Climate change has brought observed weather and climate extremes in regions around the globe. Based on the high-resolution version of the Max Planck Institute Earth System Model (MPI-ESM-1-2-HR), dynamical downscaling was adopted to study the detailed regional climate change. Here we demonstrate the summer thermal environment and hot extremes in the Pearl River Delta (PRD) under three future emission pathways in the mid-21st century (2040-2049) and the end of the century (2090-2099). Our results show that compared to the 2010s (2011- 2020), in the 2040s, the increase in summer daytime temperature ranges from 0.7℃ to 0.8℃, and the increase in nighttime temperature ranges from 0.9℃ to 1.1℃ under different future pathways over the land of the PRD. In the 2090s, the corresponding increase...[ Read more ]

Climate change has brought observed weather and climate extremes in regions around the globe. Based on the high-resolution version of the Max Planck Institute Earth System Model (MPI-ESM-1-2-HR), dynamical downscaling was adopted to study the detailed regional climate change. Here we demonstrate the summer thermal environment and hot extremes in the Pearl River Delta (PRD) under three future emission pathways in the mid-21st century (2040-2049) and the end of the century (2090-2099). Our results show that compared to the 2010s (2011- 2020), in the 2040s, the increase in summer daytime temperature ranges from 0.7℃ to 0.8℃, and the increase in nighttime temperature ranges from 0.9℃ to 1.1℃ under different future pathways over the land of the PRD. In the 2090s, the corresponding increase becomes 0.5℃ to 3.1℃ and 0.7℃ to 3.4℃, respectively. SSP1-2.6 is the only scenario that will experience a temperature decrease in the 2090s compared to the 2040s. Differences among these scenarios in the 2040s do not vary much (0-0.2℃) but will spread in the 2090s (1-2.6℃). Compared with hot extremes in the 2010s, it will become more frequent, more intense, and longer-lasting in the future under SSP2-4.5 and SSP5-8.5, respectively. Currently, when a heatwave occurs, it usually lasts for 4 days with an average daily maximum temperature of 34.5℃. However, in the 2040s, all three scenarios will experience a mean increase of 0.9 [0.8-1.1] days in duration and an enhancement of 0.3 [0.2-0.4] ℃ in intensity. These increases will become more dramatic in the 2090s under the fossil-fuel-development scenario, SSP5-8.5, under which a heatwave will last for 14 days, a 2.5-fold increase compared to the 2010s, and the average intensity will be 36.0°C. Moreover, a hot extreme event with 10-year return period in the 2010s will be shortened to once a month in the 2090s under SSP5-8.5.