Long‐term variations in regional rainfall in the south‐west of Western Australia and the difference between average and high intensity rainfalls

Abstract

AbstractThe south‐west of Western Australia is characterized by a ‘Mediterranean’ climate with dominantly winter rainfall. It is the only Australian region where the annual rainfall has significantly decreased during the period 1911–1990. Based on daily rainfall records from 70 stations in the area, high intensity rainfall (which is closely related to flooding, soil erosion, and gully formation) does not show a concurrent decrease. Reasons for this unconformable trend include a greater temporal variability of high intensity rainfall and an increase in the frequency of occurrence of rainfall events at high intensities during the summer. This tends to balance out a decrease during the winter months. While it is unwise to assume that there will be similar trends for average rainfall and high intensity rainfall for a given region, evidence from the instrumental records supports, to some extent, the notion that in a CO2‐warmed world, high intensity rainfall could occur more frequently irrespective of local change to average rainfall.