Future projections of wind and solar energy resources over China from regional climate models based on bias correction

Abstract

In this study, the wind and solar energy resources over China are projected during 2031–2060 under the Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) 8.5 scenario with the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model and Regional Climate Model version 4 (RegCM4). The bias correction method based on probability distribution is applied to correct the simulated 100-m wind speed and surface down-welling shortwave radiation. The results show that the bias correction method can remarkably improve the skill of the individual simulations and the ensemble mean in capturing the features of wind speed and shortwave radiation from the aspects of spatial distribution, annual cycle, quantile distribution, probability distribution and cumulative probability distribution. The future projections from the bias-corrected ensemble show that both the wind and solar energy resources are abundant over northwestern China, with higher wind power density reaching up to 130 W m−2 in winter and richer surface down-welling shortwave radiation above 240 W m−2 in summer. Generally, the wind and solar energy resources will decrease in the future, by around 6% over the western regions and 4% over southeastern China in winter, respectively. The interannual variability of the two resources is projected to increase over most areas of northern China, indicating a decrease in the stability of resources, while tends to decrease over Southeastern China.