European and Mediterranean hydroclimate responses to tropical volcanic forcing over the last millennium

Rao, Mukund Palat; Cook, Benjamin I.; Cook, Edward R.; D’Arrigo, Rosanne; Krusic, Paul J.; Anchukaitis, Kevin J.; LeGrande, Allegra N.; Buckley, Brendan M.; Davi, Nicole; Leland, Caroline; Griffin, Kevin L.

doi:10.1002/2017gl073057

Cited by 56 publications

(58 citation statements)

References 51 publications

(94 reference statements)

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“…Iles et al (2013) examined the global precipitation response to large low-latitude volcanic eruptions using an ensemble of last-millennium simulations from HadCM3 that indicated a significant reduction in global mean precipitation following these events. In the tropics, areas experiencing post-eruption drying coincide with climatologically wet regions, while dry regions get wetter on average, but the changes are spatially heterogeneous; a similar pattern has also been noted over Europe (Rao et al, 2017). These responses are physically consistent with future global warming projections, but of opposite sign because volcanoes and greenhouse gases have contrasting influences on radiative forcing.…”

Section: Natural Forcing Of Hydroclimatesupporting

confidence: 70%

Comparing proxy and model estimates of hydroclimate variability and change over the Common Era

Smerdon¹,

Luterbacher²,

Phipps³

et al. 2017

Clim. Past

101

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Abstract. Water availability is fundamental to societies and ecosystems, but our understanding of variations in hydroclimate (including extreme events, flooding, and decadal periods of drought) is limited because of a paucity of modern instrumental observations that are distributed unevenly across the globe and only span parts of the 20th and 21st centuries. Such data coverage is insufficient for characterizing hydroclimate and its associated dynamics because of its multidecadal to centennial variability and highly regionalized spatial signature. High-resolution (seasonal to decadal) hydroclimatic proxies that span all or parts of the Common Era (CE) and paleoclimate simulations from climate models are therefore important tools for augmenting our understanding of hydroclimate variability. In particular, the comparison of the two sources of information is critical for addressing the uncertainties and limitations of both while enriching each of their interpretations. We review the principal proxy data available for hydroclimatic reconstructions over the CE and highlight the contemporary understanding of how these proxies are interpreted as hydroclimate indicators. We also review the available last-millennium simulations from fully coupled climate models and discuss several outstanding challenges associated with simulating hydroclimate variability and change over the CE. A specific review of simulated hydroclimatic changes forced by volcanic events is provided, as is a discussion of expected improvements in estimated radiative forcings, models, and their implementation in the future. Our review of hydroclimatic proxies and last-millennium model simulations is used as the basis for articulating a variety of considerations and best practices for how to perform proxy-model comparisons of CE hydroclimate. This discussion provides a framework for how best to evaluate hydroclimate variability and its associated dynamics using these comparisons and how they can better inform interpretations of both proxy data and model simulations. We subsequently explore means of using proxy-model comparisons to better constrain and characterize future hydroclimate risks. This is explored specifically in the context of several examples that demonstrate how proxy-model comparisons can be used to quantitatively constrain future hydroclimatic risks as estimated from climate model projections.

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Section: Natural Forcing Of Hydroclimatesupporting

confidence: 70%

Comparing proxy and model estimates of hydroclimate variability and change over the Common Era

Smerdon¹,

Luterbacher²,

Phipps³

et al. 2017

Clim. Past

101

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…The impact of natural external forcing such as solar variability and volcanic eruptions on climate variability is of increasing interest (e.g. Atwood et al 2016, Otto-Bliesner et al 2016, Rao et al 2017, Cook et al 2007, Anchukaitis et al 2017, Tejedor et al 2017. Solar variability has been found to coincide with low-growth periods in Northern Hemisphere trees (e.g.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Lack of cool, not warm, extremes distinguishes late 20th Century climate in 979-year Tasmanian summer temperature reconstruction

Allen

Cook

Evans³

et al. 2018

Environ. Res. Lett.

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Very few annually resolved millennial-length temperature reconstructions exist for the Southern Hemisphere. Here we present four 979-year reconstructions for southeastern Australia for the austral summer months of December-February. Two of the reconstructions are based on the Australian Water Availability Project dataset and two on the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature dataset. For each climate data set, one reconstruction is based solely on Lagarostrobos franklinii (restricted reconstructions) while the other is based on multiple Tasmanian conifer species (unrestricted reconstructions). Each reconstruction calibrates ∼50−60% of the variance in the temperature datasets depending on the number of tree-ring records available for the reconstruction. We found little difference in the temporal variability of the reconstructions, although extremes are amplified in the restricted reconstructions relative to the unrestricted reconstructions. The reconstructions highlight the occurrence of numerous individual years, especially in the 15th−17th Centuries, for which temperatures were comparable with those of the late 20th Century. The 1950−1999 period, however, stands out as the warmest 50-year period on average for the past 979 years, with a sustained shift away from relatively low mean temperatures, the length of which is unique in the 979-year record. The reconstructions are strongly and positively related to temperatures across the southeast of the Australian continent, negatively related to temperatures in the north and northeast of the continent, and uncorrelated with temperatures in the west. The lack of a strong relationship with temperatures across the continent highlights the necessity of a sub-regional focus for Australasian temperature reconstructions.

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“…The Mediterranean Basin displays timescale-dependent and spatially diverse hydroclimate patterns throughout the past millennium, manifested by an east-west dipole at annual to decadal scales (Xoplaki et al 2004, Roberts et al 2012, Seim et al 2015, Labuhn et al 2018, Jones et al 2019, which disappears on multi-decadal to centennial timescales (Cook et al 2016). Distinct hydroclimatic dipole patterns in Europe, lasting several years, also follow large volcanic eruptions, with humid conditions in northeastern Europe, and drier conditions in northwestern Europe and parts of the Mediterranean (Fischer et al 2007, Büntgen et al 2017, Gao and Gao 2017, Rao et al 2017, Xoplaki et al 2018, Schurer et al 2019.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

European warm-season temperature and hydroclimate since 850 CE

Ljungqvist

Seim

Krusic

et al. 2019

Environ. Res. Lett.

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The long-term relationship between temperature and hydroclimate has remained uncertain due to the short length of instrumental measurements and inconsistent results from climate model simulations. This lack of understanding is particularly critical with regard to projected drought and flood risks. Here we assess warm-season co-variability patterns between temperature and hydroclimate over Europe back to 850 CE using instrumental measurements, tree-ring based reconstructions, and climate model simulations. We find that the temperature-hydroclimate relationship in both the instrumental and reconstructed data turns more positive at lower frequencies, but less so in model simulations, with a dipole emerging between positive (warm and wet) and negative (warm and dry) associations in northern and southern Europe, respectively. Compared to instrumental data, models reveal a more negative co-variability across all timescales, while reconstructions exhibit a more positive co-variability. Despite the observed differences in the temperature-hydroclimate covariability patterns in instrumental, reconstructed and model simulated data, we find that all data types share relatively similar phase-relationships between temperature and hydroclimate, indicating the common influence of external forcing. The co-variability between temperature and soil moisture OPEN ACCESS RECEIVED

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European and Mediterranean hydroclimate responses to tropical volcanic forcing over the last millennium

Cited by 56 publications

References 51 publications

Comparing proxy and model estimates of hydroclimate variability and change over the Common Era

Comparing proxy and model estimates of hydroclimate variability and change over the Common Era

Lack of cool, not warm, extremes distinguishes late 20th Century climate in 979-year Tasmanian summer temperature reconstruction

European warm-season temperature and hydroclimate since 850 CE

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