Naslov
Modelling recent climate and climate change over the eastern Adriatic

Autori
Ivan Güttler, Čedomir Branković, Marjana Gajić-Čapka

Vrsta, podvrsta i kategorija rada
Sažeci sa skupova, neobjavljeni rad, znanstveni

Skup
MedCLIVAR Final Conference Mediterranean Climate: From Past to Future

Mjesto i datum
Lecce, Italija, 06.06.2011. - 09.06.2011

Vrsta sudjelovanja
Poster

Vrsta recenzije
Međunarodna recenzija

Ključne riječi
regional climate models; Adriatic coast

Sažetak
Temperature and precipitation from five regional climate models (RCMs), all run at 25-km resolution, are compared with point observations for the 50-year period of the 20th century. Climatological stations are located in the eastern Adriatic, either on the islands or at the coast. The stations are under strong maritime influence and the main cause of sub-grid scale variability comes primarily from a very complex coastal configuration and the land-sea contrast ; local orography plays less important role there. All RCMs were driven by the same global climate model (GCM) and such a setup enables an assessment on how different physical parameterisations affect the downscaling process. On average, monthly means of observed temperature are overestimated by models in the colder part of the year and underestimated in the warm period. Precipitation is generally overestimated by models throughout the year, but approaching observations in summer, when normally small amounts prevail. Model errors are not changed much across the stations although some slight differences exist. The overall poorer RCMs simulations in winter than in summer may indicate a stronger impact of the GCM lateral boundary conditions when large- scale circulation is relatively strong. Simulated interannual variability for temperature is generally lower than observed and for precipitation higher than observed, especially during the warm part of the year. When long time-series of individual variables are compared, interannual variability is found to be strikingly similar among the models although they have different systematic errors. This indicates a prevailing impact of the same lateral boundary conditions from the forcing GCM over the regional physics. The analysis of cumulative distribution functions reveals that temperature extremes are, similar to mean values, overestimated by RCMs. Extremes in precipitation are generally overestimated but no uniform picture from model simulations emerges. Climate change and variability, with respect to the 20th century climate, are analysed for three 30-year climate periods of the 21st century for the IPCC A1B scenario. For temperature, a warming in all three periods is statistically significant in all seasons and at all locations. The warming is strongest in summer irrespective of the climate period considered. Later in the 21st century, the warming is accompanied with precipitation deficit during spring and summer, which would make the eastern Adriatic region particularly vulnerable to climate change. Models disagree on the sign of precipitation change in autumn and winter, even towards the end of the century.

Izvorni jezik
Engleski

Znanstvena područja
Geologija

POVEZANOST RADA