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Attribution analyses of potential evapotranspiration changes in China since the 1960s

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Abstract

This paper focuses on the primary causes of changes in potential evapotranspiration (ETo) in order to comprehensively understand climate change and its impact on hydrological cycle. Based on modified Penman-Monteith model, ETo is simulated, and its changes are attributed by analyzing the sensitivity of ETo to influence meteorological variables together with their changes for 595 meteorological stations across China during the period 1961–2008. Results show the decreasing trends of ETo in the whole country and in most climate regions except the cold temperate humid region in Northeast China. For China as a whole, the decreasing trend of ETo is primarily attributed to wind speed due to its significant decreasing trend and high sensitivity. Relative humidity is the highest sensitive variable; however, it has negligible effect on ETo for its insignificant trend. The positive contribution of temperature rising to ETo is offset by the effect of wind speed and sunshine duration. In addition, primary causes to ETo changes are varied for differing climate regions. ETo changes are attributed to decreased wind speed in most climate regions mainly distributed in West China and North China, to declined sunshine duration in subtropical and tropical humid regions in South China, and to increased maximum temperature in the cold temperate humid region.

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Acknowledgements

This paper was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 40701010), the President Fellowship of Chinese Academy of Sciences in 2007(O7R70040SD), and by the Knowledge Innovation Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (O7V70010SZ).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, No. 11A, Datun Road, Chaoyang District, Beijing, 100101, China

    Yunhe Yin, Shaohong Wu & Erfu Dai

  2. Policy Research Center for Environment and Economy, Ministry of Environmental Protection of the People’s Republic of China, No.1 Yuhui South Road, Beijing, 100029, China

    Gang Chen

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  1. Yunhe Yin
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  2. Shaohong Wu
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  3. Gang Chen
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  4. Erfu Dai
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Correspondence to Yunhe Yin.

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Yin, Y., Wu, S., Chen, G. et al. Attribution analyses of potential evapotranspiration changes in China since the 1960s. Theor Appl Climatol 101, 19–28 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00704-009-0197-7

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