Evolution of atmospheric conditions associated with intense rainfall in São Paulo: past observations and future projections in scenarios of climatic change

• Grant number: 12/02066-6
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: April 01, 2012
• End date: June 30, 2013
• Field of knowledge: Physical Sciences and Mathematics - Geosciences - Meteorology
• Principal Investigator: Maria Assunção Faus da Silva Dias
• Grantee: Ana Claudia Thome Sena
• Host Institution: Instituto de Astronomia, Geofísica e Ciências Atmosféricas (IAG). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil

Abstract

The question is whether the atmospheric environment of rainfall extremes in the past in the region around the city of São Paulo is well reproduced by climate simulations, what features are well represented and whether these features change for future climate scenarios. Climate simulations of the recent climate will be analyzed from the point of view of the statistics of various indices of thermodynamic instability associated with extreme rainfall. The statistics of instability indices for the recent past climate will be compared to the same statistics for the future climate simulation scenarios to evaluate possible changes in the frequency of extremes.(AU)