Abstract
Changes in precipitation amount, intensity and frequency in response to global warming are examined using global high‐resolution (16 km) climate model simulations based on the European Centre for Medium‐range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) Integrated Forecast System (IFS) conducted under Project Athena.Our study shows the increases of zonal‐mean total precipitation in all latitudes except the northern subtropics (15°–30°N) and southern subtropics‐to‐midlatitudes (30°–40°S). The probability distribution function (PDF) changes in different latitudes suggest a higher occurrence of light precipitation (LP; ≤1 mm/day) and heavy precipitation (HP; ≥30 mm/day) at the expense of moderate precipitation reduction (MP; 1–30 mm/day) from Tropics to midlatitudes, but an increase in all categories of precipitation in polar regions.On the other hand, the PDF change with global warming in different precipitation climatological zones presents another image. For all regions and seasons examined, there is an HP increase at the cost of MP, but LP varies. The reduced MP in richer precipitation zones resides in the PDF peak intensities, which linearly increase with the precipitation climatology zones. In particular in the Tropics (20°S to 20°N), the precipitation PDF has a flatter distribution (i.e. HP and LP increases with MP reduction) except for the Sahara Desert. In the primary precipitation zones in the subtropics (20°–40°) of both hemispheres, precipitation over land switches toward higher intensity (HP increases, but MP and LP decrease) in both winter and summer, while precipitation over ocean in both seasons shows a flattening trend in the intensity distribution. For the major precipitation zones of the mid‐to‐high latitude belt (40°–70°), PDF of precipitation tends to be flatter over ocean in summer, but switches toward higher intensities over land in both summer and winter, as well as over ocean in winter.
Highlights
The global mean atmospheric hydrological cycle is projected to intensify with the global warming due to the increased anthropogenic greenhouse gas emission
Comparing the precipitation spectrum change patterns in the three latitudinal belts under climate warming, we find that, except for the very dry zones (Rclim
The result shows a consistent increase at all precipitation intensities at high latitudes (70◦–90◦), and more frequency occurrence of LP and HP at the expense of MP from the Tropics to midlatitudes under climate warming
Summary
The global mean atmospheric hydrological cycle is projected to intensify with the global warming due to the increased anthropogenic greenhouse gas emission. Energy balance between latent heating and radiative cooling (Allen and Ingram, 2002; Trenberth, 2009), climate models predict global-mean precipitation increases of 1–3% K−1 in response to surface warming (Held and Soden, 2006; Sun et al, 2007), while observations show the rate of increase with a much wider range among different datasets. Most models agree that precipitation will increase in equatorial and high-latitude regions and decrease in subtropical areas, roughly matching the prediction of the “rich-get-richer” mechanism (e.g. Chou and Neelin, 2004; Held and Soden, 2006; Boucher et al, 2013). In this mechanism, the increased water vapour gives rise to the positive (negative) precipitation anomalies over climatological wet (dry) regions, provided that circulation is unchanged, only carrying more moisture around. The regional variations of precipitation characteristic changes are discussed by categorizing the areas into different latitudes and different precipitation climatological zones
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