Identification

Title

Recent trends in the near-surface climatology of the northern North American Great Plains

Abstract

We examined climate trends in the northern North American Great Plains (NNAGP) from 1970 to 2015, a period that aligns with widespread land-use changes in this globally important agricultural region. Trends were calculated from the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) and other climate datasets using a linear regression model that accounts for temporal autocorrelation. The NNAGP warmed on an annual basis, with the largest change occurring in winter (DJF) at 0.4 degrees C decade(-1). January in particular warmed at nearly 0.9 degrees C decade(-1). The NNAGP cooled by -0.18 degrees C decade(-1) during May and June, nearly the opposite of global warming trends during the study period. The atmospheric vapor pressure deficit (VPD), which can limit crop growth, decreased in excess of -0.4 hPa decade(-1) during climatological summer in the southeastern part of the study domain. Precipitation P increased in the eastern portion of the NNAGP during all seasons except fall and increased during May and June in excess of 8 mm decade(-1). Climate trends in the NNAGP largely followed global trends except during the early warm season (May and June) during which 2-m air temperature T-air became cooler, VPD lower, and P greater across large parts of the study region. These changes are consistent with observed agricultural intensification during the study period, namely the reduction of summer fallow and expansion of agricultural land use. Global climate model simulations indicate that observed T-air trends cannot be explained by natural climate variability. However, further climate attribution experiments are necessary to understand if observed changes are caused by increased agricultural intensity or other factors.

Resource type

document

Resource locator

Unique resource identifier

code

http://n2t.net/ark:/85065/d7pr8056

codeSpace

Dataset language

eng

Spatial reference system

code identifying the spatial reference system

Classification of spatial data and services

Topic category

geoscientificInformation

Keywords

Keyword set

keyword value

Text

originating controlled vocabulary

title

Resource Type

reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2016-01-01T00:00:00Z

Geographic location

West bounding longitude

East bounding longitude

North bounding latitude

South bounding latitude

Temporal reference

Temporal extent

Begin position

End position

Dataset reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2020-01-01T00:00:00Z

Frequency of update

Quality and validity

Lineage

Conformity

Data format

name of format

version of format

Constraints related to access and use

Constraint set

Use constraints

Copyright 2020 American Meteorological Society.

Limitations on public access

None

Responsible organisations

Responsible party

contact position

OpenSky Support

organisation name

UCAR/NCAR - Library

full postal address

PO Box 3000

Boulder

80307-3000

email address

opensky@ucar.edu

web address

http://opensky.ucar.edu/

name: homepage

responsible party role

pointOfContact

Metadata on metadata

Metadata point of contact

contact position

OpenSky Support

organisation name

UCAR/NCAR - Library

full postal address

PO Box 3000

Boulder

80307-3000

email address

opensky@ucar.edu

web address

http://opensky.ucar.edu/

name: homepage

responsible party role

pointOfContact

Metadata date

2023-08-18T19:08:31.029281

Metadata language

eng; USA