Diagnosing potential changes in Asian summer monsoon onset and duration in IPCC AR4 model simulations using moisture and wind indices

Using daily precipitable water (PW) and 850 hPa monsoon wind, which represent large-scale moisture and dynamic conditions for monsoon development, we analyze potential changes in Asian monsoon onset, retreat and duration simulated by 13 IPCC AR4 models. Most models are able to reproduce the observed temporal and spatial evolution patterns of the Asian monsoon system. Nevertheless, there are significant model biases and some models fail in reproducing the broad structure. Under a warmed climate, changes in onset and duration days are only moderate (about 3–10 days), with significant discrepancies among the models, particularly over the East Asia land area where the models are almost equally divided. In the tropical Indian Ocean, maritime continent and Indochina Peninsula, the majority of the models tend to simulate delayed onset and shortened duration while in the western North Pacific most models exhibit an early onset and longer duration. There are two reasons leading to such uncertainties: (1) the key processes determining the Asian monsoon onset/retreat are different among the models. Some are more influenced by ENSO-like processes. But in some models, monsoon onset/retreat is more significantly correlated to circulations in the tropics. (2) The model-simulated changes in these dominant processes are different. In some models, surface warming is more intense in the central and eastern Pacific Ocean with El Nino-like patterns, while others do not show such features. If the model-simulated monsoon onset/retreat is correlated to the central and eastern Pacific warming and at the same time the model simulates much larger warming of the central and eastern Pacific Ocean, then it is very likely that these models will show significant delay of south Asian monsoon onset and shortened duration. In some models, the delayed onsets are more related to the reduction of westerlies in the west of the warm pool region. The patterns of anomalous SST and wind conditions identified in this study are consistent with each other and both are likely linked to the weakening and westward shift of Walker circulation in the warm pool and maritime continent region. Increases in precipitable water associated with global warming do not change monsoon rainfall and circulation seasonality much but they can result in increased rainfall intensity once the summer monsoon is established.