Global River Discharge and Floods in the Warmer Climate of the Last Interglacial

Paolo Scussolini; Dirk Eilander; Edwin H. Sutanudjaja; Hiroaki Ikeuchi; Jannis M. Hoch; Philip J. Ward; Pepijn Bakker; Bette L. Otto-Bliesner; Chuncheng Guo; Christian Stepanek; Qiong Zhang; Pascale Braconnot; Maria Vittoria Guarino; Sanne Muis; Dai Yamazaki; Ted I.E. Veldkamp; Jeroen C.J.H. Aerts

doi:10.1029/2020GL089375

Global River Discharge and Floods in the Warmer Climate of the Last Interglacial

Paolo Scussolini^*, Dirk Eilander, Edwin H. Sutanudjaja, Hiroaki Ikeuchi, Jannis M. Hoch, Philip J. Ward, Pepijn Bakker, Bette L. Otto-Bliesner, Chuncheng Guo, Christian Stepanek, Qiong Zhang, Pascale Braconnot, Maria Vittoria Guarino, Sanne Muis, Dai Yamazaki, Ted I.E. Veldkamp, Jeroen C.J.H. Aerts

^*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to Journal › Article › Academic › peer-review

Abstract

We investigate hydrology during a past climate slightly warmer than the present: the last interglacial (LIG). With daily output of preindustrial and LIG simulations from eight new climate models we force hydrological model PCR-GLOBWB and in turn hydrodynamic model CaMa-Flood. Compared to preindustrial, annual mean LIG runoff, discharge, and 100-yr flood volume are considerably larger in the Northern Hemisphere, by 14%, 25%, and 82%, respectively. Anomalies are negative in the Southern Hemisphere. In some boreal regions, LIG runoff and discharge are lower despite higher precipitation, due to the higher temperatures and evaporation. LIG discharge is much higher for the Niger, Congo, Nile, Ganges, Irrawaddy, and Pearl and lower for the Mississippi, Saint Lawrence, Amazon, Paraná, Orange, Zambesi, Danube, and Ob. Discharge is seasonally postponed in tropical rivers affected by monsoon changes. Results agree with published proxies on the sign of discharge anomaly in 15 of 23 sites where comparison is possible.

Original language	English
Article number	e2020GL089375
Pages (from-to)	1-12
Number of pages	12
Journal	Geophysical Research Letters
Volume	47
Issue number	18
Early online date	25 Aug 2020
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1029/2020GL089375
Publication status	Published - 28 Sept 2020

Funding

P. S. acknowledges funding from the NWO (Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek) under Grant ALWOP.164, and from SCOR under Project COASTRISK. P. W. acknowledges funding from NWO VIDI grant 016.161.324. Hydrological and hydrodynamic simulations were carried out on the Dutch national e‐infrastructure (supercomputer Cartesius) with the support of SURF Cooperative. B. L. O.‐B. acknowledges the CESM project, which is supported primarily by the National Science Foundation (NSF). This material is based upon work supported by the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), which is a major facility sponsored by the National Science Fundation under Cooperative Agreement 1852977. Computing and data storage resources, including the Cheyenne supercomputer (doi: http://10.5065/D6RX99HX ), were provided by the Computational and Information Systems Laboratory (CISL) at NCAR. Q. Z. acknowledges funding support from Swedish Research Council VR (2013‐06476 and 2017‐04232). We thank Jian Cao for providing data of climate model NUIST‐CSM. P. S. acknowledges funding from the NWO (Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek) under Grant ALWOP.164, and from SCOR under Project COASTRISK. P. W. acknowledges funding from NWO VIDI grant 016.161.324. Hydrological and hydrodynamic simulations were carried out on the Dutch national e-infrastructure (supercomputer Cartesius) with the support of SURF Cooperative. B. L. O.-B. acknowledges the CESM project, which is supported primarily by the National Science Foundation (NSF). This material is based upon work supported by the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), which is a major facility sponsored by the National Science Fundation under Cooperative Agreement 1852977. Computing and data storage resources, including the Cheyenne supercomputer (doi:http://10.5065/D6RX99HX), were provided by the Computational and Information Systems Laboratory (CISL) at NCAR. Q. Z. acknowledges funding support from Swedish Research Council VR (2013-06476 and 2017-04232). We thank Jian Cao for providing data of climate model NUIST-CSM.

Funders	Funder number
SCOR	016.161.324
SURF Cooperative
Swedish Research Council VR	2017‐04232, 2013‐06476
National Science Foundation	1852977
National Center for Atmospheric Research
Computational and Information Systems Laboratory
Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek	ALWOP.164

Keywords

floods
global models
hydrology
last interglacial
paleoclimate
river discharge

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Scussolini, P., Eilander, D., Sutanudjaja, E. H., Ikeuchi, H., Hoch, J. M., Ward, P. J., Bakker, P., Otto-Bliesner, B. L., Guo, C., Stepanek, C., Zhang, Q., Braconnot, P., Guarino, M. V., Muis, S., Yamazaki, D., Veldkamp, T. I. E., & Aerts, J. C. J. H. (2020). Global River Discharge and Floods in the Warmer Climate of the Last Interglacial. Geophysical Research Letters, 47(18), 1-12. Article e2020GL089375. https://doi.org/10.1029/2020GL089375

