Role of soil moisture versus recent climate change for the 2010 heat wave in western Russia

The severe 2010 heat wave in western Russia was found to be influenced by anthropogenic climate change. Additionally, soil moisture‐temperature feedbacks were deemed important for the buildup of the exceptionally high temperatures. We quantify the relative role of both factors by applying the probab...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inGeophysical research letters Vol. 43; no. 6; pp. 2819 - 2826
Main Authors Hauser, Mathias, Orth, René, Seneviratne, Sonia I.
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Washington John Wiley & Sons, Inc 28.03.2016
Subjects
Anthropogenic climate changes
Anthropogenic factors
Climate
Climate change
Climate effects
Climate variability
Construction
Drying
event attribution
Extreme heat
Extreme high temperatures
Frameworks
Heat
Heat waves
High temperature
Human influences
Maximum temperatures
Moisture
Probabilistic methods
Probability theory
Risk
Russia
Russia 2010
Simulation
Soil
Soil conditions
Soil moisture
Soil temperature
Soils
Temperature
Temperature effects
Variability
Russia
INW, Russia
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Summary:The severe 2010 heat wave in western Russia was found to be influenced by anthropogenic climate change. Additionally, soil moisture‐temperature feedbacks were deemed important for the buildup of the exceptionally high temperatures. We quantify the relative role of both factors by applying the probabilistic event attribution framework and analyze ensemble simulations to distinguish the effect of climate change and the 2010 soil moisture conditions for annual maximum temperatures. The dry 2010 soil moisture alone has increased the risk of a severe heat wave in western Russia sixfold, while climate change from 1960 to 2000 has approximately tripled it. The combined effect of climate change and 2010 soil moisture yields a 13 times higher heat wave risk. We conclude that internal climate variability causing the dry 2010 soil moisture conditions formed a necessary basis for the extreme heat wave. Key Points Soil moisture conditions of 2010 led to a sixfold heat wave risk increase in western Russia Recent climate change has approximately tripled the heat wave risk The soil moisture anomaly in 2010 would have been large even without anthropogenic climate change
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ISSN:0094-8276
1944-8007
DOI:10.1002/2016GL068036