Loeb, Nicole A;
Crawford, Alex;
Stroeve, Julienne C;
Hanesiak, John;
(2022)
Extreme Precipitation in the Eastern Canadian Arctic and Greenland: An Evaluation of Atmospheric Reanalyses.
Frontiers in Environmental Science
, 10
, Article 866929. 10.3389/fenvs.2022.866929.
Preview |
Text
Stroeve_fenvs-10-866929.pdf - Published Version Download (3MB) | Preview |
Abstract
Extreme precipitation events are becoming more common in the Arctic as the climate warms, but characterizing these events is notoriously challenging. Atmospheric reanalyses have become popular tools for climate studies in data-sparse regions such as the Arctic. While modern reanalyses have been shown to perform reasonably well at reproducing Arctic climate, their ability to represent extreme precipitation events has not been investigated in depth. In this study, three of the most recent reanalyses, ERA-5, MERRA-2, and CFSR, are compared to surface precipitation observations in the Eastern Canadian Arctic and Greenland from 1980 to 2016 to assess how well they represent the most intense observed events. Overall, the reanalyses struggled to match observed accumulations from individual events (−0.11 ≤ r ≤ 0.47) but matched the observed seasonality of precipitation extremes. The region with the strongest match between observations and reanalyses was Southwest Greenland. Performance varies by event, and the best match between reanalyses and station observations may have a spatial/temporal offset (up to one grid cell or 1 day). The three products saw similar performance in general; however, ERA-5 tends to see slightly higher correlations and lower biases than MERRA-2 or CFSR. Considering the limitations of in situ observations, these results suggest that the reanalyses are capable of representing aggregate extreme precipitation (e.g., seasonal or annual time scales), but struggle to consistently match the timing and location of specific observed events.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | Extreme Precipitation in the Eastern Canadian Arctic and Greenland: An Evaluation of Atmospheric Reanalyses |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.3389/fenvs.2022.866929 |
| Publisher version: | https://doi.org/10.3389/fenvs.2022.866929 |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | Copyright © 2022 Loeb, Crawford, Stroeve and Hanesiak. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms. |
| Keywords: | Science & Technology, Life Sciences & Biomedicine, Environmental Sciences, Environmental Sciences & Ecology, extreme precipitation, atmospheric reanalysis, Arctic, climate, Greenland, Canadian Arctic, SNOWFALL, CLIMATE, TEMPERATURE, SIMULATIONS, DERIVATION, SKILL |
| UCL classification: | UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Maths and Physical Sciences UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Maths and Physical Sciences > Dept of Earth Sciences UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS UCL |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10151024 |
Archive Staff Only
 |
View Item |
