Assessing the future evolution of climate extremes favouring floods using the regional climate model MAR over the CORDEX.be domain

In Belgium, most flooding events occur in winter as a result of intense precipitation events but also to the abrupt melting of the snow that covers the Ardennes summits. These conditions favourable to floods exhibit a decreasing trend over the period 1959–2010 resulting from the reduction in snow accumulation thought extreme precipitation events show a positive but non-significant signal. In this study, we investigate how these trends could evolve in a warmer climate by using future projections performed with the regional climate model MAR (for “Modèle Atmosphérique Régional”) in the framework... Mehr ...

Verfasser: Wyard, Coraline
Doutreloup, Sébastien
Fettweis, Xavier
Dokumenttyp: conference poster not in proceedings
Erscheinungsdatum: 2018
Schlagwörter: Floods / Belgium / snow / Ourthe / climate modelling / Physical / chemical / mathematical & earth Sciences / Earth sciences & physical geography / Physique / chimie / mathématiques & sciences de la terre / Sciences de la terre & géographie physique
Sprache: Englisch
Permalink: https://search.fid-benelux.de/Record/base-28940967
Datenquelle: BASE; Originalkatalog
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Link(s) : https://orbi.uliege.be/handle/2268/222053

In Belgium, most flooding events occur in winter as a result of intense precipitation events but also to the abrupt melting of the snow that covers the Ardennes summits. These conditions favourable to floods exhibit a decreasing trend over the period 1959–2010 resulting from the reduction in snow accumulation thought extreme precipitation events show a positive but non-significant signal. In this study, we investigate how these trends could evolve in a warmer climate by using future projections performed with the regional climate model MAR (for “Modèle Atmosphérique Régional”) in the framework of CORDEX.be, the Belgian EURO-CORDEX project. These future projections were obtained by nesting MAR into NorESM1-M and MIROC5 under the RCP8.5 scenario. Both these global models were selected from the CMIP5 archive after evaluation of their ability to represent the current (1976-2005) mean climate over Europe. This assessment is based on the skill score methodology. Results show that the period 2071-2100 would be marked by a decrease in snowfall amount, in snow accumulation, and consequently in conditions favourable to floods generated by snowpack melting with respect to 1976-2005. Regarding total PPN amount and extremes, the signal is less clear as both GCMs simulate different patterns and trends.