IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/nat/natcom/v13y2022i1d10.1038_s41467-022-35571-0.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Quantifying the role of variability in future intensification of heat extremes

Author

Listed:
  • Claudia Simolo

    (Institute of Atmospheric Sciences and Climate, National Research Council of Italy)

  • Susanna Corti

    (Institute of Atmospheric Sciences and Climate, National Research Council of Italy)

Abstract

Heat extremes have grown disproportionately since the advent of industrialization and are expected to intensify further under unabated greenhouse warming, spreading unevenly across the globe. However, amplification mechanisms are highly uncertain because of the complex interplay between regional physical responses to human forcing and the statistical properties of atmospheric temperatures. Here, focusing on the latter, we explain how and to what extent the leading moments of thermal distributions sway the future trajectories of heat extremes. Crucially, we show that daily temperature variability is the key to understanding global patterns of change in the frequency and severity of the extremes and their exacerbation in many places. Variability accounts for at least half of the highly differential regional sensitivities and may well outweigh the background warming. These findings provide fundamental insights for assessing the reliability of climate models and improving their future projections.

Suggested Citation

  • Claudia Simolo & Susanna Corti, 2022. "Quantifying the role of variability in future intensification of heat extremes," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 13(1), pages 1-13, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:nat:natcom:v:13:y:2022:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-022-35571-0
    DOI: 10.1038/s41467-022-35571-0
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-022-35571-0
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1038/s41467-022-35571-0?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Peter Pfleiderer & Carl-Friedrich Schleussner & Kai Kornhuber & Dim Coumou, 2019. "Summer weather becomes more persistent in a 2 °C world," Nature Climate Change, Nature, vol. 9(9), pages 666-671, September.
    2. Chris Huntingford & Philip D. Jones & Valerie N. Livina & Timothy M. Lenton & Peter M. Cox, 2013. "No increase in global temperature variability despite changing regional patterns," Nature, Nature, vol. 500(7462), pages 327-330, August.
    3. Aiguo Dai & Dehai Luo & Mirong Song & Jiping Liu, 2019. "Arctic amplification is caused by sea-ice loss under increasing CO2," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 10(1), pages 1-13, December.
    4. Adrian E. Raftery & Alec Zimmer & Dargan M. W. Frierson & Richard Startz & Peiran Liu, 2017. "Less than 2 °C warming by 2100 unlikely," Nature Climate Change, Nature, vol. 7(9), pages 637-641, September.
    5. E. M. Fischer & R. Knutti, 2015. "Anthropogenic contribution to global occurrence of heavy-precipitation and high-temperature extremes," Nature Climate Change, Nature, vol. 5(6), pages 560-564, June.
    6. James A. Screen, 2014. "Arctic amplification decreases temperature variance in northern mid- to high-latitudes," Nature Climate Change, Nature, vol. 4(7), pages 577-582, July.
    7. Sonia I. Seneviratne & Markus G. Donat & Andy J. Pitman & Reto Knutti & Robert L. Wilby, 2016. "Allowable CO2 emissions based on regional and impact-related climate targets," Nature, Nature, vol. 529(7587), pages 477-483, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Alessandro Dosio & Mirco Migliavacca & Douglas Maraun, 2025. "How fast is climate changing? One generation is sufficient for unfamiliar heatwave characteristics to emerge in Europe," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 178(2), pages 1-17, February.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Carl-Friedrich Schleussner & Joeri Rogelj & Michiel Schaeffer & Tabea Lissner & Rachel Licker & Erich M. Fischer & Reto Knutti & Anders Levermann & Katja Frieler & William Hare, 2016. "Science and policy characteristics of the Paris Agreement temperature goal," Nature Climate Change, Nature, vol. 6(9), pages 827-835, September.
    2. Luke J. Harrington & Carl-Friedrich Schleussner & Friederike E. L. Otto, 2021. "Quantifying uncertainty in aggregated climate change risk assessments," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 12(1), pages 1-10, December.
    3. Xiaoting Sun & Qinghua Ding & Shih-Yu Simon Wang & Dániel Topál & Qingquan Li & Christopher Castro & Haiyan Teng & Rui Luo & Yihui Ding, 2022. "Enhanced jet stream waviness induced by suppressed tropical Pacific convection during boreal summer," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 13(1), pages 1-10, December.
