The Landscape of Climate Change
Timothy Brown and John Abatzoglou
Desert Research Institute - Reno, NV
The climate system
Bonan, 2002
DIRECT OBSERVATIONS OF RECENT
CLIMATE CHANGE
Since the Third Assessment Report, progress in understanding
how climate is changing in space and in time has been gained
through:
• improvements and extensions of numerous
datasets and data analyses
• broader geographical coverage
• better understanding of uncertainties, and
• a wider variety of measurements
From IPCC WG1 presentation
Direct Observations of Recent Climate Change
Warming of the climate system is unequivocal, as is now
evident from observations of increases in global average
air and ocean temperatures, widespread melting of snow
and ice, and rising global mean sea level.
From IPCC WG1 presentation
Direct Observations of Recent Climate Change
Global mean
temperature
Global average
sea level
Northern hemisphere
Snow cover
From IPCC WG1 presentation
Direct Observations of Recent Climate Change
At continental, regional, and ocean basin scales,
numerous long-term changes in climate have
been observed. These include:
–
–
–
Changes in Arctic temperatures and ice,
Widespread changes in precipitation amounts, ocean salinity,
wind patterns
and aspects of extreme weather including droughts, heavy
precipitation, heat waves and the intensity of tropical cyclones
From IPCC WG1 presentation
Climate change and chemistry
Attribution
Building climate projections
Special Report on Emissions Scenarios
Emission Scenario
SRES-A1B
Climate Models
IPSL
CM4
BCCR
BCM2.0
FGOALS
INM
CM3
GFDL
CM2.0
GFDL
CM2.1
NASA
GISS-ER
CGCM
T47
MRI
CGCM2
CGCM
T63
CNRM
CM3
Climate Change
MIROC
hires
ECHAM5
MIROC
medres
CSIRO
MK3.5
2˚x2˚ horizontal resolution
ΔTemp, Δ Precipitation, Δ Relative Humidity, Δ Wind Speed
Ensemble
Mean
Future Climate (Δmonthly)
SummerTemperature
TemperatureChange
Change
Summer
st minus Late 20th) SRES-A1B
(Late
21
st
(Late 21 minus Late 20th) SRES-A1B
15 different GCMs all run under the same scenario
Change in Degrees Celsius
Change in Degrees Celsius
15 different GCMs all run under the same scenario
SummerTemperature
PrecipitationChange
Change
Summer
st minus Late 20th) SRES-A1B
(Late
21
st
(Late 21 minus Late 20th) SRES-A1B
15 different GCMs all run under the same scenario
Change in Degrees Celsius
% Change
15 different GCMs all run under the same scenario
Global temperature projections
Seasonal temperature prediction
Climate change and moisture
Precipitation intensity
Precipitation prediction
Precipitation prediction (extremes)
Drought prediction
From Hoerling and Eischeid (2007)
Relative humidity prediction
Wind speed prediction
Murphy Complex climate change
Murphy Complex climate change
Murphy Complex climate change
Murphy Complex climate change