[en] Drought is typically associated with a lack of precipitation, whereas the contribution of evapotranspiration and runoff to drought evolution is not well understood. Here, we use unique long-term observations made in four headwater catchments in Central and Western Europe to reconstruct storage anomalies and study the drivers of storage anomaly evolution during drought. We provide observational evidence for the ‘drought-paradox’ in that region: a consistent and significant increase in evapotranspiration during drought episodes which acts to amplify the storage anomalies. In contrast, decreases in runoff act to limit storage anomalies. Our findings stress the need for the correct representation of evapotranspiration and runoff processes in drought indices.
Disciplines :
Earth sciences & physical geography
Author, co-author :
Teuling, Adriaan J.; Wageningen University > 1Hydrology and Quantitative Water Management Group
Van Loon, Anne F.; Wageningen University > Hydrology and Quantitative Water Management Group
Seneviratne, Sonia Isabelle; 2Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science, ETH Zurich, Switzerland
Lehner, Irene; Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science, ETH Zurich, Switzerland and University of Lund, Sweden
Aubinet, Marc ; Université de Liège - ULiège > Sciences et technologie de l'environnement > Physique des bio-systèmes
Heinesch, Bernard ; Université de Liège - ULiège > Sciences et technologie de l'environnement > Physique des bio-systèmes
Bernhofer, Christian; TU Dresden, Germany
Grünwald, Thomas; TU Dresden, Germany
Prasse, Heiko; TU Dresden, Germany
Spank, Uwe; TU Dresden, Germany
Language :
English
Title :
Evapotranspiration amplifies European summer drought
Publication date :
22 April 2013
Journal title :
Geophysical Research Letters
ISSN :
0094-8276
eISSN :
1944-8007
Publisher :
American Geophysical Union, Washington, United States - District of Columbia
Aubinet, M., B. Chermanne, M. Vandenhaute, B. Longdoz, M. Yernaux, and, E. Laitat, (2001), Long term carbon dioxide exchange above a mixed forest in the Belgian Ardennes, Agric. For. Meteorol., 108, 293-315.
Brauer, C. C., A. J. Teuling, A. Overeem, Y. van der Velde, P. Hazenberg, P. M. M. Warmerdam, and, R. Uijlenhoet, (2011), Anatomy of extraordinary rainfall and flash flood in a Dutch lowland catchment, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 15, 1991-2005, doi: 10.5194/hess-15-1991-2011.
Ciais, P., et al. (2005), Europe-wide reduction in primary productivity caused by the heat and drought in 2003, Nature, 437 (7058), 529-533, doi: 10.1038/nature03972.
Corti, T., M. W. Wuest, D. Bresch, and, S. I. Seneviratne, (2011), Drought-induced building damages from simulations at regional scale, Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci., 11, 3335-3342, doi: 10.5194/nhess-11-3335-2011.
De Boeck, H. J., and, H. Verbeeck, (2011), Drought-associated changes in climate and their relevance for ecosystem experiments and models, Biogeosciences, 8, 1121-1130, doi: 10.5194/bg-8-1121-2011.
Dolman, A. J., and, R. A. M. de Jeu, (2010), Evaporation in focus, Nat. Geosci., 3 (5), 296-296, doi: 10.1038/cgeo849.
Grünwald, T., and, C. Bernhofer, (2007), A decade of carbon, water and energy flux measurements of an old spruce forest at the Anchor Station Tharandt, Tellus, 59B, 387-396.
Hobbins, M. T., A. Dai, M. L. Roderick, and, G. D. Farquhar, (2008), Revisiting the parameterization of potential evaporation as a driver of long-term water balance trends, Geophys. Res. Lett., 35, L12403, doi: 10.1029/2008GL033840.
Jiménez, C., et al. (2011), Global intercomparison of 12 land surface heat flux estimates, J. Geophys. Res., 116, D02102, doi: 10.1029/2010JD014545.
Li, B., et al. (2012), Assimilation of GRACE terrestrial water storage into a land surface model: Evaluation and potential value for drought monitoring in western and central Europe, J. Hydrol., 446-447, 103-115, doi: 10.1016/j.jhydrol.2012.04.035.
Lloyd-Hughes, B., and, M. A. Saunders, (2002), A drought climatology for Europe, Int. J. Climatol., 22, 1571-1592, doi: 10.1002/joc.846.
Miralles, D. G.,;, M. J. van den Berg, A. J. Teuling, and, R. A. M. de Jeu, (2012), Soil moisture-temperature coupling: A multiscale observational analysis, Geophys. Res. Lett., 39, L21707, doi: 10.1029/2012GL053703.
Mueller, B., and, S. I. Seneviratne, (2012), Hot days induced by precipitation deficits at the global scale, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U. S. A., 109 (31), 12398-12403, doi: 10.1073/pnas.1204330109.
Mueller, B., et al. (2011), Evaluation of global observations-based evapotranspiration datasets and IPCC AR4 simulations, Geophys. Res. Lett., 38, L06402, doi: 10.1029/2010GL046230.
Seneviratne, S. I., et al. (2012a), Changes in climate extremes and their impacts on the natural physical environment, in Managing the Risks of Extreme Events and Disasters to Advance Climate Change Adaptation, A Special Report of Working Groups I and II of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), edited by, Field, C. B., V. Barros, T. F. Stocker, D. Qin, D. J. Dokken, K. L. Ebi, M. D. Mastrandrea, K. J. Mach, G.-K. Plattner, S. K. Allen, M. Tignor, and, P. M. Midgley, pp. 109-230, Cambridge Univ. Press, Cambridge, U. K.
Seneviratne, S. I., et al. (2012b), Swiss prealpine Rietholzbach research catchment and lysimeter: 32 year time series and 2003 drought event, Water Resour. Res., 48, W06526, doi: 10.1029/2011WR011749.
Sheffield, J., and, E. F. Wood, (2008), Global trends and variability in soil moisture and drought characteristics, 1950-2000, from observation-driven simulations of the terrestrial hydrologic cycle, J. Clim., 21 (3), 432-458, doi: 10.1175/2007JCLI1822.1.
Sheffield, J., E. F. Wood, and, M. L. Roderick, (2012), Little change in global drought over the past 60 years, Nature, 491, doi: 10.1038/nature11575.
Spank, U., and, C. Bernhofer, (2012), Beschreibung, Messung und Modellierung von Wasserhaushalt und Wasserhaushaltskomponenten von Wäldern (Description, measurement and modeling of water budget and water budget components of forests), PROMET, 38, 80-91.
Stegehuis, A. I., et al. (2013), Summer temperatures in Europe and land heat fluxes in observation-based data and regional climate model simulations, Clim. Dyn., online first, doi: 10.1007/s00382-012-1559-X.
Teuling, A. J., et al. (2010a), Contrasting response of European forest and grassland energy exchange to heatwaves, Nat. Geosci., 3 (10), 722-727, doi: 10.1038/ngeo950.
Teuling, A. J., I. Lehner, J. W. Kirchner, and, S. I. Seneviratne, (2010b), Catchments as simple dynamical systems: Experience from a Swiss prealpine catchment, Water Resour. Res., 46, W10502, doi: 10.1029/2009WR008777.
Wilson, K. B., et al. (2002), Energy balance closure at FLUXNET sites, Agric. For. Meteorol., 113, 223-243.
