Evaluation of reanalysis air temperature products in permafrost regions on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau

Abstract

Surface air temperature is important for climate change, hydrological, and ecosystems undergoing climate warming in the permafrost regions on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau (QTP). We monitored daily air temperatures at five sites (alpine desert, alpine desert steppe, alpine steppe, alpine meadow, and alpine wet meadow) from 2011 to 2015 in permafrost regions on the QTP. Using this data, we evaluated the performance of five different reanalysis air temperature products (CFSR, ERA-Interim, GLDAS-NOAH, MERRA, JRA-55, and CMFD). These results demonstrated that the ERA-Interim air temperature products exhibited the best performance at the majority of sites. However, the original ERA-Interim air temperature products were found to overestimate air temperature at most sites. The calibration models were established by the observed daily air temperatures measured from 2013 to 2015 for the ERA-Interim air temperature products, which validated with observational data from 2011 to 2012. Following calibration, ERA-Interim products were found to be closer to the observations made across all sites. In addition, this paper demonstrated a warming trend present in month, seasonal, and annual mean air temperature from the calibration results collected from 1980 to 2015. These results demonstrated that the largest warming trend was observed in February, while the smallest warming trend was observed in March. We demonstrated that all air temperatures warmed fastest in the summer and winter, more slowly in autumn, and the slowest in spring at the majority of sites tested. In addition, we found that the average annual air temperature warming trends were 0.0398, 0.0394, 0.0288, 0.0259, and 0.0254 °C/year in the alpine desert steppe, alpine desert, alpine steppe, alpine meadow, and alpine wet meadow in the permafrost regions on the QTP, respectively. These findings generate a useful tool for the recognizing of the variation in permafrost under climate change in permafrost regions on the QTP.