Abstract

<p>Understanding and predicting how extratropical cyclones might respond to climate change is essential for assessing future weather risks and informing climate change adaptation strategies. Climate model simulations provide a vital component of this assessment, with the caveat that their representation of the present-day climate is adequate. In this study the representation of the NH storm tracks and jet streams and their responses to climate change are evaluated across the three major phases of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project: CMIP3 (2007), CMIP5 (2012), and CMIP6 (2019). The aim is to quantity how present-day biases in the NH storm tracks and jet streams have evolved with model developments, and to further our understanding of their responses to climate change.</p><p>The spatial pattern of the present-day biases in CMIP3, CMIP5, and CMIP6 are similar. However, the magnitude of the biases in the CMIP6 models is substantially lower in the DJF North Atlantic storm track and jet stream than in the CMIP3 and CMIP5 models. In summer, the biases in the JJA North Atlantic and North Pacific storm tracks are also much reduced in the CMIP6 models. Despite this, the spatial pattern of the climate change response in the NH storm tracks and jet streams are similar across the CMIP3, CMIP5, and CMIP6 ensembles. The SSP2-4.5 scenario responses in the CMIP6 models are substantially larger than in the corresponding RCP4.5 CMIP5 models, consistent with the larger climate sensitivities of the CMIP6 models compared to CMIP5.</p>

Highlights

  • Midlatitude storms are one of the major weather risks in the extratropics of the Northern Hemisphere (NH)

  • Despite this improved representation of the current climate, the spatial patterns of the climate change response of the NH storm tracks and jet streams remain similar in the CMIP3, CMIP5, and CMIP6 models

  • The representation of the NH storm tracks and jet streams and their response to climate change have been evaluated in the CMIP3, CMIP5, and CMIP6 climate models

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Summary

Introduction

Midlatitude storms are one of the major weather risks in the extratropics of the Northern Hemisphere (NH). In the NH, midlatitude storms ( known as extratropical cyclones) are primarily found over the Northern Atlantic and Northern Pacific Oceans (e.g., Blackmon et al, 1977). Midlatitude storms typically develop in the strongly baroclinic regions over the western North Pacific and North Atlantic where strong meridional temperature gradients exist associated with the land/sea contrast and the Kuroshio and Gulf Stream ocean currents. These regions of midlatitude storm activity are known as the storm tracks. The NH jet streams are strongly associated with the storm tracks, with the North Atlantic jet stream and the North Pacific jet stream positioned just to the south of the storm tracks

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