Flooding 1990s along the Yangtze River, has it concern of global warming?

Abstract

There were a series of severe floods along the middle to lower reaches of the Yangtze River (Changjiang River) in China during the 1990s. The extensive summer (June, July and August) precipitation is mostly responsible for the flooding. The summer rainfall in the 1980s and the 1990s is much higher than that in the previous 3 decades. The means for 1990–1999 is +87.62 mm above normal, marked the 1990s the wettest decade since the 1950s. Six stations with a time span of 1880–1999 are selected to establish century-long rainfall series. This series also shows that the 1990s is the wettest decade during the last 120 years. In the wettest 12 years, four occurred in the 1990s (1991, 1996, 1998 and 1999). Both global and China’s temperature show there is a relative lower air temperature during the 1960–1970s, and a rapid warming in the 1980–1990s. Comparisons of rainfall between 1960–1979 and 1980–1999 show there are dramatic changes. In the cold period 1960–1979, the summer rainfall along the Yangtze River is 3.8 % to 4.7 % below the normal, during the warm period 1980–1999, over 8.4 % to 18.2 % of summer rainfall occurs. Over the whole eastern China, the summer rainfall shows opposite spatial patterns from the 1960–1970s to 1980–1990s. The consistent trend toward more rainfall with global warming is also presented by the greenhouse scenario modeling. A millennial Drought/flood Index for the middle to lower reaches of the Yangtze River showed that although the surplus summer rainfall in the 1990s is the severest during the past 150 years, it is not outstanding in the context of past millennium. Power spectra of the Drought/flood Index show significant interdecadal periods at 33.3 and 11.8 years. Thus, both the natural interdecadal variations and the global warming may play important roles in the frequent floods witnessed during the last two decades.