Greater future U.K. winter precipitation increase in new convection-permitting scenarios

Abstract

For the first time, a model at a resolution on par with operational weather forecast models has been used for national climate scenarios. An ensemble of 12 climate change projections at convection-permitting (2.2 km) scale has been run for the United Kingdom, as part of the UK Climate Projections (UKCP) project. Contrary to previous studies, these show greater future increases in winter mean precipitation in the convection-permitting model compared with the coarser (12 km) driving model. A large part (60%) of the future increase in winter precipitation occurrence over land comes from an increase in convective showers in the 2.2 km model, which are most likely triggered over the sea and advected inland with potentially further development. In the 12 km model, increases in precipitation occurrence over the sea, largely due to an increase in convective showers, do not extend over the land. This is partly due to known limitations of the convection parameterization scheme, used in conventional coarse-resolution climate models, which acts locally without direct memory and so has no ability to advect diagnosed convection over the land or trigger new showers along convective outflow boundaries. This study shows that the importance of accurately representing convection extends beyond short-duration precipitation extremes and the summer season to projecting future changes in mean precipitation in winter.