2015-16 floods and droughts in China, and its response to the strong El Niño

Feng Ma; Aizhong Ye; Jinjun You; Qingyun Duan

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2018.01.280

2015-16 floods and droughts in China, and its response to the strong El Niño

Sci Total Environ. 2018 Jun 15:627:1473-1484. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2018.01.280. Epub 2018 Feb 20.

Authors

Feng Ma¹, Aizhong Ye², Jinjun You³, Qingyun Duan¹

Affiliations

¹ State Key Laboratory of Earth Surface and Ecological Resources, Faculty of Geographical Science, Beijing Normal University, Beijing 100875, China.
² State Key Laboratory of Earth Surface and Ecological Resources, Faculty of Geographical Science, Beijing Normal University, Beijing 100875, China. Electronic address: azye@bnu.edu.cn.
³ State Key Laboratory of Simulation and Regulation of Water Cycle in River Basin, China Institute of Water Resources and Hydropower Research, Beijing 100038, China.

PMID: 30857109
DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2018.01.280

Abstract

The features of hydro-climate anomalies in China in 2015-2016 were analyzed in great detail, together with possible responses to the super 2015-16 El Niño event. The 2015-16 El Niño is characterized as a "strong" event in terms of the duration, intensity, and coverage of warming sea surface temperature (SST) in the central and east-central equatorial Pacific in comparison to the 1982-83 and 1997-98 events. The floods and droughts frequency were incidence of floods and droughts per year, respectively. The results show several significant anomalies in China: 1) About 9%-173% of precipitation variance in 2015-16 can be attributed to this El Niño; 2) There was significant inconformity between hydro-climate anomalies and the occurrence of floods and droughts; 3) Flood frequency has increased, especially over Southeast China and the Yangtze River in the summer of 2016; 4) Drought frequency has also increased, especially over Northeast China in summer of 2015, Northwest China in spring of 2016, and most parts in winter of 2015. The response of China hydro-climate anomalies to the 2015-16 El Niño was significant via El Niño and warm Indian Ocean induced circulation anomalies, which were characterized by stronger and more westward-extending western Pacific subtropical high and anomalous water vapor transport. Knowledge of the response of hydro-climate extremes to El Niño can provide valuable information to improve flood and drought forecasting in China.

Keywords: 2015–16 El Niño; China; Hydro-climate extremes; Impact.