Projected increases in near-surface air temperature over Ontario, Canada: a regional climate modeling approach

Wang, Xiuquan; Huang, Guohe; Liu, Jinliang

doi:10.1007/s00382-014-2387-y

Cited by 24 publications

(19 citation statements)

References 57 publications

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“…The projected IDF curves for the entire province can be accessed and downloaded free of charge at Ontario CCDP for further analysis. The generated IDF curves for the baseline period have been validated at 12 selected stations in comparison with the ones developed with observational data provided by Environment Canada, and the validation results are presented in the paper of Wang et al (2014c). FIG.…”

Section: Projected Idf Curvesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Return periods considered in this study are 2, 5, 10, 25, 50, and 100 yr. The detailed steps for developing the projected IDF curves are provided in the work of Wang et al (2014c).…”

Section: Projected Idf Curvesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This makes GCM outputs unsuitable for driving impact models (e.g., for crops, water resources, and terrestrial ecosystems) because these models require projections with a much finer resolution (in the order of 10 km). Further downscaling through either dynamical or statistical techniques is thus required for deriving regional climate details from the coarse-resolution outputs (e.g., Castro et al 2005;Diro et al 2012;Jordan et al 2014;Pierce et al 2013;Schmidli et al 2006;Wang et al 2013Wang et al , 2014b. However, effective downscaling of GCM projections is practically difficult for impact researchers because of the lack of computation resources and/or long-term reference data, which are indispensable for either dynamical or statistical downscaling (Fowler et al 2007;Jha et al 2013;Rife et al 2013;Willems et al 2012).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In response to these changes, the government of Ontario has initiated prudent steps to protect its public health, economy, and communities from the harmful effects of climate change (Ontario Ministry of the Environment 2011b). Implementation of such an adaptation initiative substantially depends on our current understanding of future climatic changes in the context of Ontario as well as our confidence about these changes (Wang et al 2015). As a result, reliable climate projection with finer resolution over Ontario is becoming an urgent need to local policymakers and climate researchers who are focusing on climate change impact assessment at regional scales (Wang et al 2014a).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Ensemble Projections of Regional Climatic Changes over Ontario, Canada

et al. 2015

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In this study, high-resolution climate projections over Ontario, Canada, are developed through an ensemble modeling approach to provide reliable and ready-to-use climate scenarios for assessing plausible effects of future climatic changes at local scales. The Providing Regional Climates for Impacts Studies (PRECIS) regional modeling system is adopted to conduct ensemble simulations in a continuous run from 1950 to 2099, driven by the boundary conditions from a HadCM3-based perturbed physics ensemble. Simulations of temperature and precipitation for the baseline period are first compared to the observed values to validate the performance of the ensemble in capturing the current climatology over Ontario. Future projections for the 2030s, 2050s, and 2080s are then analyzed to help understand plausible changes in its local climate in response to global warming. The analysis indicates that there is likely to be an obvious warming trend with time over the entire province. The increase in average temperature is likely to be varying within [2.6, 2.7]8C in the 2030s, [4.0, 4.7]8C in the 2050s, and [5.9, 7.4]8C in the 2080s. Likewise, the annual total precipitation is projected to increase by [4.5, 7.1]% in the 2030s, [4.6, 10.2]% in the 2050s, and [3.2, 17.5]% in the 2080s. Furthermore, projections of rainfall intensity-duration-frequency (IDF) curves are developed to help understand the effects of global warming on extreme precipitation events. The results suggest that there is likely to be an overall increase in the intensity of rainfall storms. Finally, a data portal named Ontario Climate Change Data Portal (CCDP) is developed to ensure decision-makers and impact researchers have easy and intuitive access to the refined regional climate change scenarios.

