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Temporal and spatial variation characteristics of extreme precipitation on the Loess Plateau of China facing the precipitation process

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Abstract

The preceding and succeeding precipitation (PSP) often act together with extreme precipitation (EP), in turn, causing floods, which is an objective component that is often overlooked with regard to summer flood hazards in the arid region of Northwest China. In this study, event-based extreme precipitation (EEP) was defined as continuous precipitation that includes at least one day of EP. We analyzed the spatiotemporal variation characteristics of four EEP types (front EEP, late EEP, balanced EEP, and single day EEP) across the Loess Plateau (LP) based on data acquired from 87 meteorological stations from 1960 to 2019. Precipitation on the LP basically maintained a spatial pattern of “low in the northwest region and high in the southeast region”, and EP over the last 10 a increased significantly. The cumulative precipitation percentage of single day EEP was 34% and was dominant for 60 a, while the cumulative precipitation percentage of front, late, and balanced EEP types associated with PSP accounted for 66%, which confirms to the connotation of EEP. The cumulative frequencies of front and late EEP types were 23% and 21%, respectively, while the cumulative frequency of balanced EEP had the lowest value at only 13%. Moreover, global warming could lead to more single day EEP across the LP, and continuous EEP could increase in the northwestern region and decrease in the eastern region in the future. The concept of process-oriented EP could facilitate further exploration of disaster-causing processes associated with different types of EP, and provide a theoretical basis for deriving precipitation disaster chains and construction of disaster cluster characteristics.

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Acknowledgements

This research was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (52022081), and the Technology Project Funded by Clean Energy and Ecological Water Conservancy Engineering Research Center of China (QNZX-2019-03).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Eco-Hydraulic in Northwest Arid Region, Xi’an University of Technology, Xi’an, 710048, China

    Yixin Zhang, Peng Li, Guoce Xu, Zhanbin Li, Bin Wang & Yiting Chen

  2. Key Laboratory of National Forestry and Grassland Administration on Ecological Hydrology and Disaster Prevention in Arid Regions, Northwest Survey and Planning Institute of National Forestry and Grassland Administration, Xi’an, 710048, China

    Zhiqiang Min & Qingshun Li

  3. State Key Laboratory of Soil Erosion and Dryland Farming on the Loess Plateau, Chinese Academy of Sciences and Ministry of Water Resources, Yangling, 712100, China

    Zhanbin Li

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  1. Yixin Zhang
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  2. Peng Li
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  3. Guoce Xu
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  4. Zhiqiang Min
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  7. Bin Wang
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  8. Yiting Chen
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Correspondence to Peng Li.

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Zhang, Y., Li, P., Xu, G. et al. Temporal and spatial variation characteristics of extreme precipitation on the Loess Plateau of China facing the precipitation process. J. Arid Land 15, 439–459 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40333-023-0098-0

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