    4. Gaupp, Franziska & Hall, Jim & Mitchell, Dann & Dadson, Simon, 2019. "Increasing risks of multiple breadbasket failure under 1.5 and 2 °C global warming," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 175(C), pages 34-45.
    5. Malanson, George P. & DeRose, R. Justin & Bekker, Matthew F., 2019. "Individual variation and ecotypic niches in simulations of the impact of climatic volatility," Ecological Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 411(C).
    6. Dirk Olonscheck & Andrew P. Schurer & Lucie Lücke & Gabriele C. Hegerl, 2021. "Large-scale emergence of regional changes in year-to-year temperature variability by the end of the 21st century," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 12(1), pages 1-10, December.
    7. Melanie Meis & Mariela Sued & Ramiro I. Saurral & Patricia Menéndez, 2024. "A novel statistically-based approach to regionalize extreme precipitation events using temperature data," Natural Hazards: Journal of the International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, Springer;International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, vol. 120(15), pages 14785-14807, December.
    8. Wei Zhang & Gabriele Villarini, 2017. "Heavy precipitation is highly sensitive to the magnitude of future warming," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 145(1), pages 249-257, November.
    9. Isabel Hovdahl, 2020. "Deadly Variation: The Effect of Temperature Variability on Mortality," Working Papers No 01/2020, Centre for Applied Macro- and Petroleum economics (CAMP), BI Norwegian Business School.
    10. Zoe E. Petropoulos & Oriana Ramirez-Rubio & Madeleine K. Scammell & Rebecca L. Laws & Damaris Lopez-Pilarte & Juan José Amador & Joan Ballester & Cristina O’Callaghan-Gordo & Daniel R. Brooks, 2021. "Climate Trends at a Hotspot of Chronic Kidney Disease of Unknown Causes in Nicaragua, 1973–2014," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(10), pages 1-13, May.
    11. Coderoni, Silvia & Pagliacci, Francesco, 2023. "The impact of climate change on land productivity. A micro-level assessment for Italian farms," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 205(C).
    12. Fengchun Ye & Pinya Wang & Yang Yang & Lili Ren & Jianping Tang & Hong Liao, 2025. "Anthropogenic forcing dominates changes in compound long-duration dry and heat extremes in China," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 178(2), pages 1-19, February.
    13. Xiaohang Ren & Wenqi Li & Xu Cheng & Xinwei Zheng, 2024. "Economic freedom and corporate carbon emissions: International evidence," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 33(8), pages 8388-8412, December.
    14. Xing Zhang & Tianjun Zhou & Wenxia Zhang & Liwen Ren & Jie Jiang & Shuai Hu & Meng Zuo & Lixia Zhang & Wenmin Man, 2023. "Increased impact of heat domes on 2021-like heat extremes in North America under global warming," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 14(1), pages 1-11, December.
    15. Strzałkowski, Andrzej, 2024. "Adaptation and operationalisation of sustainable degrowth for policy: Why we need to translate research papers into legislative drafts?," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 220(C).
    16. Frances C. Moore, 2017. "Learning, Adaptation, And Weather In A Changing Climate," Climate Change Economics (CCE), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 8(04), pages 1-21, November.
    17. Dae II Jeong & Alex J. Cannon & Bin Yu, 2022. "Influences of atmospheric blocking on North American summer heatwaves in a changing climate: a comparison of two Canadian Earth system model large ensembles," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 172(1), pages 1-21, May.
    18. Yi Yang & Jianping Tang, 2023. "Downscaling and uncertainty analysis of future concurrent long-duration dry and hot events in China," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 176(2), pages 1-25, February.
    19. Christopher W. Callahan & Justin S. Mankin, 2022. "National attribution of historical climate damages," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 172(3), pages 1-19, June.
    20. Hong Ying & Hongyan Zhang & Ying Sun & Jianjun Zhao & Zhengxiang Zhang & Xiaoyi Guo & Hang Zhao & Rihan Wu & Guorong Deng, 2020. "CMIP5-Based Spatiotemporal Changes of Extreme Temperature Events during 2021–2100 in Mainland China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(11), pages 1-18, May.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nat:natcom:v:13:y:2022:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-022-35571-0. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.nature.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.