The role of cyclonic activity in tropical temperature-rainfall scaling.

ABSTRACT: The attribution of changing intensity of rainfall extremes to global warming is a key challenge of climate research. From a thermodynamic perspective, via the Clausius-Clapeyron relationship, rainfall events are expected to become stronger due to the increased water-holding capacity of a warmer atmosphere. Here, we employ global, 1-hourly temperature and 3-hourly rainfall data to investigate the scaling between temperature and extreme rainfall. Although the Clausius-Clapeyron scaling of +7% rainfall intensity increase per degree warming roughly holds on a global average, we find very heterogeneous spatial patterns. Over tropical oceans, we reveal areas with consistently strong negative scaling (below -40%^∘C^-1). We show that the negative scaling is due to a robust line

SUBMITTER: Traxl D 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8602412 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature