Assessment of CMIP6 in Simulating Multiyear El Niño and the Associated Spring Precipitation over Southern China
2025
Xiaoman Zhang | Wenxiu Zhong | Qingquan Li | Xiaoming Hu | Meng Li | Yunqi Kong
Multiyear El Niño events have been increasing in recent decades and exert markedly different climatic impacts than single-year events. The enhanced spring precipitation observed over southern China following multiyear El Niño events is particularly notable. However, the ability of current climate models to simulate these events and their associated regional impacts remains unclear. Using historical simulations from 39 Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 models, we assess their performance in simulating multiyear El Niño events from 1950 to 2014, and examine the associated spring precipitation anomalies in the following years. Most models simulate a high frequency of multiyear El Niño events; however, they are limited in capturing the spatial distribution of spring precipitation, with Taylor skill scores ranging from 0.15 to 0.98. Notably, E3SM-1-0 is the only model that reproduces the observed increase in precipitation over southern China and simulates realistic water vapor transport and convergence-related uplift. However, the model fails to accurately simulate the large-scale circulation anomalies associated with these events.
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