Final Report of the Workshop on Adaptation of Climate Scenarios to Arctic Climate Impact Assessments, Oslo, May 14-16, 2007. AMAP Report 2007:4.

Abstract

The Arctic Climate Impact Assessment (ACIA) report identified a critical gap concerning spatial scales in climate scenarios between the output of global and regional climate models (GCMs/RCMs) and the needs of stakeholders and impact assessments. An established methodology for bridging this gap is statistical downscaling, which has not yet been applied systematically to the Arctic but which offers the potential for achieving the specificity required of climate change projections. In view of the ACIA recommendation for downscaled climate scenarios and the readiness of the approach, the AMAP CEG suggested arranging a workshop on the organization of an Arctic-wide statistical downscaling project to produce site-specific climate scenarios for future Arctic climate impact assessments. By bringing together scientists working with downscaling of climate scenarios and Arctic climate impact researchers, the AMAP-sponsored workshop aimed to • summarize the present status concerning statistical downscaling and adjustment techniques, • identify a target distribution of locations for which statistical downscaling algorithms can be developed, • address technical issues such as the choice of climate models and emission scenarios (A2, A1B, B2, etc), predictor variables for use in the development of downscaling algorithms and predictands, • propose an implementation strategy for the coordinated pan-Arctic downscaling activity The suggestion was approved by the AMAP council. The workshop was arranged in Oslo on May 14-16, 2007.