ENSEMBLES WP5.4: Evaluation of extreme events
in observational and RCM data

WP5.4 project info

Leader
Adri Buishand (KNMI)

Participants
Martin Hanel, Adri Buishand & Jules Beersma (KNMI)
Chris Ferro & David Stephenson (UEXETER)
Hans Caspary (FTS-STU)
Andras Bardossy & Mahboob Alam (IWS-STU)
Tracy Ewen (ETH)
Phil Jones & David Lister (UEA)
Christos Giannakopoulos & Effie Kostopoulou (NOA)

Objective
This work package will use descriptive indices that represent key aspects of climate extremes. Examples of such indices are given in the internationally agreed WMO-CCL/CLIVAR list. For a number of these indices, in particular those characterising extreme precipitation, the likelihood of detecting a systematic change at a single site or grid point is quite small due to the large year-to-year variability. Spatial pooling (regional analysis) will be considered to increase the probability of detecting trends. Extreme-value theory will be used to complement the descriptive indices in order to evaluate more aspects of the extreme tail of the distributions.

Tasks
(a) Description of changes in extreme indices in observational data and ensemble integrations
(b) Objective classification of circulation types causing extreme events
(c) Reproduction of observed trends in heavy precipitation over the Alpine region by ERA40 driven RCMs
(d) Validation of extreme events and assessment of their changes in RCM data
(e) Analysis of changes in the extreme tail of the distribution

WP5.4 news