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Probabilistic estimates of recent changes in temperature: a multi-scale attribution analysis

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Abstract

The role of anthropogenic forcings in temperature changes during recent decades is investigated over a range of spatial scales. Changes in the annual mean surface temperature and also in the warmest night of the year, which has implications for human health, are considered. Distributions of regional trends with and without the effect of human activity are produced, using constraints from a global optimal detection analysis. Anthropogenic forcings are estimated to have more than doubled the likelihood of mean warming in all regions considered except central North America, where results are more model dependent. The likelihood of warming of the warmest night has also increased, but the estimated change is more uncertain. Inferences on sub-continental scales are indicative rather than definitive because of the absence of locally important forcings and processes in model simulations, as well as model biases. As model inconsistencies may impact regional analyses, a multi-model approach is essential.

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Acknowledgments

The authors are grateful to two anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments. NC and PAS were supported by the Joint DECC, Defra and MoD Integrated Climate Programme—DECC/Defra (GA01101), MoD (CBC/2B/0417_Annex C5). HS and TN were funded by the Innovative Program of Climate Change Projection for the 21st century from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology of Japan, and by the Global Environment Research Fund (S-5) of the Ministry of the Environment of Japan. We thank Chris Huntingford and Myles Allen for their contribution to the development of the EIV software.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Met Office Hadley Centre, FitzRoy Road, Exeter, EX1 3PB, UK

    Nikolaos Christidis

  2. Met Office Hadley Centre (Reading Unit), Meteorology Building, University of Reading, Reading, RG6 6BB, UK

    Peter A. Stott

  3. Climate Research Division, Environment Canada, Toronto, ON, M3H 5T4, Canada

    Francis W. Zwiers

  4. National Institute for Environmental Studies, Tsukuba, Ibaraki, 305-8506, Japan

    Hideo Shiogama & Toru Nozawa

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  1. Nikolaos Christidis
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  2. Peter A. Stott
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Correspondence to Nikolaos Christidis.

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Christidis, N., Stott, P.A., Zwiers, F.W. et al. Probabilistic estimates of recent changes in temperature: a multi-scale attribution analysis. Clim Dyn 34, 1139–1156 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-009-0615-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-009-0615-7

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