Premium
Global Freshwater Availability Below Normal Conditions and Population Impact Under 1.5 and 2 °C Stabilization Scenarios
Author(s) -
Liu Wenbin,
Lim Wee Ho,
Sun Fubao,
Mitchell Dann,
Wang Hong,
Chen Deliang,
Bethke Ingo,
Shiogama Hideo,
Fischer Erich
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
geophysical research letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.007
H-Index - 273
eISSN - 1944-8007
pISSN - 0094-8276
DOI - 10.1029/2018gl078789
Subject(s) - precipitation , environmental science , evapotranspiration , population , middle latitudes , tropics , climatology , global warming , amazon rainforest , climate change , geography , physical geography , oceanography , ecology , geology , meteorology , demography , sociology , biology
Based on the large ensembles of the half a degree additional warming, prognosis, and projected impacts historical, +1.5 and +2 °C experiments, we quantify changes in the magnitude of water availability (i.e., precipitation minus actual evapotranspiration; a function of monthly precipitation flux, latent heat flux, and surface air temperature) below normal conditions (less than median, e.g., 20th percentile water availability). We found that, relative to the historical experiment, water availability below normal conditions of the +1.5 and +2 °C experiments would decrease in the midlatitudes and the tropics, indicating that hydrological drought is likely to increase in warmer worlds. These cause more (less) people in East Asia, Central Europe, South Asia, and Southeast Asia (West Africa and Alaska/Northwest Canada) to be exposed to water shortage. Stabilizing warming at 1.5 °C instead of 2 °C would limit population impact in most of the regions, less effective in Alaska/Northwest Canada, Southeast Asia, and Amazon. Globally, this reduced population impact is ~117 million people.