Abstract
AbstractPrecipitation is vital for the water‐limited region of the southwestern United States. Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 global climate models project 21st century precipitation trends of varying sign for this region, even if forced by an identical anthropogenic emissions scenario. This study investigates the role of the present‐day and future atmospheric circulation in driving the disparity in precipitation trends among models. The wettest model projections are linked to the development of an anomalous mid‐tropospheric trough over the eastern North Pacific Ocean, which depends in part on future unpredictable internal variability. By contrast, future precipitation trends are also linked to models' representation of the present‐day climatological mid‐tropospheric ridge over western North America. Models that fail to properly simulate this ridge in the present‐day climatology are responsible for the most extreme outlier precipitation scenarios for the Southwest for the 21st century: extreme drying in winter and extreme wetting in summer.
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