Changes in Extremely Hot Summers over the Global Land Area under Various Warming Targets

• Published in: PloS one Vol. 10; no. 6; p. e0130660
• Main Authors: Wang, Lei, Huang, Jianbin, Luo, Yong, Yao, Yao, Zhao, Zongci
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Public Library of Science 19.06.2015; Public Library of Science (PLoS)
• Subjects: 21st century; Climate Change; Climate models; Ecology; Education; Global temperatures; Global warming; Global Warming - statistics & numerical data; Heat; Historic temperatures; Hot summers; Impact damage; Laboratories; Land area; Mean temperatures; Models, Theoretical; Science; Seasons; Simulation; Spatial distribution; Statistical analysis; Studies; Summer; Temperature anomalies; Temperature effects; Temperature extremes; Temperature rise; Working groups; Beijing China; Northern Hemisphere; United States > US; China
• ISSN: 1932-6203; 1932-6203
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0130660

Summer temperature extremes over the global land area were investigated by comparing 26 models of the fifth phase of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP5) with observations from the Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) and the Climate Research Unit (CRU). Monthly data of the observations and models were averaged for each season, and statistics were calculated for individual models before averaging them to obtain ensemble means. The summers with temperature anomalies (relative to 1951-1980) exceeding 3σ (σ is based on the local internal variability) are defined as "extremely hot". The models well reproduced the statistical characteristics evolution, and partly captured the spatial distributions of historical summer temperature extremes. If the global mean temperature increases 2°C relative to the pre-industrial level, "extremely hot" summers are projected to occur over nearly 40% of the land area (multi-model ensemble mean projection). Summers that exceed 5σ warming are projected to occur over approximately 10% of the global land area, which were rarely observed during the reference period. Scenarios reaching warming levels of 3°C to 5°C were also analyzed. After exceeding the 5°C warming target, "extremely hot" summers are projected to occur throughout the entire global land area, and summers that exceed 5σ warming would become common over 70% of the land area. In addition, the areas affected by "extremely hot" summers are expected to rapidly expand by more than 25%/°C as the global mean temperature increases by up to 3°C before slowing to less than 16%/°C as the temperature continues to increase by more than 3°C. The area that experiences summers with warming of 5σ or more above the warming target of 2°C is likely to maintain rapid expansion of greater than 17%/°C. To reduce the impacts and damage from severely hot summers, the global mean temperature increase should remain low.