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Comparison of the temporal variability of winter daily extreme temperatures and precipitations in southern Quebec (Canada) using the Lombard and copula methods
Author(s) -
Guerfi Nadjet,
Assani Ali A.,
Mesfioui Mhamed,
Kinnard Christophe
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
international journal of climatology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.58
H-Index - 166
eISSN - 1097-0088
pISSN - 0899-8418
DOI - 10.1002/joc.4282
Subject(s) - snow , climatology , precipitation , environmental science , climate change , temperate climate , copula (linguistics) , mean radiant temperature , atmospheric sciences , meteorology , geography , geology , oceanography , botany , economics , econometrics , biology
Although numerous studies have looked at the long‐term trend of the temporal variability of winter temperature and precipitation in southern Quebec, no study has focused on the shifts in series means and the dependence between these two types of climate variables associated with this long‐term trend. To fill these gaps, we used the Lombard method to detect the shifts in mean values and the copula method to detect any change in dependence between extreme (maximum and minimum) temperatures and precipitation (snow and rain) over the periods 1950–2000 (17 stations) and 1950–2010 (7 stations). During these two periods, the shifts in mean values of temperature and precipitation were recorded at less than half of the stations. The only significant change observed at the provincial scale is a decrease in the amount of snowfall, which occurred in many cases during the 1970s. This decrease affected stations on the north shore (continental temperate climate) more strongly than stations on the south shore (maritime temperate climate) of the St Lawrence River. However, this decrease in the amount of snowfall had no impact on the dependence over time between temperature and precipitation as snow.