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Past and Future Drought in MongoliaThe severity of recent droughts in semiarid regions is increasingly attributed to anthropogenic climate change, but it is unclear whether these moisture anomalies exceed those of the past and how past variability compares to future projections. On the Mongolian Plateau, a recent decade-long drought that exceeded the variability in the instrumental record was associated with economic, social, and environmental change. We evaluate this drought using an annual reconstruction of the Palmer Drought Severity Index (PDSI) spanning the last 2060 years in concert with simulations of past and future drought through the year 2100 CE. We show that although the most recent drought and pluvial were highly unusual in the last 2000 years, exceeding the 900-year return interval in both cases, these events were not unprecedented in the 2060-year reconstruction, and events of similar duration and severity occur in paleoclimate, historical, and future climate simulations. The Community Earth System Model (CESM) ensemble suggests a drying trend until at least the middle of the 21st century, when this trend reverses as a consequence of elevated precipitation. Although the potential direct effects of elevated CO2 on plant water use efficiency exacerbate uncertainties about future hydroclimate trends, these results suggest that future drought projections for Mongolia are unlikely to exceed those of the last two millennia, despite projected warming.
Document ID
20180003145
Acquisition Source
Goddard Space Flight Center
Document Type
Reprint (Version printed in journal)
External Source(s)
Authors
Hessl, Amy E.
(West Virginia Univ. Morgantown, WV, United States)
Anchukaitis, Kevin J.
(Arizona Univ. Phoenix, AZ, United States)
Jelsema, Casey
(West Virginia Univ. Morgantown, WV, United States)
Cook, Benjamin
(NASA Goddard Inst. for Space Studies New York, NY, United States)
Byambasuren, Oyunsanaa
(National Univ. of Mongolia Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia)
Leland, Caroline
(Columbia Univ. Palisades, NY, United States)
Nachin, Baatarbileg
(National Univ. of Mongolia Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia)
Pederson, Neil
(Harvard Univ. Boston, MA, United States)
Tian, Hanqin
(Alabama Univ. Auburn, AL, United States)
Hayles, Laia Andreu
(Columbia Univ. Palisades, NY, United States)
Date Acquired
May 29, 2018
Publication Date
March 14, 2018
Publication Information
Publication: Science Advances
Publisher: American Association for the Advancement of Science
Volume: 4
Issue: 3
e-ISSN: 2375-2548
Subject Category
Meteorology And Climatology
Report/Patent Number
GSFC-E-DAA-TN54041
Funding Number(s)
CONTRACT_GRANT: NSF CNH-1210360
CONTRACT_GRANT: NSF DEB-0816700
CONTRACT_GRANT: NG 9114-12
Distribution Limits
Public
Copyright
Other
Keywords
drought projection
soil moisture
evapotranspiration
dendrochronology
Palmer Drought Severity Index

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