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Since the late 1970s, East Asian summer monsoon (EASM) has shown a significant weakening trend, and sustained drought has occurred across North China. Placing recent climate changes in the paleoclimatic context can better understand the EASM variations. Four δ18O sequences based on tree-ring cellulose of Chinese pine were developed from Mt. Beiwudang, North China, covering a period from 1700 to 2013. Based on a climatic response analysis, a transfer function was designed to reconstruct the relative humidity from July to August (RHJA hereafter). The RHJA spans from 1765 to 2013 and explains 49% (R2adj= 48%) of the instrumental variance during the calibration period (1961–2013, r = − 0.70, p < 0.0001). The RHJA is mainly influenced by precipitation in the summer rainy season and reflect EASM variations. Spatial representation analysis indicates that RHJA represents the dry/wet variations across North China. At the interannual scale, RHJA records many extreme dry/wet events, among which the events in 1876–1878, 1900, and the 1920s are extensive droughts. Those events correspond well to ENSO events, plus further correlation and periodicity analysis indicate that RHJA contains ENSO signals. At the interdecadal scale, RHJA shows a decreasing trend and unprecedented low values from 1981 to 2013, suggesting that the weakening of EASM since the late 1970s is unprecedented in the past 249 years. Similarly, the significantly correlating region in the spatial correlation analysis, covering the Meiyu/Baiu/Changma rainfall belt and India, have also undergone a climatic shift since the late 1970s according to previous papers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although ski tourism in China is experiencing a boom, and the number of operating ski areas has significantly increased, the influence of climate change on the future development of China's ski industry has so far largely been overlooked. This paper addresses this important gap by applying the ski season simulation model SkiSim 2.0 at 116 ski areas. Four main indicators of climate change impact were examined: ski season length, operational ski days in economically important season segments, technically produced snow and snowmaking requirements. For all ski resorts in China and all climate change scenarios, average ski seasons are projected to shorten (− 4 to − 61% RCP 4.5; − 6 to − 79% RCP 8.5 in the 2050s) while snowmaking needs increase (27 to 51% RCP 4.5; 46 to 80% RCP 8.5 in the 2050s). The results indicate that high regional differences in climate change vulnerability exist. The implications for altered competitiveness and development potential of the ski industry in China are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]