ELPIS: a dataset of local-scale daily climate scenarios for Europe

Abstract

We developed a dataset of local-scale daily climate scenarios for Europe, called ELPIS. This dataset is based on 25 km grids of interpolated daily precipitation, minimum and maximum tem- peratures and radiation from the European Crop Growth Monitoring System (CGMS) meteorological dataset and climate predictions from the multi-model ensemble of 15 global climate models that were used in the IPCC 4th Assessment Report. The site parameters for the distributions of climatic vari- ables have been estimated by the LARS-WG weather generator for nearly 12 000 grids for the period 1982-2008. Using changes in climate predicted by global climate models, we perturbed site parame- ters for the baseline climate to generate local-scale daily climate scenarios for the future under sev- eral emission scenarios. The ability of LARS-WG to reproduce daily weather for the period 1982-2008 was assessed using statistical tests. This prototype dataset was designed for use in con- junction with process-based impact models (e.g. crop simulation models) for the assessment of cli- mate change impacts in Europe. A climate scenario generated by LARS-WG for a grid represents daily weather at a typical site from this grid that is used for agricultural production. This makes it different from the recently developed 25 km gridded dataset for Europe (E-OBS), which gives the best estimate of grid box averages to enable direct comparison with regional climate models.