A Holistic View of Extreme Weather: A California Heat Waves Archetype
Abstract
Over AGU's 100 years extreme weather research began within disciplines but now cuts across disciplines. With plots and animations I show California heat waves as an archetype for how synoptic and dynamic meteorology, extreme value statistics, weather forecasting, climate modeling, public health, and crop science blend to address societal impacts.
First, simple statistics focused on single variables, here: maximum temperature. Then synoptic analysis combining extreme value and basic statistics identified two consistent patterns preceding heat wave onset. A specific large scale meteorological pattern (LSMP) creates the heat wave pattern at onset (and during the heat wave) that forecasters use in short-term forecasts. Second, dynamics and statistics uncovered remote links, some of which are captured by low frequency phenomena. Here, the MJO is shown to provide medium-range predictability. These remote events influence heat wave intensity and provide a way to extend forecasting beyond the two week predictability limit. Third, the LSMPs described above will be shown to provide: 1) an assessment tool of climate models, 2) a tool to characterize future climate variability, and 3) a means to make more confident future projections of heat waves. Finally, there is growing emphasis on societal impacts. It is not sufficient to characterize heat waves by max temperature alone. Factors gleaned from public health and agricultural literature mandate consideration of compound extremes: combinations of temperature, humidity, and radiant energy and other factors like: duration and recovery period. Compound trends shown differ from temperature trends. Weather impacts differ by crop but heat impacts appear in historical yield data. Historical trends in compound extremes are shown to differ from temperature extremes. Impactful weather factors are identified according to crop, its development stage, and related factors that in turn illustrate how we should use climate models when making projections of extremes.- Publication:
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AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2019
- Bibcode:
- 2019AGUFMNH54A..03G
- Keywords:
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- 4308 Other;
- NATURAL HAZARDS;
- 4328 Risk;
- NATURAL HAZARDS;
- 4351 International organizations and natural disasters;
- NATURAL HAZARDS;
- 4352 Interaction between science and disaster management authorities;
- NATURAL HAZARDS