Testing bias adjustment methods for regional climate change applications under observational uncertainty and resolution mismatch

Systematic biases in climate models hamper their direct use in impact studies and, as a consequence, many statistical bias adjustment methods have been developed to calibrate model outputs against observations. The application of these methods in a climate change context is problematic since there i...

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Autores: Casanueva, Ana, Herrera, Sixto, Iturbide, Maialen, Lange, Stefan, Jury, Martin, Dosio, Alessandro, Maraun, Douglas, Gutiérrez, José M.
Tipo de recurso: artículo
Fecha de publicación:2020
País:España
Institución:Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC)
Repositorio:UPCommons. Portal del coneixement obert de la UPC
Idioma:inglés
OAI Identifier:oai:upcommons.upc.edu:2117/342167
Acceso en línea:https://hdl.handle.net/2117/342167
https://dx.doi.org/10.1002/asl.978
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palabra clave:Climatic changes
Climatology
Climate variations
Bias adjustment
Climate change signal
Downscaling
Observational uncertainty
Canvis climàtics
Àrees temàtiques de la UPC::Enginyeria agroalimentària::Ciències de la terra i de la vida::Climatologia i meteorologia
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network_name_str España
repository_id_str
dc.title.none.fl_str_mv Testing bias adjustment methods for regional climate change applications under observational uncertainty and resolution mismatch
title Testing bias adjustment methods for regional climate change applications under observational uncertainty and resolution mismatch
spellingShingle Testing bias adjustment methods for regional climate change applications under observational uncertainty and resolution mismatch
Casanueva, Ana
Climatic changes
Climatology
Climate variations
Bias adjustment
Climate change signal
Downscaling
Observational uncertainty
Canvis climàtics
Àrees temàtiques de la UPC::Enginyeria agroalimentària::Ciències de la terra i de la vida::Climatologia i meteorologia
title_short Testing bias adjustment methods for regional climate change applications under observational uncertainty and resolution mismatch
title_full Testing bias adjustment methods for regional climate change applications under observational uncertainty and resolution mismatch
title_fullStr Testing bias adjustment methods for regional climate change applications under observational uncertainty and resolution mismatch
title_full_unstemmed Testing bias adjustment methods for regional climate change applications under observational uncertainty and resolution mismatch
title_sort Testing bias adjustment methods for regional climate change applications under observational uncertainty and resolution mismatch
dc.creator.none.fl_str_mv Casanueva, Ana
Herrera, Sixto
Iturbide, Maialen
Lange, Stefan
Jury, Martin
Dosio, Alessandro
Maraun, Douglas
Gutiérrez, José M.
author Casanueva, Ana
author_facet Casanueva, Ana
Herrera, Sixto
Iturbide, Maialen
Lange, Stefan
Jury, Martin
Dosio, Alessandro
Maraun, Douglas
Gutiérrez, José M.
author_role author
author2 Herrera, Sixto
Iturbide, Maialen
Lange, Stefan
Jury, Martin
Dosio, Alessandro
Maraun, Douglas
Gutiérrez, José M.
author2_role author
author
author
author
author
author
author
dc.subject.none.fl_str_mv Climatic changes
Climatology
Climate variations
Bias adjustment
Climate change signal
Downscaling
Observational uncertainty
Canvis climàtics
Àrees temàtiques de la UPC::Enginyeria agroalimentària::Ciències de la terra i de la vida::Climatologia i meteorologia
topic Climatic changes
Climatology
Climate variations
Bias adjustment
Climate change signal
Downscaling
Observational uncertainty
Canvis climàtics
Àrees temàtiques de la UPC::Enginyeria agroalimentària::Ciències de la terra i de la vida::Climatologia i meteorologia
description Systematic biases in climate models hamper their direct use in impact studies and, as a consequence, many statistical bias adjustment methods have been developed to calibrate model outputs against observations. The application of these methods in a climate change context is problematic since there is no clear understanding on how these methods may affect key magnitudes, for example, the climate change signal or trend, under different sources of uncertainty. Two relevant sources of uncertainty, often overlooked, are the sensitivity to the observational reference used to calibrate the method and the effect of the resolution mismatch between model and observations (downscaling effect). In the present work, we assess the impact of these factors on the climate change signal of temperature and precipitation considering marginal, temporal and extreme aspects. We use eight standard and state‐of‐the‐art bias adjustment methods (spanning a variety of methods regarding their nature—empirical or parametric—, fitted parameters and trend‐preservation) for a case study in the Iberian Peninsula. The quantile trend‐preserving methods (namely quantile delta mapping (QDM), scaled distribution mapping (SDM) and the method from the third phase of ISIMIP‐ISIMIP3) preserve better the raw signals for the different indices and variables considered (not all preserved by construction). However, they rely largely on the reference dataset used for calibration, thus presenting a larger sensitivity to the observations, especially for precipitation intensity, spells and extreme indices. Thus, high‐quality observational datasets are essential for comprehensive analyses in larger (continental) domains. Similar conclusions hold for experiments carried out at high (approximately 20 km) and low (approximately 120 km) spatial resolutions.
