U.S. flag An official website of the United States government.
Official websites use .gov

A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.

Secure .gov websites use HTTPS

A lock ( ) or https:// means you've safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.

i

Trends and Variability in Airmass Frequencies: Indicators of a Changing Climate

Supporting Files


Details

  • Journal Title:
    Journal of Climate
  • Personal Author:
    Lee, Cameron C.
  • NOAA Program & Office:
  • Description:
    Recent international efforts at communicating climate change have begun using the notion of a climate indicator—a climate-related metric that can be used to track changes in the Earth system over time. Based upon a recently developed global-scale classification of daily air masses, this research examines the trends and variability in the frequencies of these air masses and then utilizes them to develop two nontraditional climate indicators: a warm/cool index (WCI) and a global extremes index (GEI). Results show that both indices trend significantly upward over the 40-yr period of record, indicating an increase in warm-based air masses (WCI) and extreme air masses (GEI). The two indices also exhibit a moderate (GEI) to strong (WCI) association with the global mean temperature record, multiple near-surface climate variables, and other existing climate indicators over that same time, showing promise as global indicators. Shorter-term variability in these indices also show a linear relationship between the WCI and changes in the Atlantic multidecadal oscillation and a nonlinear relationship between GEI and El Niño–Southern Oscillation. While many published climate indicators are based upon a single variable, and/or are regional in scope, the two indices presented herein are unique in that they are representative of the trends in the multivariate (and extreme, in the case of the GEI) weather conditions that are experienced near Earth’s surface, while also being global in scope.
  • Keywords:
  • Source:
    Journal of Climate, 33(19), 8603-8617
  • DOI:
  • Document Type:
    Journal Article
  • Funding:
    Grant no. NA17OAR4310159
  • Rights Information:
    Other
  • Compliance:
    Submitted
  • Main Document Checksum:
    urn:sha256:52c8d77f85e575cd6d669b59f74ea9a9785fd2f29cf363328503186d03062a9b
  • Download URL:
  • File Type:
    Filetype[PDF - 4.18 MB ]

Supporting Files

PREVIOUS
ON THIS PAGE
Details Supporting Files
The NOAA IR serves as an archival repository of NOAA-published products including scientific findings, journal articles, guidelines, recommendations, or other information authored or co-authored by NOAA or funded partners. As a repository, the NOAA IR retains documents in their original published format to ensure public access to scientific information.
BACK TO TOP