Changes in rain and snow over the Tibetan Plateau based on IMERG and Ground-based observation

Li, Donghuan; Qi, Yujie; Chen, Deliang

doi:10.1016/j.jhydrol.2021.127400

Cited by 26 publications

(11 citation statements)

References 57 publications

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“…However, IMERG products contained the probability of liquid precipitation, which can be used to detect snowfall (Li et al 2022). Following the study of Li et al (2022), the hourly precipitation (calibrated IMERG precipitation) can be classified as snowfall if the probability of liquid precipitation is <20% over the TP during the observation hour. The hourly precipitation that was classified as snowfall was summed to get the daily and monthly snowfall amounts.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Wet bias of summer precipitation in the northwestern Tibetan Plateau in ERA5 is linked to overestimated lower-level southerly wind over the plateau

Chen

Tang

et al. 2023

Clim Dyn

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The Tibetan Plateau (TP), also called the Third Pole, is considered to be “the world water tower”. The northwestern TP (NWTP), which has an average elevation higher than 4800 m, is an arid region where the summer precipitation is largely overestimated by the ERA5 global reanalysis product. We hypothesize that this wet bias is mainly caused by unrealistic lower-level winds that trigger strong convection over the region; it can be reduced by using a high-resolution regional climate model with a large domain that allows realistically representing interactions between the Westerlies and Asian summer monsoons. Here, downscaling using the Weather Research and Forecasting (WRF) model driven by ERA5 was conducted with a large domain (8°‒50° N, 65°‒125° E) at 9 km for the period 1979‒2019 (WRF9km). Precipitation values from WRF9km and ERA5 were evaluated against satellite observations; compared with ERA5, WRF9km captured the climatological summer precipitation over the NWTP with a much-reduced wet bias. The ERA5 overestimation is mainly caused by excessive convective precipitation, likely linked to strong vertical motions over the NWTP induced by an overestimated lower-level southerly wind.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Wet bias of summer precipitation in the northwestern Tibetan Plateau in ERA5 is linked to overestimated lower-level southerly wind over the plateau

Chen

Tang

et al. 2023

Clim Dyn

Self Cite

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“…Li et al. (2022) reported that the amount and frequency of precipitation have a larger decrement in the spring than those in the summer and autumn on the south TP during 2001–2020, and the change in winter is ignorable. Li et al.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Such variation not only directly affects the water availability but also indirectly influence the energy input and glacial melting. For example, the increment of snow cover in the early spring (Li et al., 2022) can lead to higher albedo and reduce the energy input used for evaporation. Third, the change in phenological characteristics of vegetation is another dominant factor.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The decrement of precipitation reduces the water availability in the underlying surface, thus results in decrement of E , especially in the water‐limited areas. Second, as the general atmospheric circulation changed, the magnitudes, frequencies, and distribution of snow varied dramatically in the recent two decades (Li et al., 2022). Such variation not only directly affects the water availability but also indirectly influence the energy input and glacial melting.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The different performance of the E trend in each season may be related to several aspects. First, the seasonal variation of precipitation can influence the trend of E. Li et al (2022) reported that the amount and frequency of precipitation have a larger decrement in the spring than those in the summer and autumn on the south TP during 2001-2020, and the change in winter is ignorable. Li et al (2020) also reported that the decrement of precipitation on the TP during 2000-2018 is higher in the spring than those in other seasons.…”

Section: When Did the Evaporation Decreasementioning

confidence: 99%

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The Evaporation on the Tibetan Plateau Stops Increasing in the Recent Two Decades

et al. 2022

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As a crucial variable in hydrological and climate modeling, a lot of efforts have been made to estimate the evaporation (E, including soil evaporation, canopy interception, and plant transpiration) on the Tibetan Plateau (TP). Most studies showed that the evaporation on the TP stops increasing or even decreases in the recent two decades. However, the spatio‐temporal variability of this phenomenon and its underlying mechanism remains uncertain. Here, we utilized a state‐of‐the‐art version of the sigmoid generalized complementary equation to estimate the monthly evaporation over the TP for the period of 1979–2018. The results show that the annual E increases significantly during 1979–1998 with a rate of 1.94 mm yr−1 (based on the total E over the TP), however, it decreases during 1999–2018 with a rate of −1.06 mm yr−1. The most significant decreasing trend of E occurs in the spring. The areas with the most significant decrement of E include the central and western Qiangtang Plateau, the middle reaches of Yarlung Zangbo River, and the Yangtze River basin. By introducing a new aridity index Rwe, we identified that the decrement of E mainly occurs in the water‐limited regions, which contribute to 60% of the total decreasing trend of the whole region; at the same time, the energy‐limited regions also contribute to 40% of the decreasing trend. This study is important for the hydrological researches and decision making because the trend of E can influence the water resources and agriculture.

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One‐kilometre monthly air temperature and precipitation product over the Mongolian Plateau for 1950–2020

Xin

Yang

Chen

et al. 2023

Intl Journal of Climatology

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The fragile ecological environment of the Mongolian Plateau (MP) is sensitive to climate change. It is necessary to fully understand the temperature and precipitation changes on the MP to ensure regional sustainable development. Most existing studies are conducted based on station observations which suffer from sparse distribution and limited spatial representativeness and cannot perfectly represent the climatic conditions of the whole region. By contrast, the long‐term, spatially continuous reanalysis products offer new opportunities for MP climate change research. However, the coarse spatial resolution and large uncertainties of reanalysis data limit their applicability to provide reliable climate information at finer scales. Within the delta downscaling framework, we downscale and correct the state‐of‐the‐art European Centre for Medium‐range Weather Forecasts ReAnalysis 5 land portion (ERA5‐Land) using a high‐resolution WorldClim reference climatology and generate a long‐term (1950–2020) 1‐km monthly air temperature and precipitation downscaled dataset. During the downscaling process, the results obtained by nearest neighbour, bilinear and bicubic interpolation methods are evaluated and compared. Air temperature result of bilinear method and precipitation result of nearest neighbour method, which have the best accuracy, are taken as the final downscaled data. The evaluation shows that the downscaled data has acceptable accuracy (overall MBE = −0.41°C, Corr = 0.997, RMSE = 1.51°C for air temperature, and MBE = 1.58 mm·month−1, Corr = 0.747, RMSE = 24.24 mm·month−1 for precipitation), and outperforms the original ERA5‐Land and widely used Climatic Research Unit (CRU) data. In addition, the downscaled data can also provide accurate and detailed temperature and precipitation change trends over the MP. With fine spatial resolution, long‐time span and good spatial continuity, the downscaled air temperature and precipitation will be a useful data source to explore climate change over the MP.

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Changes in rain and snow over the Tibetan Plateau based on IMERG and Ground-based observation

Cited by 26 publications

References 57 publications

Wet bias of summer precipitation in the northwestern Tibetan Plateau in ERA5 is linked to overestimated lower-level southerly wind over the plateau

Wet bias of summer precipitation in the northwestern Tibetan Plateau in ERA5 is linked to overestimated lower-level southerly wind over the plateau

The Evaporation on the Tibetan Plateau Stops Increasing in the Recent Two Decades

One‐kilometre monthly air temperature and precipitation product over the Mongolian Plateau for 1950–2020

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