Context
Precipitation is an essential climate variable making the Total Precipitation a fundamental index for following climate variability and change. This Index is the only one in the Total precipitation Hazard type of the Wet and Dry category of the classification.
A higher/lower Index value indicates a wetter/drier climate. Change (i.e difference relative to an average over a 30-year reference period) in Total precipitation is often used as a headline index in regional climate change assessments whereas changes in seasonal means are relevant for seasonal changes evaluation and sectoral applications.
Definition
The cumulated precipitation over a period (mm/period). In weather and climate models total precipitation is the flux of water equivalent (rain or snow) reaching the land surface (expressed as kg⋅m⁻²⋅sec⁻² and converted to mm/day). This Index is usually presented as annual, seasonal or monthly cumulated values over the considered period.
Data Sources
The data was assembled on behalf of the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) based on climate projections hosted on the C3S Climate Data Store (CDS). The Index is calculated from the ERA5 reanalysis and a set of nine bias-corrected multi-model simulations from the EURO-CORDEX experiment. These simulations have a spatial resolution of 0.25°x0.25°, a 3-hourly output, and cover scenarios RCP4.5 and RCP8.5. More information about the dataset can be found in the corresponding CDS documentation resources.
Supporting Information
Further information about this application can be found in the ECDE application User Guide and the Data and datasets underpining the ECDE. Related information can also be found in other sections of the EEA site:
- The Index based interactive EEA report: Wet and dry — mean precipitation (link).