Emerging regional climate change signals for Europe under varying large-scale circulation conditions

Abstract

A large ensemble of regional climate model projections was investigated regarding if and when they show an emergence of significant climate change signals in seasonal temperature and precipitation within Europe. The influence of the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO), as simulated in the projections, was investigated. In most parts of Europe, the projections indicate robust emergence of temperature change in the first 2 decades of the 21st century, typically earlier for summer than for winter. For precipitation changes, signals generally emerge much later than for temperature. For Europe as a whole, the precipitation signals tend to emerge some 40 to 60 yr later than the temperature signals. In some sub-regions, robust signals for precipitation are not found within the studied period, i.e. until 2100. Some sub-regions, notably the Mediterranean area and Scandinavia, show different behaviour in some aspects compared to the ensemble-based results as a whole. NAO has some influence on the temperature change signals, which emerge earlier in winter for some models and regions if NAO is accounted for. For summer temperatures, the influence of NAO is less evident. Similarly, for precipitation, accounting for NAO leads to an earlier emergence in some regions and models. Here, we find an impact for both summer and winter. © 2013 Inter-Research.