Trend analysis of annual maximum precipitation in Western Europe over the past 70 years
Abstract
Analysis of changes in extreme precipitation is important for the development of effective water resources management. Several researchers have attributed the changes in annual maximum precipitation (AMP) to the climate and other anthropogenic changes. This study investigates the changes in AMP in western Europe using trend analysis based on gridded precipitation data recorded for the period 1950-2019. Daily precipitation data from 124,449 grids with a spacing of 0.1 degrees covering western Europe were selected for the analysis and annual maximum precipitation was extracted for each of the 70 years corresponding to every grid. Mann-Kendall nonparametric trend analysis was performed on the AMP time series to investigate presence of trends (linear/nonlinear) in each grid. Results indicate that 27.5% of the grids exhibit trends in AMP at 5% significance level. Regression analysis of those grids exhibiting trend revealed that 24.7% of total grids have a significant increase in AMP, while 2.8% grids showed a decrease in AMP at a 5% significance level. Increases in AMP were noted in several countries such as Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Finland, Iceland, Italy, Montenegro, Norway, Poland, Romania, Scotland, Serbia, Slovenia, Sweden and Switzerland, while decreases in AMP were found in Portugal, Slovakia, Ukraine and Wales. Information on changes in AMP, along with other meteorological variables such as temperature, humidity etc., and climatic factors can be used to analyze the changes in the annual maximum floods across Europe.
- Publication:
-
AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2020
- Bibcode:
- 2020AGUFMH141.0026B
- Keywords:
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- 3305 Climate change and variability;
- ATMOSPHERIC PROCESSES;
- 1817 Extreme events;
- HYDROLOGY;
- 1854 Precipitation;
- HYDROLOGY;
- 4318 Statistical analysis;
- NATURAL HAZARDS