Identification

Title

Extratropical cyclone statistics during the last millennium and the 21st century

Abstract

Extratropical cyclones in winter and their characteristics are investigated in depth for the Atlantic European region, as they are responsible for a significant part of the rainfall and extreme wind and/or precipitation-induced hazards. The analysis is based on a seamless transient simulation with a state-of-the-art fully coupled Earth system model from 850 to 2100 CE. The Representative Concentration Pathway 8.5 (RCP8.5) scenario is used in the 21st century. During the Common Era, cyclone characteristics show pronounced variations on interannual and decadal timescales, but no external forcing imprint is found prior to 1850. Thus, variations of extratropical cyclone characteristics are mainly caused by internal variability of the coupled climate system. When anthropogenic forcing becomes dominant in the 20th century, a decrease of the cyclone occurrences mainly over the Mediterranean and a strong increase of extreme cyclone-related precipitation become detectable. The latter is due to thermodynamics as it follows the Clausius-Clapeyron relation. An important finding, though, is that the relation between temperature and extreme cyclone-related precipitation is not always controlled by the Clausius-Clapeyron relation, which suggests that dynamical processes can play an important role in generating extreme cyclone-related precipitation - for example, in the absence of anomalously warm background conditions. Thus, the importance of dynamical processes, even on decadal timescales, might explain the conundrum that proxy records suggest enhanced occurrence of precipitation extremes during rather cold periods in the past.

Resource type

document

Resource locator

Unique resource identifier

code

http://n2t.net/ark:/85065/d7jd50qj

codeSpace

Dataset language

eng

Spatial reference system

code identifying the spatial reference system

Classification of spatial data and services

Topic category

geoscientificInformation

Keywords

Keyword set

keyword value

Text

originating controlled vocabulary

title

Resource Type

reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2016-01-01T00:00:00Z

Geographic location

West bounding longitude

East bounding longitude

North bounding latitude

South bounding latitude

Temporal reference

Temporal extent

Begin position

End position

Dataset reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2018-10-22T00:00:00Z

Frequency of update

Quality and validity

Lineage

Conformity

Data format

name of format

version of format

Constraints related to access and use

Constraint set

Use constraints

Limitations on public access

None

Responsible organisations

Responsible party

contact position

OpenSky Support

organisation name

UCAR/NCAR - Library

full postal address

PO Box 3000

Boulder

80307-3000

email address

opensky@ucar.edu

web address

http://opensky.ucar.edu/

name: homepage

responsible party role

pointOfContact

Metadata on metadata

Metadata point of contact