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title = "Global River Discharge and Floods in the Warmer Climate of the Last Interglacial",

abstract = "We investigate hydrology during a past climate slightly warmer than the present: the last interglacial (LIG). With daily output of preindustrial and LIG simulations from eight new climate models we force hydrological model PCR-GLOBWB and in turn hydrodynamic model CaMa-Flood. Compared to preindustrial, annual mean LIG runoff, discharge, and 100-yr flood volume are considerably larger in the Northern Hemisphere, by 14%, 25%, and 82%, respectively. Anomalies are negative in the Southern Hemisphere. In some boreal regions, LIG runoff and discharge are lower despite higher precipitation, due to the higher temperatures and evaporation. LIG discharge is much higher for the Niger, Congo, Nile, Ganges, Irrawaddy, and Pearl and lower for the Mississippi, Saint Lawrence, Amazon, Paran{\'a}, Orange, Zambesi, Danube, and Ob. Discharge is seasonally postponed in tropical rivers affected by monsoon changes. Results agree with published proxies on the sign of discharge anomaly in 15 of 23 sites where comparison is possible.",

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author = "Paolo Scussolini and Dirk Eilander and Sutanudjaja, {Edwin H.} and Hiroaki Ikeuchi and Hoch, {Jannis M.} and Ward, {Philip J.} and Pepijn Bakker and Otto-Bliesner, {Bette L.} and Chuncheng Guo and Christian Stepanek and Qiong Zhang and Pascale Braconnot and Guarino, {Maria Vittoria} and Sanne Muis and Dai Yamazaki and Veldkamp, {Ted I.E.} and Aerts, {Jeroen C.J.H.}",

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Scussolini, P , Eilander, D, Sutanudjaja, EH, Ikeuchi, H, Hoch, JM, Ward, PJ , Bakker, P, Otto-Bliesner, BL, Guo, C, Stepanek, C, Zhang, Q, Braconnot, P, Guarino, MV, Muis, S, Yamazaki, D, Veldkamp, TIE & Aerts, JCJH 2020, 'Global River Discharge and Floods in the Warmer Climate of the Last Interglacial', Geophysical Research Letters, vol. 47, no. 18, e2020GL089375, pp. 1-12. https://doi.org/10.1029/2020GL089375

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T1 - Global River Discharge and Floods in the Warmer Climate of the Last Interglacial

AU - Scussolini, Paolo

AU - Eilander, Dirk

AU - Sutanudjaja, Edwin H.

AU - Ikeuchi, Hiroaki

AU - Hoch, Jannis M.

AU - Ward, Philip J.

AU - Bakker, Pepijn

AU - Otto-Bliesner, Bette L.

AU - Guo, Chuncheng

AU - Stepanek, Christian

AU - Zhang, Qiong

AU - Braconnot, Pascale

AU - Guarino, Maria Vittoria

AU - Muis, Sanne

AU - Yamazaki, Dai

AU - Veldkamp, Ted I.E.

AU - Aerts, Jeroen C.J.H.

PY - 2020/9/28

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N2 - We investigate hydrology during a past climate slightly warmer than the present: the last interglacial (LIG). With daily output of preindustrial and LIG simulations from eight new climate models we force hydrological model PCR-GLOBWB and in turn hydrodynamic model CaMa-Flood. Compared to preindustrial, annual mean LIG runoff, discharge, and 100-yr flood volume are considerably larger in the Northern Hemisphere, by 14%, 25%, and 82%, respectively. Anomalies are negative in the Southern Hemisphere. In some boreal regions, LIG runoff and discharge are lower despite higher precipitation, due to the higher temperatures and evaporation. LIG discharge is much higher for the Niger, Congo, Nile, Ganges, Irrawaddy, and Pearl and lower for the Mississippi, Saint Lawrence, Amazon, Paraná, Orange, Zambesi, Danube, and Ob. Discharge is seasonally postponed in tropical rivers affected by monsoon changes. Results agree with published proxies on the sign of discharge anomaly in 15 of 23 sites where comparison is possible.

AB - We investigate hydrology during a past climate slightly warmer than the present: the last interglacial (LIG). With daily output of preindustrial and LIG simulations from eight new climate models we force hydrological model PCR-GLOBWB and in turn hydrodynamic model CaMa-Flood. Compared to preindustrial, annual mean LIG runoff, discharge, and 100-yr flood volume are considerably larger in the Northern Hemisphere, by 14%, 25%, and 82%, respectively. Anomalies are negative in the Southern Hemisphere. In some boreal regions, LIG runoff and discharge are lower despite higher precipitation, due to the higher temperatures and evaporation. LIG discharge is much higher for the Niger, Congo, Nile, Ganges, Irrawaddy, and Pearl and lower for the Mississippi, Saint Lawrence, Amazon, Paraná, Orange, Zambesi, Danube, and Ob. Discharge is seasonally postponed in tropical rivers affected by monsoon changes. Results agree with published proxies on the sign of discharge anomaly in 15 of 23 sites where comparison is possible.

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KW - last interglacial

KW - paleoclimate

KW - river discharge

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JF - Geophysical Research Letters

IS - 18

M1 - e2020GL089375

ER -

Global River Discharge and Floods in the Warmer Climate of the Last Interglacial

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