publishDate 2020
dc.date.none.fl_str_mv 2020
2020-04-01
2021
2021-03-22
dc.type.none.fl_str_mv journal article
http://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_6501
VoR
http://purl.org/coar/version/c_970fb48d4fbd8a85
dc.type.openaire.fl_str_mv info:eu-repo/semantics/article
format article
dc.identifier.none.fl_str_mv https://hdl.handle.net/2117/342167
https://dx.doi.org/10.1002/asl.978
url https://hdl.handle.net/2117/342167
https://dx.doi.org/10.1002/asl.978
dc.language.none.fl_str_mv Inglés
eng
language_invalid_str_mv Inglés
language eng
dc.rights.none.fl_str_mv open access
http://purl.org/coar/access_right/c_abf2
Attribution 3.0 Spain
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/es/
Attribution 3.0 Spain
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
dc.rights.openaire.fl_str_mv info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess
rights_invalid_str_mv open access
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Attribution 3.0 Spain
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eu_rights_str_mv openAccess
dc.format.none.fl_str_mv application/pdf
dc.publisher.none.fl_str_mv Wiley
publisher.none.fl_str_mv Wiley
dc.source.none.fl_str_mv reponame:UPCommons. Portal del coneixement obert de la UPC
instname:Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC)
instname_str Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC)
reponame_str UPCommons. Portal del coneixement obert de la UPC
collection UPCommons. Portal del coneixement obert de la UPC
repository.name.fl_str_mv
repository.mail.fl_str_mv
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spelling Testing bias adjustment methods for regional climate change applications under observational uncertainty and resolution mismatchCasanueva, AnaHerrera, SixtoIturbide, MaialenLange, StefanJury, MartinDosio, AlessandroMaraun, DouglasGutiérrez, José M.Climatic changesClimatologyClimate variationsBias adjustmentClimate change signalDownscalingObservational uncertaintyCanvis climàticsÀrees temàtiques de la UPC::Enginyeria agroalimentària::Ciències de la terra i de la vida::Climatologia i meteorologiaSystematic biases in climate models hamper their direct use in impact studies and, as a consequence, many statistical bias adjustment methods have been developed to calibrate model outputs against observations. The application of these methods in a climate change context is problematic since there is no clear understanding on how these methods may affect key magnitudes, for example, the climate change signal or trend, under different sources of uncertainty. Two relevant sources of uncertainty, often overlooked, are the sensitivity to the observational reference used to calibrate the method and the effect of the resolution mismatch between model and observations (downscaling effect). In the present work, we assess the impact of these factors on the climate change signal of temperature and precipitation considering marginal, temporal and extreme aspects. We use eight standard and state‐of‐the‐art bias adjustment methods (spanning a variety of methods regarding their nature—empirical or parametric—, fitted parameters and trend‐preservation) for a case study in the Iberian Peninsula. The quantile trend‐preserving methods (namely quantile delta mapping (QDM), scaled distribution mapping (SDM) and the method from the third phase of ISIMIP‐ISIMIP3) preserve better the raw signals for the different indices and variables considered (not all preserved by construction). However, they rely largely on the reference dataset used for calibration, thus presenting a larger sensitivity to the observations, especially for precipitation intensity, spells and extreme indices. Thus, high‐quality observational datasets are essential for comprehensive analyses in larger (continental) domains. Similar conclusions hold for experiments carried out at high (approximately 20 km) and low (approximately 120 km) spatial resolutions.We acknowledge the E‐OBS dataset from the EU‐FP6 project UERRA (https://www.uerra.eu) and the Copernicus Climate Change Service, and the data providers in the ECA&D project (https://eca.knmi.nl). The authors are grateful to the World Climate Research Programme's Working Group on Regional Climate, and the Working Group on Coupled Modelling, former coordinating body of CORDEX and responsible panel for CMIP5. We also thank the climate modelling groups for producing and making available their model output, the Earth System Grid Federation infrastructure an international effort led by the U.S. Department of Energy's Program for Climate Model Diagnosis and Intercomparison, the European Network for Earth System Modelling and other partners in the Global Organisation for Earth System Science Portals (GO‐ESSP). This study contributes to the EURO‐CORDEX pillar on statistical downscaling, which is a follow‐up of the EU COST Action ES1102 VALUE (Validating and Integrating Downscaling Methods for Climate Change Research). Participation of S. Herrera and J.M. Gutiérrez was partially supported by the project AfriCultuReS (European Union's Horizon 2020 program, grant agreement no, 774652). S. Lange acknowledges funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under grant agreement no. 641816 (CRESCENDO). The authors are also grateful to three anonymous reviewers who helped to improve the original manuscript.Peer ReviewedWiley20202020-04-0120212021-03-22journal articlehttp://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_6501VoRhttp://purl.org/coar/version/c_970fb48d4fbd8a85info:eu-repo/semantics/articleapplication/pdfhttps://hdl.handle.net/2117/342167https://dx.doi.org/10.1002/asl.978reponame:UPCommons. Portal del coneixement obert de la UPCinstname:Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC)Inglésengopen accesshttp://purl.org/coar/access_right/c_abf2Attribution 3.0 Spainhttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/es/Attribution 3.0 Spainhttps://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccessoai:upcommons.upc.edu:2117/3421672026-05-27T15:37:01Z
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