The potential impacts of climate change in europe: the role of extreme temperatures

• Main Author: Livermore, Matthew Thomas James
• Format: Dissertation
• Language: English
• Published: ProQuest Dissertations & Theses 01-01-2005
• Subjects: Atmospheric sciences

Daily temperature data from a coupled atmosphere-ocean global climate model (HadCM3) and the NCEP/NCAR reanalysis model have been evaluated with regards to their suitability for use in an impacts assessment study. Having been deemed suitable, the daily data were used to create a statistical database of current day temperature extremes and a series of SRES-driven future scenarios. Building on this, a suite of Europe-wide, national level impact models, designed to explore the potential implications of climate change on selected exposure units; energy consumption and human health, have been developed using multiple linear regression techniques. Special care was taken to create models that would enable the rigorous assessment of temperature extremes in a climate change impact assessment. Both energy consumption and human mortality models designed to use measures of change in mean temperature demonstrate a clear north-south divide in terms of the potential impacts associated with the regional manifestation of climate change. During winter months, anthropogenic climate change is likely to bring benefits to much of western and northern Europe. In stark contrast, elevated summertime temperatures result in negative impacts in most southern European countries. The incorporation of information regarding the change in the behaviour of extreme temperatures, while broadly agreeing with the results mentioned above, led to significant regional differences in the response to climate change, in the mid- to long-term. This suggests that the inclusion of indices of extreme temperature within impact assessments is a valid and worthwhile exercise.