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This paper investigates the performance of gridded rainfall datasets for precipitation detection and streamflow simulations in Indiaʼs Tungabhadra river basin. Sixteen precipitation datasets categorized under gauge-based, satellite-only, reanalysis, and gauge-adjusted datasets were compared statistically against the gridded Indian Meteorological Dataset (IMD) employing two categorical and three continuous statistical metrics. Further, the precipitation datasets' performance in simulating streamflow was assessed by using the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) hydrological model. Based on the statistical metrics, Asian Precipitation Highly Resolved Observational Data Integration Towards Evaluation (APHRODITE) furnished very good results in terms of detecting rainfall, followed by Climate Hazards Group Infrared Precipitation (CHIRP), National Centres for Environmental Prediction-Climate Forecast System Reanalysis (NCEP CFSR), Tropical Rainfall Measurement Mission (TRMM) 3B42 v7, Global Satellite Mapping of Precipitation Gauge Reanalysis v6 (GSMaP_Gauge_RNL), and Multisource Weighted Ensemble Precipitation (MSWEP) datasets which had good-to-moderate performances at a monthly time step. From the hydrological simulations, TRMM 3B42 v7, CHIRP, CHIRPS 0.05°, and GSMaP_Gauge_RNL v6 produced very good results with a high degree of correlation to observed streamflow, while Soil Moisture 2 Rain-Climate Change Initiative (SM2RAIN-CCI) dataset exhibited poor performance. From the extreme flow event analysis, it was observed that CHIRP, TRMM 3B42 v7, Global Precipitation Climatology Centre v7 (GPCC), and APHRODITE datasets captured more peak flow events and hence can be further implemented for extreme event analysis. Overall, we found that TRMM 3B42 v7, CHIRP, and CHIRPS 0.05° datasets performed better than other datasets and can be used for hydrological modeling and climate change studies in similar topographic and climatic watersheds in India. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Effective Strength Index (ESI) is the relative strength of NAOand SO. ESI tendency is the algebraic difference between April-ESI and January-ESI and it represents the simultaneous evolution of NAO and SO from winter to spring. During positive (negative) phase of ESI tendency, NAO restores positive (negative) phase and SO restores negative (positive) phase before the beginning of summer season. Thus during contrasting phases (positive and negative) of ESI tendency, the evolution of NAO and SOis out of phase. In this paper we have studied the spatial and temporal variability of winter-time temperature field over Europe, Arabian Sea and Bay of Bengal during contrasting phases of ESI tendency. The study reveals that during positive (negative) ESI tendency, smaller (larger) region of Europe is showing significant winter-time cooling (warming) at surface. The relationship between winter-time surface temperature over above regions and Indian summer monsoon rainfall (ISMR) also shows spatial and temporal variability. The probable explanation for this change in the relationship is discussed in the paper. Two sets of temperature parameters for two different phases of ESI tendency are found out. Multiple regression equations are developed for the prediction of ISMR in each phase of ESI tendency. The performance of these equations is also discussed in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Indian monsoon is an important climatic phenomenon and a global climatic marker. Both statistical and numerical prediction schemes for Indian monsoon have been widely studied in literature. Statistical schemes are mainly based on regression or neural networks. However, the variability of monsoon is significant over the years and a single model is often inadequate. Meteorologists revise their models on different years based on prevailing global climatic incidents like El-Niño. These indices often have degree of severity associated with them. In this paper, we cluster the monsoon years based on their fuzzy degree of associativity to these climatic event patterns. Next, we develop individual prediction models for the year clusters. A weighted ensemble of these individual models is used to obtain the final forecast. The proposed method performs competitively with existing forecast models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the influence of aerosols on UV erythemal dose over four metro cities in India. Tropospheric Emission Monitoring Internet Service (TEMIS), archived UV-index (UV-I), and UV daily erythemal dose obtained from SCIAMACHY satellite were used in this study during June 2004 and May 2005 periods covering four important Indian seasons. UV-Index (UV-I), an important parameter representing UV risk, was found to be in the high to extreme range in Chennai (8.1 to 15.33), moderate to extreme range in Mumbai and Kolkata (5 to 16.5), and low to extreme over Delhi (3 to 15). Average UV erythemal dose showed seasonal variation from 5.9 to 6.3 KJm-2 during summer, 2.9 to 4.4 KJm-2 during postmonsoon, 3 to 4.5 KJm-2 during winter, and 5.1 to 6.19 KJm-2 during premonsoon seasons over the four cities. To estimate the influence of aerosols on reducing UV dose, UV aerosol radiative forcing and forcing efficiency were estimated over the sites. The average aerosol forcing efficiency was found to be from -1.38 ±0.33 to -3.01 ±0.28 KJm-2 AOD-1 on different seasons. The study suggests that aerosols can reduce the incoming UV radiation dose by 30-60% during different seasons. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The detection of possible changes in extreme climate events, in terms of the frequency, intensity as well as duration assumes profound importance on the local, regional, and national scales, due to the associated critical socioeconomic consequences. Therefore, an attempt ismade in this paper to evaluate various aspects of future projections of precipitation extremes over India, as projected by a state-of-art regional climatemodeling system, known as PRECIS (Providing REgional Climates for Impacts Studies) towards the end of the 21st century (that is, 2071-2100) using standardized indices. Study reveals that PRECIS simulations under scenarios of increasing greenhouse gas concentration and sulphate aerosols indicate marked increase in precipitation towards the end of the 21st century and is expected to increase throughout the year. However the changes in daily precipitation and the precipitation extremes during summer monsoon (June through September) season are prominent than during the rest of year. PRECIS simulations under both A2 and B2 scenarios indicate increase in frequency of heavy precipitation events and also enhancement in their intensity towards the end of the 21st century. Both A2 and B2 scenarios show similar patterns of projected changes in the precipitation extremes towards the end of the 21st century. However, the magnitudes of changes in B2 scenario are on the lower side. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The regional climate model HIRHAM has been applied over the Asian continent to simulate the Indian monsoon circulation under present-day conditions. The model is driven at the lateral and lower boundaries by European reanalysis (ERA40) data for the period from 1958 to 2001. Simulations with a horizontal resolution of 50 km are carried out to analyze the regional monsoon patterns. The focus in this paper is on the validation of the long-term summer monsoon climatology and its variability concerning circulation, temperature, and precipitation. Additionally, the monsoonal behavior in simulations for wet and dry years has been investigated and compared against several observational data sets. The results successfully reproduce the observations due to a realistic reproduction of topographic features. The simulated precipitation shows a better agreement with a high-resolution gridded precipitation data set over the central land areas of India and in the higher elevated Tibetan and Himalayan regions than ERA40. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]