysis data. Two ECHAM forced simulations show similar increases in the occurrence of rainfall extremes of over a 150-year period, but significantly different changes in the magnitudes. The physical processes behind convective rainfall extremes generate a distinctive spatial inter-site correlation structure for extreme events. All analysed RCM rainfall extremes, however, show a clear deviation from this correlation structure for sub-daily rainfalls, partly because RCM output represents areal rainfall intensities and partly due to well-known inadequacies in the convective parameterization of RCMs. The results highlight the problem urban designers are facing when using RCM output. The paper takes the first step towards a methodology by which RCM performance and other downscaling methods can be assessed in relation to the simulation of short-duration rainfall extremes. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2013

Suggested Citation

  • Ida Gregersen & Hjalte Sørup & Henrik Madsen & Dan Rosbjerg & Peter Mikkelsen & Karsten Arnbjerg-Nielsen, 2013. "Assessing future climatic changes of rainfall extremes at small spatio-temporal scales," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 118(3), pages 783-797, June.
  • Handle: RePEc:spr:climat:v:118:y:2013:i:3:p:783-797
    DOI: 10.1007/s10584-012-0669-0
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Marcia B. Baker & Thomas Peter, 2008. "Small-scale cloud processes and climate," Nature, Nature, vol. 451(7176), pages 299-300, January.
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    Cited by:

    1. Lauren M. Cook & Seth McGinnis & Constantine Samaras, 2020. "The effect of modeling choices on updating intensity-duration-frequency curves and stormwater infrastructure designs for climate change," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 159(2), pages 289-308, March.
    2. M. T. Vu & V. S. Raghavan & S.-Y. Liong, 2017. "Deriving short-duration rainfall IDF curves from a regional climate model," Natural Hazards: Journal of the International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, Springer;International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, vol. 85(3), pages 1877-1891, February.
    3. Łukasz Kuźmiński & Michał Nadolny & Henryk Wojtaszek, 2020. "Probabilistic Quantification in the Analysis of Flood Risks in Cross-Border Areas of Poland and Germany," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(22), pages 1-16, November.
    4. Farman Ali & Bing-Zhao Li & Zulfiqar Ali, 2022. "A New Weighting Scheme for Diminishing the Effect of Extreme Values in Regional Drought Analysis," Water Resources Management: An International Journal, Published for the European Water Resources Association (EWRA), Springer;European Water Resources Association (EWRA), vol. 36(11), pages 4099-4114, September.
    5. Patrick Willems, 2013. "Multidecadal oscillatory behaviour of rainfall extremes in Europe," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 120(4), pages 931-944, October.

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