TY - JOUR
T1 - Climate Extremes across the North American Arctic in Modern Reanalyses
AU - Avila-Diaz, Alvaro
AU - Bromwich, David H.
AU - Wilson, Aaron B.
AU - Justino, Flavio
AU - Wang, Sheng Hung
N1 - Funding Information:
Acknowledgments. This research was funded in part by the Office of Naval Research Grant N00014-18-1-2361 to author Bromwich and is Contribution 1600 of the Byrd Polar and Climate Research Center. The authors thank the Ohio Supercomputer Center (https://www.osc.edu) for their use of the Oakley, Ruby, and Owens Clusters to conduct ASRv2. Author Avila-Diaz acknowledges the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel (CAPES) for financial support through a doctoral scholarship. Author Justino was supported by grants CNPq 3061812016 and FAPEMIG Ppm-00773-18. We thank the Byrd Polar and Climate Research Center, The Ohio State University, and Universidade Federal de Viçosa. We also thank Wilmar Loiza Cerón from Universidad del Valle (Colombia) for his thorough review of this paper.
Funding Information:
This research was funded in part by the Office of Naval Research Grant N00014-18-1-2361 to author Bromwich and is Contribution 1600 of the Byrd Polar and Climate Research Center. The authors thank the Ohio Supercomputer Center (https://www.osc.edu) for their use of the Oakley, Ruby, and Owens Clusters to conduct ASRv2. Author Avila-Diaz acknowledges the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel (CAPES) for financial support through a doctoral scholarship. Author Justino was supported by grants CNPq 3061812016 and FAPEMIG Ppm- 00773-18.We thank the Byrd Polar and Climate Research Center, The Ohio State University, and Universidade Federal de Vi?osa. We also thank Wilmar Loiza Cer?n from Universidad del Valle (Colombia) for his thorough review of this paper.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 American Meteorological Society.
PY - 2021/4/1
Y1 - 2021/4/1
N2 - Atmospheric reanalyses are a valuable climate-related resource where in situ data are sparse. However, few studies have investigated the skill of reanalyses to represent extreme climate indices over the North American Arctic, where changes have been rapid and indigenous responses to change are critical. This study investigates temperature and precipitation extremes as defined by the Expert Team on Climate Change Detection and Indices (ETCCDI) over a 17-yr period (2000-16) for regional and global reanalyses, namely the Arctic System Reanalysis, version 2 (ASRv2); North American Regional Reanalysis (NARR); European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) ERA5 reanalysis; Modern-Era Retrospective Analysis for Research and Applications, version 2 (MERRA-2); and Global Meteorological Forcing Dataset for Land Surface Modeling (GMFD). Results indicate that the best performances are demonstrated by ASRv2 and ERA5. Relative to observations, reanalyses show the weakest performance over far northern basins (e.g., the Arctic and Hudson basins) where observing networks are less dense. Observations and reanalyses show consistent warming with decreased frequency and intensity of cold extremes. Cold days, cold nights, frost days, and ice days have decreased dramatically over the last two decades. Warming can be linked to a simultaneous increase in daily precipitation intensity over several basins in the domain. Moreover, the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) and Arctic Oscillation (AO) distinctly influence extreme climate indices. Thus, these findings detail the complexity of how the climate of the Arctic is changing, not just in an average sense, but in extreme events that have significant impacts on people and places.
AB - Atmospheric reanalyses are a valuable climate-related resource where in situ data are sparse. However, few studies have investigated the skill of reanalyses to represent extreme climate indices over the North American Arctic, where changes have been rapid and indigenous responses to change are critical. This study investigates temperature and precipitation extremes as defined by the Expert Team on Climate Change Detection and Indices (ETCCDI) over a 17-yr period (2000-16) for regional and global reanalyses, namely the Arctic System Reanalysis, version 2 (ASRv2); North American Regional Reanalysis (NARR); European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) ERA5 reanalysis; Modern-Era Retrospective Analysis for Research and Applications, version 2 (MERRA-2); and Global Meteorological Forcing Dataset for Land Surface Modeling (GMFD). Results indicate that the best performances are demonstrated by ASRv2 and ERA5. Relative to observations, reanalyses show the weakest performance over far northern basins (e.g., the Arctic and Hudson basins) where observing networks are less dense. Observations and reanalyses show consistent warming with decreased frequency and intensity of cold extremes. Cold days, cold nights, frost days, and ice days have decreased dramatically over the last two decades. Warming can be linked to a simultaneous increase in daily precipitation intensity over several basins in the domain. Moreover, the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) and Arctic Oscillation (AO) distinctly influence extreme climate indices. Thus, these findings detail the complexity of how the climate of the Arctic is changing, not just in an average sense, but in extreme events that have significant impacts on people and places.
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U2 - 10.1175/JCLI-D-20-0093.1
DO - 10.1175/JCLI-D-20-0093.1
M3 - Research Article
AN - SCOPUS:85102971280
SN - 0894-8755
VL - 34
SP - 2385
EP - 2410
JO - Journal of Climate
JF - Journal of Climate
IS - 7
ER -