A Subseasonal Regime Approach for Assessing Intra-annual Variability of Evapotranspiration and Application to the Upper Colorado River Basin

Evapotranspiration (ET) is strongly influenced by gradual climate change and fluctuations in meteorological conditions, such as earlier snowmelt and occurrence of droughts. While numerous studies have investigated how climate change influences the inter-annual variability of ET, very few studies focused on quantifying how subseasonal events control the intra-variability of ET. In this study, we developed the concept of subseasonal regimes, whose timing and duration are determined statistically using Hidden Markov Models (HMM) based on meteorological conditions. We tested the value of subseasonal regimes for quantitatively characterizing the variability of seasonal and subseasonal events, including the onset of snow accumulation, snowmelt, growing season, monsoon, and defoliation. We examined how ET varied as a function of the timing of these events within a year and across six watersheds in the region. Variability of annual ET across these six sites is much less significant than the variability in hydroclimate attributes at the sites. Subseasonal ET, defined as the total ET during a given subseasonal regime, provides a measure of intra-annual variability of ET. Our study suggests that snowmelt and monsoon timing influence regime transitions and duration, such as earlier snowmelt can increase springtime ET rapidly but can trigger long-lasting fore-summer drought conditions that lead to decrease subseasonal ET. Overall, our approach provides an enhanced statistically based framework for quantifying how the timing of subseasonal-event transitions influence ET variability. The improved understanding of subseasonal ET variability is important for predicting the future impact of climate change on water resources from the Upper Colorado River Basin regions.

Environmental Control of Inter-annual Variability of Net Ecosystem Exchange in Rice-rice Cropping System

Consecutive five-year long eddy covariance measurements in a lowland tropical rice-rice system were used to investigate the impacts of gross primary productivity (GPP), climate drivers and ecosystem responses (i.e. ecosystem respiration, RE) on the inter-annual variability (IAV) of the net ecosystem exchange (NEE), which is directly related to the agricultural productivity and climate change. The IAV of carbon dioxide fluxes in two crop growing phases i.e. dry and wet season along with fallow period were analysed. The respiratory fluxes build up during the non-growing season were lower by net uptake in growing season. Annual cumulative value of NEE was negative (sink) in both the crop growing season. The variability of climate drivers and changes in the ecosystem responses to drivers revealed a large intra-annual as well as inter-annual variability of net ecosystem fluxes. NEE was found to be strongly correlated with GPP and RE and also with other metrological variables such as photosynthetically active radiation (PAR), precipitation, air temperature and soil temperature. The anomalies of NEE, GPP and RE were observed to be less in 2017 and 2018 which may be due to lower temperature anomalies recorded in these years. Further understanding of biological mechanisms is needed which is involved in the variation of climatological variables to improve our ability to predict future IAV of NEE.

Structure and Inter-Annual Variability of the Freshened Surface Layer in the Laptev and East-Siberian Seas During Ice-Free Periods

This work is focused on the structure and inter-annual variability of the freshened surface layer (FSL) in the Laptev and East-Siberian seas during ice-free periods. This layer is formed mainly by deltaic rivers among which the Lena River contributes about two thirds of the inflowing freshwater volume. Based on in situ measurements, we show that the area of this FSL during certain years is much greater than the area of FSL in the neighboring Kara Sea, while the total annual freshwater discharge to the Laptev and East-Siberian seas is 1.5 times less than to the Kara Sea (mainly from the estuaries of the Ob and Yenisei rivers). This feature is caused by differences in morphology of the estuaries and deltas. Shallow and narrow channels of the Lena Delta are limitedly affected by sea water. As a result, undiluted Lena discharge inflows to sea from multiple channels and forms relatively shallow plume, as compared to the Ob-Yenisei plume, which mixes with subjacent saline sea water in deep and wide estuaries. Due to small vertical extents of FSL in the Laptev and East-Siberian seas, wind conditions strongly affect its spreading and determine its significant inter-annual variability, as compared to relatively stable FSL in the Kara Sea. During years with prevailing western and northern winds, FSL is localized in the southern parts of the Laptev and East-Siberian seas due to southward Ekman transport, meridional extent (<250 km) and area (∼250,000 km2) of FSL are relatively small. During years with strong eastern winds FSL spreads northward over large area (up to 500,000 km2), its meridional extent increases up to 500–700 km. At the same time, area and position of FSL do not show any dependence on significant variability of the annual river discharge volume and ice coverage during warm season.

Secular variations and trends in the occurrence of monsoon synoptic systems and its impact on central India rainfall

Importance of monsoon depressions, Low Pressure Systems (LPS) and the number of LPS days on rainfall and hence indirectly on agriculture and hydrology, is well recognized. In this paper the pattern of annual variability in these systems have been examined using data from 1901-2000. The above mentioned parameters have been subjected to decadal analysis to detect presence of any regular pattern. An attempt has been made to find its tendency with time. Impact of these systems on central India rainfall has been determined and discussed. The study endorses the earlier findings that there is a decreasing trend in the frequency of depressions which has been compensated with increase in LPS days over Indian region in recent years. The rainfall over central India is more significantly related with a number of LPS days over Indian region.