Representation of U.S. Warm Temperature Extremes in Global Climate Model Ensembles

Hogan, Emily; Nicholas, Robert E.; Keller, Klaus; Eilts, Stephanie M.; Sriver, R. L.

doi:10.1175/jcli-d-18-0075.1

Cited by 5 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 48 publications

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“…S4). These results are also consistent with recent work (Huang, et al, 2016;Alaya, et al, 2018;Hogan, et al, 2019). We compare the GEV distributions of maximum daily Tx7d anomalies in the CESM-PI simulation against the linearly detrended values in ERA5 during the heat waves in Chicago 1995, Europe 2003 and Russia 2010, averaged over the same regions, respectively (yellow lines).…”

Section: A Gev-based Estimates For Unseen Very Rare Heat Extremessupporting

confidence: 89%

Very rare heat extremes: quantifying and understanding using ensemble re-initialization

et al. 2021

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Heat waves such as the one in Europe 2003 have severe consequences for the economy, society, and ecosystems. It is unclear whether temperatures could have exceeded these anomalies even without further climate change. Developing storylines and quantifying highest possible temperature levels is challenging given the lack of long homogeneous time series and methodological framework to assess them. Here, we address this challenge by analysing summer temperatures in a nearly 5000-year pre-industrial climate model simulation, performed with the Community Earth System Model CESM1. To assess how anomalous temperatures could get, we compare storylines, generated by three different methods: (1) a return-level estimate, deduced from a generalized extreme value distribution, (2) a regression model, based on dynamic and thermodynamic heat wave drivers, and (3) a novel ensemble boosting method, generating large samples of re-initialized extreme heat waves in the long climate simulation.All methods provide consistent temperature estimates, suggesting that historical exceptional heat waves as in Chicago 1995, Europe 2003 and Russia 2010 could have been substantially exceeded even in the absence of further global warming. These estimated unseen heat waves are caused by the same drivers as moderate observed events, but with more anomalous patterns. Moreover, altered contributions of circulation and soil moisture to temperature anomalies include amplified feedbacks in the surface energy budget. The methodological framework of combining different storyline approaches of heat waves with magnitudes beyond the observational record may ultimately contribute to adaptation and to the stress testing of ecosystems or socio-economic systems to increase resilience to extreme climate stressors.

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Section: A Gev-based Estimates For Unseen Very Rare Heat Extremessupporting

confidence: 89%

Very rare heat extremes: quantifying and understanding using ensemble re-initialization

et al. 2021

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“…In comparison to the present climate, AM‐HI exceeding 40.6°C are not only expected to intensify further over the Gulf of Mexico and Southeast Atlantic coastal regions, but also to spread over the entire East, Midwest, and Great Plains under the RCP8.5 emission scenario. Such spatial patterns of increase are in close agreement with historical analyses and with climate‐model projections of increases in maximum temperature (Figure S1) based on RCP8.5 (Hogan et al., 2019; Raymond et al., 2017). These spatial patterns additionally demonstrate that the relatively slower recent rates of increases in extreme temperatures observed in the Midwest and South partially disappear when the variable of interest is instead heat stress.…”

Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 87%

“…10.1029/2020EF001886 11 of 14 some atmospheric mechanisms such as planetary wave resonance, that are implicated in the observed increase in both the magnitude and persistence of key recent extreme heat events (Hogan et al, 2019;Mann et al, 2017Mann et al, , 2018. Such limitations may lead to a systematic underestimate of increases in extreme events.…”

Section: Future Changes Inmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…There are important caveats that should be kept in mind concerning our results. Recent-generation climate models such as those used in the CMIP5 multi-model simulations appear unable to faithfully capture some atmospheric mechanisms such as planetary wave resonance, that are implicated in the observed increase in both the magnitude and persistence of key recent extreme heat events (Hogan et al, 2019;Mann et al, 2017Mann et al, , 2018. Such limitations may lead to a systematic underestimate of increases in extreme events.…”

Section: Future Changes Inmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Anthropogenic Warming and Population Growth May Double US Heat Stress by the Late 21st Century

et al. 2021

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Climate change has increased extreme events (e.g., drought, heatwave, and heat stress) in a warming world (Konapala et al., 2020;Matthews et al., 2017;Mukherjee & Mishra, 2021). Heat stress has led to massive human morbidity and mortality in recent years (Matthews et al., 2017). The impact of high temperatures is often compounded by high atmospheric relative humidity, which slows heat dissipation from the human body, thereby adding to heat stress (HS) (Buzan & Huber, 2020). Numerous recent studies have reported the adverse effect of heat stress on public health and labor efficiency in the United States (Fechter-Leggett et al., 2016), much of which has been exacerbated by human-caused climate change (Matthews et al., 2017). Severe recent HS events in the West and the Southeast in summer 2020 are representative of the types of conditions expected to become more common in the CONUS in future (Rastogi et al., 2020;Wu et al., 2014).Extreme heat events in the CONUS in recent decades have trended toward earlier springtime occurrence and increased severity, frequency, and areal extent (Smith et al., 2013). These trends appear connected to anthropogenic warming (Keellings & Moradkhani, 2020;Knutson & Ploshay, 2016;Wang et al., 2020). Critically, increasing global temperatures bring with them increasing moisture, leading to projections of heat stress that are both larger and higher-confidence than those for temperature alone (Fischer & Knutti, 2013;

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“…Characterizing changes in extreme events, such as temperature and precipitation extremes, floods, and droughts, is particularly difficult on account of small sample sizes and relatively short observational records. In addition, variability in large-scale dynamics and teleconnections may influence regional temperature and precipitation extremes across different climate model ensembles [1,2] because of differences in resolution, model structure, and the representation of teleconnections between ocean temperature, polar sea ice, and mid-latitude jet stream variability [3]. Even with these uncertainties, we observe robust changes in key climate variables related to floods and droughts, including increases in extreme warm temperatures globally and regional changes in the distributions of heavy precipitation events [4,5].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Extreme Floods and Droughts under Future Climate Scenarios

Markus

Cai

Sriver

2019

Water

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Climate projections indicate that in many regions of the world the risk of increased flooding or more severe droughts will be higher in the future. To account for these trends, hydrologists search for the best planning and management measures in an increasingly complex and uncertain environment. The collection of manuscripts in this Special Issue quantifies the changes in projected hydroclimatic extremes and their impacts using a suite of innovative approaches applied to regions in North America, Asia, and Europe. To reduce the uncertainty and warrant the applicability of the research on projections of future floods and droughts, their continued development and testing using newly acquired observational data are critical.

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Representation of U.S. Warm Temperature Extremes in Global Climate Model Ensembles

Cited by 5 publications

References 48 publications

Very rare heat extremes: quantifying and understanding using ensemble re-initialization

Very rare heat extremes: quantifying and understanding using ensemble re-initialization

Anthropogenic Warming and Population Growth May Double US Heat Stress by the Late 21st Century

Extreme Floods and Droughts under Future Climate Scenarios

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