Article: Assessment of CMIP5 climate models over South Asia and climate change projections over Pakistan under representative concentration pathways Journal: International Journal of Global Warming (IJGW) 2018 Vol.16 No.4 pp.381 - 415 Abstract: Future climate change projections from global climate models (GCMs) are the primary drivers of regional downscaling and impacts research. Climate projections are also in increased demand from disaster management agencies, policymakers, and other stakeholders. A set of 36 global climate models from the Coupled Model Inter-Comparison Project Phase 5 (CMIP5) is assessed for their performance over South Asia region for making future climate projection with a focus on Pakistan and its sub-regions. A suite of statistics was calculated to assess the credibility of GCMs with the observed statistics. The results show that GCMs have the ability to approximately capture the spatial patterns of temperature; however, the accuracy of precipitation simulation is relatively low. The future projection generated by the GCMs shows that temperature in Pakistan will increase in the 21st century by around 6.7°C under the RCP 8.5 scenarios and with increasing latitude, this warming is getting accelerated. Inderscience Publishers - linking academia, business and industry through research

Title: Assessment of CMIP5 climate models over South Asia and climate change projections over Pakistan under representative concentration pathways

Authors: Nadia Rehman; Muhammad Adnan; Shaukat Ali

Addresses: Global Change Impact Studies Centre, 6th Floor, Emigration Tower, Plot No. 10, Mauve Area, G-8/1, Islamabad 44000, Pakistan ' Global Change Impact Studies Centre, 6th Floor, Emigration Tower, Plot No. 10, Mauve Area, G-8/1, Islamabad 44000, Pakistan ' Global Change Impact Studies Centre, 6th Floor, Emigration Tower, Plot No. 10, Mauve Area, G-8/1, Islamabad 44000, Pakistan

Abstract: Future climate change projections from global climate models (GCMs) are the primary drivers of regional downscaling and impacts research. Climate projections are also in increased demand from disaster management agencies, policymakers, and other stakeholders. A set of 36 global climate models from the Coupled Model Inter-Comparison Project Phase 5 (CMIP5) is assessed for their performance over South Asia region for making future climate projection with a focus on Pakistan and its sub-regions. A suite of statistics was calculated to assess the credibility of GCMs with the observed statistics. The results show that GCMs have the ability to approximately capture the spatial patterns of temperature; however, the accuracy of precipitation simulation is relatively low. The future projection generated by the GCMs shows that temperature in Pakistan will increase in the 21st century by around 6.7°C under the RCP 8.5 scenarios and with increasing latitude, this warming is getting accelerated.

Keywords: CMIP5; global climate models; GCMs; representative concentration pathways; RCPs; temperature; precipitation; climate change projections; Pakistan; global warming.

DOI: 10.1504/IJGW.2018.095994

International Journal of Global Warming, 2018 Vol.16 No.4, pp.381 - 415

Received: 18 Oct 2017
Accepted: 11 Apr 2018
Published online: 06 Nov 2018 *

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Title: Assessment of CMIP5 climate models over South Asia and climate change projections over Pakistan under representative concentration pathways

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