Variation of extreme drought and flood in North China revealed by document-based seasonal precipitation reconstruction for the past 300 years
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Abstract
Using a 17-site seasonal precipitation reconstruction from a unique historical archive, Yu-Xue-Fen-Cun, the decadal variations of extreme droughts and floods (i.e., the event with occurrence probability of less than 10 % from 1951 to 2000) in North China were investigated, by considering both the probabilities of droughts/floods occurrence in each site and spatial coverage (i.e., percentage of sites). Then, the possible linkages of extreme droughts and floods with ENSO (i.e., El Niño and La Niña) episodes and large volcanic eruptions were discussed. The results show that there were 29 extreme droughts and 28 extreme floods in North China from 1736 to 2000. For most of these extreme drought (flood) events, precipitation decreased (increased) evidently at most of the sites for the four seasons, especially for summer and autumn. But in drought years of 1902 and 1981, precipitation only decreased in summer slightly, while it decreased evidently in the other three seasons. Similarly, the precipitation anomalies for different seasons at different sites also existed in several extreme flood years, such as 1794, 1823, 1867, 1872 and 1961. Extreme droughts occurred more frequently (2 or more events) during the 1770s–1780s, 1870s, 1900s–1930s and 1980s–1990s, among which the most frequent (3 events) occurred in the 1900s and the 1920s. More frequent extreme floods occurred in the 1770s, 1790s, 1820s, 1880s, 1910s and 1950s–1960s, among which the most frequent (4 events) occurred in the 1790s and 1880s. For the total of extreme droughts and floods, they were more frequent in the 1770s, 1790s, 1870s–1880s, 1900s–1930s and 1960s, and the highest frequency (5 events) occurred in the 1790s. A higher probability of extreme drought was found when El Niño occurred in the current year or the previous year. However, no significant connections were found between the occurrences of extreme floods and ENSO episodes, or the occurrences of extreme droughts/floods and large volcanic eruptions.
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Climate change is projected to increase the frequency and severity of droughts in many areas of the world.
“Climate change is projected to increase the frequency and severity of droughts in many areas of the world (67,68).”
From Restoring Degraded Lands (2021) · cites this paper as [68]
The Introduction reports observed drought trends since 1950, including increases in some regions and decreases in others. A search for future drought projections found no passage in our copy stating that climate change is projected to increase drought frequency and severity across many areas of the world. (LLM, conf=0.75)
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Arneth, A., Olsson, L., Cowie, A., Erb, K.-H., Hurlbert, M., Kurz, W. A., Mirzabaev, A., & Rounsevell, M. D. A. (2021) · Annual Review of Environment and Resources · doi:10.1146/annurev-environ-012320-054809 · Cited by 106 · see citing works
“Climate change is projected to increase the frequency and severity of droughts in many areas of the world (67, 68).”
Background
- Authors
- Zheng, J., Yu, Y., Zhang, X., & Hao, Z.
- Affiliations
- Chinese Academy of Sciences (CN)
- Corresponding author
- Hao, Zhixin
- Venue
- Climate of the Past
- Publisher
- Copernicus GmbH
- Published
- 2018-08-09
- Volume
- 14
- Issue
- 8
- Pages
- 1135-1145
- ISSN
- 1814-9324 (ISSN-L)
- 1814-9332
- OpenAlex
- W2802937228
- Cited by
- 34
- References
- 2
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 5 · 2024: 3 · 2023: 3 · 2022: 3 · 2021: 5 · 2020: 5 · 2019: 4 · 2018: 3
- FWCI
- 2.49
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Climate of the past (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion)
- Biogeosciences (European Geosciences Union) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- Funders
- National Natural Science Foundation of China (41671201, 2016YFA0600702, 41430528)
- Chinese Academy of Sciences (XDA19040101)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Hydrology and Drought Analysis
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Climate variability and models
- Physical Sciences › Earth and Planetary Sciences › Atmospheric Science › Geology and Paleoclimatology Research
- Keywords
- extreme drought, extreme floods, historical precipitation records, North China, decadal variability, ENSO, volcanic eruptions, precipitation anomalies, drought frequency, flood frequency
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