The increasing frequency of heatwaves over East Asia (EA) is impacting agriculture, water management, and people’s livelihood. However, the effect of humidity on high-temperature events has not yet been fully explored. Using observations and future climate change projections conducted with the latest generation of Earth System models, we examine the mechanisms of dry and moist heatwaves over EA. In the dry heatwave region, anticyclonic circulation has been amplified after the onset of heatwaves under the influence of the convergence of anomalous wave activity flux over northern EA, resulting in surface warming via adiabatic processes. In contrast, the moist heatwaves are triggered by the locally generated anticyclonic anomalies, with the surface warming amplified by cloud and water vapor feedback. Model simulations from phase six of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project projected display intensification of dry heatwaves and increased moist heatwave days in response to projected increases in greenhouse gas concentrations.

In 2018, heatwaves (HWs), which are defined as period of abnormally hot weather with the daily maximum temperature (T_Max) exceeding its 95th percentile threshold for at least three consecutive days, were prevalent during June to August, and temperature records were broken in many countries over East Asia (EA) including China (CH), Japan (JP), and the Korean Peninsula (KP). In particular, extreme HWs through July to August lasted for the longest duration with 21.3 days with T_Max reaching 36.9°C. The highest T_Max, recorded since 1907, exceeded to 41°C in Hongcheon, located east of Seoul in the KP. Here, we examine the factors that influenced the 2018 HW, and how these relate to the 1994 HW, which was second longest HW recorded in the KP. The results show that abnormally strong and northwestward extended anticyclone features observed in July 2018 lasted as a persistent North Pacific anticyclone anomaly until August 2018 centered at the northern KP. These anticyclone features subsequently formed as a modon-like blocking with a cyclonic anomaly in the East China Sea. Meanwhile, in August 1994, the North Pacific High (NPH) extended to eastern EA, which broked the meridional dipole structure and HWs do not persist. The NPH, which persisted till August 2018, was accompanied by a sinking motion, suppression of precipitation, anomalous maximum temperature, weakening of the westerly jet stream, and increased insolation due to clear sky. We find that the prolonged and northwestward-shifted NPH including the KP drove the extraordinarily hot 2018 summer in Korea. In addition, low precipitation and massive evapotranspiration with the persistent insolation in July 2018 influenced the dry condition at the surface. We suggest that the predictions for the location and duration of the NPH associated with the HWs are required to reduce heat-related mortality and the impact on agriculture due to excessive evapotranspiration.

In this work, we projected future drought risks over East Asia from the perspective of evapotranspiration (ET) deficit using the new climate projections of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 (CMIP6). For the regional drought projections, we employed a state‐of‐the‐art complementary relationship (CR) method to estimate ET and atmospheric evaporative demand (Ep) that quantify the combined impact of water deficiency and vapor pressure deficit stress. The performance of the CR method was validated using the reanalysis climate data and independent water‐balance ET estimates. The same CR method was again applied to hindcasts and projections of seven global climate models (GCM) in the CMIP6 archive. Results showed that the CR ET estimates and the GCM‐driven ET products were both able to approximately close the basin‐scale water balance and tightly correlated with each other. The application with the CMIP6 GCM hindcasts provided the same indication that the CR ET and the GCM‐driven ET are consistent. The drought assessments using the ET deficit (ET − Ep) from the CMIP6 projections implicates that future drought risks over East Asia would be much higher than indicated by precipitation or soil moisture projections. Rising trends of Ep are expected to outpace those of ET even under the medium‐level greenhouse gas emission scenario. Our new drought projections suggest that Ep amplified by soil water deficiency could raise agricultural and wildfire risks substantially by the end of the 21st century.