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Future projections of wet and dry spells in southern Sweden : The impact of climate model resolution

An, Dong LU orcid ; Olsson, Jonas LU ; Du, Yiheng LU ; Sörensen, Johanna LU orcid ; Uvo, Cintia B. LU orcid and Berg, Peter (2026) In Atmospheric Research 330.
Abstract

This study evaluates how well five Regional Climate Model (RCM) projections at resolutions from 44 km to 3 km reproduce wet and dry spells compared with observations at six locations in Scania, southern Sweden. Future changes in general and extreme wet and dry signals were also analyzed under RCP8.5 to the end of the 21st century. Convection-permitting climate models (CPMs), operating at resolutions fine enough to explicitly resolve convective processes (< 4 km), are widely recognized to simulate precipitation characteristics more accurately than coarser models. Our results confirm that CPM AROME (3 km), outperforms coarser RCMs in representing both wet and dry spells. Future projections across all resolutions indicate increases in... (More)

This study evaluates how well five Regional Climate Model (RCM) projections at resolutions from 44 km to 3 km reproduce wet and dry spells compared with observations at six locations in Scania, southern Sweden. Future changes in general and extreme wet and dry signals were also analyzed under RCP8.5 to the end of the 21st century. Convection-permitting climate models (CPMs), operating at resolutions fine enough to explicitly resolve convective processes (< 4 km), are widely recognized to simulate precipitation characteristics more accurately than coarser models. Our results confirm that CPM AROME (3 km), outperforms coarser RCMs in representing both wet and dry spells. Future projections across all resolutions indicate increases in wet spells to the end of the century, with average daily precipitation increasing by 8–12 %. The number of wet events, their average depth, and duration also projected to increase to varying degrees. For dry spells, the annual number of dry days shows a slight increase (0–3 %). The number of dry events is projected to decrease while both the average duration and the annual maximum consecutive dry days increase. Extreme value analysis shows that extreme precipitation intensities at various accumulating durations increase over 5- to 50-year return periods, as implied by the Wet Climate Factor (WCF). The Dry Climate Factor (DCF) indicates shorter annual maximum consecutive dry days in the near future, but prolonged at the end of the century by 3–9 %. These findings corroborate with previous research and improve understanding of systematic biases across RCMs resolutions. They further suggest that CPMs offer improved reliability in projecting future variability in wet and dry conditions, with important implications for regional climate services.

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author
; ; ; ; and
organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
keywords
Climate extremes, Convection-permitting model, Model resolution, Regional climate model, Wet and dry spells
in
Atmospheric Research
volume
330
article number
108547
publisher
Elsevier
external identifiers
  • scopus:105018669161
ISSN
0169-8095
DOI
10.1016/j.atmosres.2025.108547
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
a75390f4-7b5f-4cfa-ada5-1e6c769e6c1b
date added to LUP
2025-12-11 15:31:53
date last changed
2025-12-11 15:32:46
@article{a75390f4-7b5f-4cfa-ada5-1e6c769e6c1b,
  abstract     = {{<p>This study evaluates how well five Regional Climate Model (RCM) projections at resolutions from 44 km to 3 km reproduce wet and dry spells compared with observations at six locations in Scania, southern Sweden. Future changes in general and extreme wet and dry signals were also analyzed under RCP8.5 to the end of the 21st century. Convection-permitting climate models (CPMs), operating at resolutions fine enough to explicitly resolve convective processes (&lt; 4 km), are widely recognized to simulate precipitation characteristics more accurately than coarser models. Our results confirm that CPM AROME (3 km), outperforms coarser RCMs in representing both wet and dry spells. Future projections across all resolutions indicate increases in wet spells to the end of the century, with average daily precipitation increasing by 8–12 %. The number of wet events, their average depth, and duration also projected to increase to varying degrees. For dry spells, the annual number of dry days shows a slight increase (0–3 %). The number of dry events is projected to decrease while both the average duration and the annual maximum consecutive dry days increase. Extreme value analysis shows that extreme precipitation intensities at various accumulating durations increase over 5- to 50-year return periods, as implied by the Wet Climate Factor (WCF). The Dry Climate Factor (DCF) indicates shorter annual maximum consecutive dry days in the near future, but prolonged at the end of the century by 3–9 %. These findings corroborate with previous research and improve understanding of systematic biases across RCMs resolutions. They further suggest that CPMs offer improved reliability in projecting future variability in wet and dry conditions, with important implications for regional climate services.</p>}},
  author       = {{An, Dong and Olsson, Jonas and Du, Yiheng and Sörensen, Johanna and Uvo, Cintia B. and Berg, Peter}},
  issn         = {{0169-8095}},
  keywords     = {{Climate extremes; Convection-permitting model; Model resolution; Regional climate model; Wet and dry spells}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  publisher    = {{Elsevier}},
  series       = {{Atmospheric Research}},
  title        = {{Future projections of wet and dry spells in southern Sweden : The impact of climate model resolution}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosres.2025.108547}},
  doi          = {{10.1016/j.atmosres.2025.108547}},
  volume       = {{330}},
  year         = {{2026}},
}