Hydrologic Impacts of Ensemble-RCM-Projected Climate Changes in the Athabasca River Basin, Canada

AbstractIn this study, the Providing Regional Climates for Impacts Studies (PRECIS) and the Regional Climate Model (RegCM) system as well as the Variable Infiltration Capacity (VIC) macroscale hydrologic model were integrated into a general framework to investigate impacts of future climates on the hydrologic regime of the Athabasca River basin. Regional climate models (RCMs) including PRECIS and RegCM were used to develop ensemble high-resolution climate projections for 1979–2099. RCMs were driven by the boundary conditions from the Hadley Centre Global Environment Model, version 2 with Earth system configurations (HadGEM2-ES); the Second Generation Canadian Earth System Model (CanESM2); and the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory Earth System Model with MOM (GFDL-ESM2M) under the representative concentration pathways (RCPs). The ensemble climate simulations were validated through comparison with observations for 1984–2003. The RCMs project increases in temperature, precipitation, and wind speed under ...