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Regional climate simulations of summer diurnal rainfall variations over East Asia and Southeast China

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Abstract

This study evaluates the performance of RegCM3 (Regional Climate Model Version 3) in simulating the East Asian rainfall, with emphasis on the diurnal variations of rainfall over Southeast China during the 1998–2002 summer (June–August) seasons. The evaluation focuses on the sensitivity of the choice of cumulus parameterizations and model domain. With the right setup, the spatial and temporal evolution of diurnal rainfall over Southeast China, which has not been well simulated by past studies, can be accurately simulated by RegCM3. Results show that the Emanuel cumulus scheme has a more realistic simulation of summer mean rainfall in East Asia, while the GFC (Grell scheme with the Frisch-Chappell convective closure assumption) scheme is better in simulating the diurnal variations of rainfall over Southeast China. The better performance of these two schemes [relative to the other two schemes in RegCM3: the Kuo scheme and the GAS (Grell scheme with the Arakawa–Schubert closure assumption) scheme] can be attributed to the reasonable reproduction of the major formation mechanism of rainfall—the moisture flux convergence—over Southeast China. Furthermore, when the simulation domain covers the entire Tibetan Plateau, the diurnal variations of rainfall over Southeast China are found to exhibit a noticeable improvement without changes in the physics schemes.

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Notes

  1. We have also compared the results presented in Figs. 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 of the present work with those using NCEP reanalysis 2 as perfect boundary conditions (not shown) and found that the former are similar to the latter, supporting the robustness of conclusions made in this study.

  2. Note that because increases of errors in simulating \( {\bar{\text{P}}} \) are also evident when we use NCEP2 reanalysis as the lateral boundary condition (see also footnote 1) to drive the two domains (not shown), the difference in lateral boundary condition errors is likely not one of the causes for the increases of errors in simulating \( {\bar{\text{P}}} \).

  3. The observed and simulated percentage (%) of Var(ΔP)SEC explained by its related S1(P)SEC and S2(P)SEC is listed in row 7 and row 12 of Table 4 respectively.

  4. \( ( - \nabla \cdot {\mathbf{\overset{\lower0.5em\hbox{$\smash{\scriptscriptstyle\rightharpoonup}$}} {Q} }}) = - \nabla \cdot \left( {\int_{{{\text{P}}0}}^{{300{\text{hPa}}}} {{\mathbf{\overset{\lower0.5em\hbox{$\smash{\scriptscriptstyle\rightharpoonup}$}} {V} }}{\text{q}}\,{\text{dp}}} } \right) \), where V denotes the horizontal wind, q is the specific humidity, and p is the pressure level.

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Acknowledgments

The authors thank Dr. Simon Wang at Utah State University, USA and anonymous reviewers for their comments and suggestions which greatly improved the manuscript.

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  1. Wan-Ru Huang

    Present address: Department of Earth Sciences, National Taiwan Normal University, No. 88, Sec. 4, Tingzhou Rd., Wenshan District, Taipei, 11677, Taiwan, ROC

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Guy Carpenter Asia-Pacific Climate Impact Centre, School of Energy and Environment, City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China

    Wan-Ru Huang, Johnny C. L. Chan & Andie Y. M. Au-Yeung

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Huang, WR., Chan, J.C.L. & Au-Yeung, A.Y.M. Regional climate simulations of summer diurnal rainfall variations over East Asia and Southeast China. Clim Dyn 40, 1625–1642 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-012-1457-2

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