Seasonal trends of air temperature and diurnal range in the Arabian Peninsula, the Levant, and Iraq: a spatiotemporal study and development of an online data visualization tool

Abstract

As the temperature and the diurnal temperature range (DTR) influence our life in many fields like agriculture and health, changes in either parameter may affect our current and future plans in such areas. This paper investigates the variability of temperature and DTR in the Levant and the Arabian Peninsula (172 stations in 12 countries) in different study periods of 10, 25, 40, 50, and 60 years. The data were tested for homogeneity using four standard tests, and we used the nonparametric statistics Mann-Kendall and Theil-Sen to calculate trend significance, direction, and magnitude in time series. Our results show a significant warming trend in 45–60% of the region with an average increase of 0.65, 0.43, and 0.30 °C/decade for the 25-, 40-, and 50-year study periods. The highest number of stations that have a significant increase in temperature occurs in spring and summer. On the other hand, decreasing DTR trends occur in about 31% of the region, mostly in the south of the Arabian Peninsula at 0.60 °C/decade. This work, additionally, provides an interactive online tool that shows the trends and temperature on zoomable maps, charts, and other visuals to station level. This tool could benefit researchers and strategic planners for the studied region. In many stations, we found that there are a significant increase in temperature and a decrease in DTR which reflect a severe change in the climate that should be considered in future planning. We recommend expanding this study to cover precipitation and other meteorological factors.