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Extreme Rainfall Variations Under Climate Change Scenarios. Case of Study in an Andean Tropical River Basin

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Abstract

Maximum rainfall events have triggered hazards that harm ecosystems and populations. Climate change could modify these extreme events, becoming more severe and frequent. Knowing the patterns of Spatio-temporal changes in the distribution of extreme rainfall in Andean regions represents a research challenge due to the complex climate behavior in the tropical mountain basins. The study aimed to analyze future Spatio-temporal changes in maximum daily rainfall patterns. The methods and analysis were performed in the Paute river basin in Ecuador through observed and simulated data from 1985 to 2005. The outputs of an ensemble regional climate model of Ecuador (RCM) based on CMIP5 models were used with two representative concentrations pathways (RCP), scenarios 4.5 and 8.5, in two future periods; future 1 from 2011 to 2040 and future 2 from 2041 to 2070. The General Extreme Value (GEV) distribution was used to fit the maximum annual daily rainfall. The maximum rainfall change factor between historical and future periods was calculated for 5,10,30, 60, and 100 years return periods. The results showed an increment of maximum rainfall spatial average in all return periods for RCP 4.5 and 8.5 in the future 1. Future 2 presented an increment of maximum rainfall spatial average in all return periods for RCP 4.5 and 8.5 scenarios except for the 30,60 and 100 years return periods of the RCP 4.5 scenario, displaying a decrease of maximum rainfall spatial average. Knowing rainfall pattern projections could help formulate actions to diminish the risks of extreme rainfall.

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Data Availability

The datasets and code used and analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank INAMHI and MAATE for providing the information for this study.

Funding

This research was funded by the University of Cuenca through its Research Department (DIUC) as part of the project titled “Estudio de las condiciones climatológicas de América del Sur que producen las sequías en el Ecuador continental”.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Carrera de Ingeniería Ambiental, Facultad de Ciencias Químicas, Universidad de Cuenca, Campus Central, Av. 12 de Abril s/n y Loja, 010203, Cuenca, Ecuador

    Martín Montenegro, Fernando García & Alex Avilés

  2. Grupo de Evaluación de riesgos ambientales en sistemas de producción y servicios (RISKEN), Universidad de Cuenca, Campus Central, Av. 12 de Abril s/n y Loja, 010203, Cuenca, Ecuador

    Fernando García & Alex Avilés

  3. Carrera de Ingeniería Civil & Departamento de Ingeniería Civil, Facultad de Ingeniería, Universidad de Cuenca, Campus Central, Av. 12 de Abril s/n y Loja, 010203, Cuenca, Ecuador

    Daniel Mendoza & Diego Mora

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  1. Martín Montenegro
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Contributions

M.M.: Conceptualization, Methodology, Software, Formal Analysis, Writing- Original draft. D.Me.: Data curation, Formal Analysis. D.Mo: Writing- Reviewing and Editing. F.G: Formal Analysis, Writing- Reviewing and Editing. A.A.: Conceptualization, Formal Analysis, Writing- Reviewing and Editing, Supervision. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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Correspondence to Alex Avilés.

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Montenegro, M., Mendoza, D., Mora, D. et al. Extreme Rainfall Variations Under Climate Change Scenarios. Case of Study in an Andean Tropical River Basin. Water Resour Manage 36, 5931–5944 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11269-022-03332-9

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