Long-term changes in surface air temperature over the Chinese mainland during 1901-2020

Abstract

The magnitude of long-term surface climate warming over some regions, such as the Chinese mainland, is still uncertain due to the lack of observational data early in the 20th century. In this study, the monthly data series of the average, maximum, and minimum temperatures in the Chinese mainland during 1901-2020 were constructed based on the daily surface air temperature observations from 60 stations across the country, and the characteristics of the average, maximum, and minimum temperature, and diurnal temperature range (DTR) changes were analyzed. Results show that (1) regional average annual mean temperature in the Chinese mainland rose by 0.14°C per decade, maximum temperature rose by 0.07°C per decade, minimum temperature rose by 0.19°C per decade, and DTR decreased by 0.13°C per decade. All these trends are statistically significant (p < 0.01); (2) the largest annual mean maximum temperature increase occurred in spring, followed by winter and autumn/summer, and the largest annual mean minimum temperature increase was in winter and spring, followed by autumn and summer; (3) annual mean DTR decreased significantly at a rate of -0.08, -0.12, -0.12, and -0.13°C per decade (p < 0.01) in spring, summer, autumn, and winter, respectively; (4) the stations with drops in maximum temperature were mainly in Central China, southern North China, the southeastern coastal areas, and the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River, and the stations with significant increases in minimum temperature were located in North China, Northeast China, and Northwest China; (5) the areas with the fastest dropping DTR were mainly located in Northeast China and North China. The maximum and minimum temperature series for China based on climate anomalies are comparable to those based on other currently available datasets.