DOI: 10.1175/JCLI-D-14-00382.1
Scopus记录号: 2-s2.0-84926034744
论文题名: The effect of global warming on severe thunderstorms in the United States
作者: Seeley J.T. ; Romps D.M.
刊名: Journal of Climate
ISSN: 8948755
出版年: 2015
卷: 28, 期: 6 起始页码: 2443
结束页码: 2458
语种: 英语
Scopus关键词: Boundary layers
; Climate change
; Global warming
; Precipitation (meteorology)
; Scales (weighing instruments)
; Storms
; Thunderstorms
; CAPE
; Convective instabilities
; Convective storms
; Coupled Model Intercomparison Project
; Divergent projection
; Favorable conditions
; Relative weights
; Wind shears
; Climate models
; climate change
; climate modeling
; convective system
; global warming
; hail
; humidity
; thunderstorm
; wind shear
; Great Plains
; United States
英文摘要: How will warming temperatures influence thunderstorm severity? This question can be explored by using climate models to diagnose changes in large-scale convective instability (CAPE) and wind shear, conditions that are known to be conducive to the formation of severe thunderstorms. First, an ensemble of climate models from phase 5 of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP5) is evaluated on its ability to reproduce a radiosonde climatology of such storm-favorable conditions in the current climate's spring and summer seasons, focusing on the contiguous United States (CONUS). Of the 11 climate models evaluated, a high-performing subset of four (GFDL CM3, GFDL-ESM2M, MRI-CGCM3, and NorESM1-M) is identified. Second, the twenty-first-century changes in the frequency of environments favorable to severe thunderstorms are calculated in these high-performing models as they are forced by the RCP4.5 and RCP8.5 emissions pathways. For the RCP8.5 scenario, the models predict consistent CONUS-mean fractional springtime increases in the range of 50%-180% by the end of the twenty-first century; for the summer, three of the four models predict increases in the range of 40%-120% and one model predicts a small decrease. This disagreement between the models is traced to divergent projections for future CAPE and boundary layer humidity in the Great Plains. This paper also explores the sensitivity of the results to the relative weight given to wind shear in determining how "favorable" a large-scale environment is for the development of severe thunderstorms, and it is found that this weighting is not the dominant source of uncertainty in projections of future thunderstorm severity. © 2015 American Meteorological Society. 资助项目: NSF, National Science Foundation
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资源类型: 期刊论文
标识符: http://119.78.100.158/handle/2HF3EXSE/50767
Appears in Collections: 气候变化事实与影响
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作者单位: Department of Earth and Planetary Science, University of California, Berkeley, CA, United States; Earth Sciences Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA, United States
Recommended Citation:
Seeley J.T.,Romps D.M.. The effect of global warming on severe thunderstorms in the United States[J]. Journal of Climate,2015-01-01,28(6)