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Section: Projected Idf Curvesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Return periods considered in this study are 2, 5, 10, 25, 50, and 100 yr. The detailed steps for developing the projected IDF curves are provided in the work of Wang et al (2014c).…”

Section: Projected Idf Curvesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Ensemble Projections of Regional Climatic Changes over Ontario, Canada

et al. 2015

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“…As the largest economy in Canada, the province of Ontario has already seen many consequences of climate change, such as frequent and intense weather anomalies, shorter duration of ice cover on the Great Lakes and fluctuating water levels in lakes, rivers and streams (Ministry of the Environment, 2011a; Wang et al, 2014e). For example, Ontario has experienced the hottest summer in 2010, leading to an increasing requirement for investments in the electricity system (Wang et al, 2014b); Toronto flooding in July 2013 has been recorded as the largest natural disaster in the history of Ontario, and the insurance cost caused by this event has constituted the third largest natural insured catastrophe in Canadian history (Wang et al, 2014d).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Observed regional climatic changes over Ontario, Canada, in response to global warming

Wang

Huang

Liu

2015

Meteorological Applications

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Human-induced climatic changes are not expected to be uniform across the globe due to the regional variations in topography, land cover/land use, economic development and so on. Investigating the regional effects of climate change is thus of great concern for decision makers and resource managers to develop scientifically informed policies and strategies against the changing climate. In the present study, regional climatology over Ontario, Canada, and its temporal trends in the past century are analysed based on the historical observations at the gauged stations, aiming to investigate how the local climate has been affected by human-induced global warming. The analysis shows that the annual mean temperature over Ontario varies mainly between 1.6 and 7 ∘ C with a median of 3.8 ∘ C, while its annual total precipitation usually ranges between 836 and 1004 mm with a median of 896 mm. Further correlation analysis suggests that no or negligible correlations between total precipitation and mean temperature are found at the vast majority of stations (accounting for over 80% of the total), except for summer when significant negative correlations (with a correlation co-efficient varying between −0.7 and −0.2) are reported at over 54% stations. As for the temporal trends, significant warming trends are detected throughout the province and the overall trend in annual mean temperature varies largely between 0.01 and 0.02 ∘ C year -1 . Increasing trends in annual rainfall (by 1-3 mm year -1 ) and total precipitation (by 1-4 mm year -1 ) are detected at the vast majority of gauged stations, but no significant trends in annual snowfall are identified at most of the stations. The results of this study can help better understand the regional climate of Ontario and provide important references for developing future climate scenarios that can be used for impact studies.

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Projected increases in intensity and frequency of rainfall extremes through a regional climate modeling approach

2014

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Global warming is changing the hydrological cycle in multiple ways such as increased cloudiness, latent heat fluxes, and intense precipitation events. How extreme rainfall events will be influenced by the changing climate is becoming one of the most important problems for hydrological risk analysis and engineering design. In this study, a regional climate modeling approach based on the Providing REgional Climates for Impacts Studies modeling system is proposed for investigating the potential impacts of climate change induced by increased greenhouse gases on the intensity and frequency of extreme rainfall events in the context of Ontario, Canada. An ensemble of high-resolution climate projections is first developed under both current and future forcing conditions. Validation of the ensemble simulations is then conducted through comparing the simulated rainfall annual extremes for 1960-1990 to the observed ones. Following that, the rainfall projections for future periods are used to develop projected intensity-duration-frequency curves and their plausible changes in 2030s, 2050s, and 2080s for the City of Toronto. The results suggest that intensities of rainfall extreme events versus various durations with different return periods are all likely to increase over time: [5, 17]% in 2030s, [11, 22]% in 2050s, and [25, 50]% in 2080s. Such a consistent increase would lead to an overall uplift in the exceedance values of rainfall intensity of extreme events, implying that intense rainfall events are likely to occur more frequently in the future. In addition, more significant changes in the rainfall intensity are projected for extreme events with longer return periods at all given durations.

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Projected increases in near-surface air temperature over Ontario, Canada: a regional climate modeling approach

Cited by 24 publications

References 57 publications

Ensemble Projections of Regional Climatic Changes over Ontario, Canada

Ensemble Projections of Regional Climatic Changes over Ontario, Canada

Observed regional climatic changes over Ontario, Canada, in response to global warming

Projected increases in intensity and frequency of rainfall extremes through a regional climate modeling approach

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