Northern Hemisphere Blended Snow Extent and Snow Mass Time Series

This paper presents an analysis of observed and simulated historical snow cover extent and snow mass, along with future snow cover projections from models participating in the 6th phase of the World Climate Research Programme Coupled Model Inter-comparison Project (CMIP6). Where appropriate, the CMIP6 output is compared to CMIP5 results in order to assess progress (or absence thereof) between successive model generations. An ensemble of six observation-based products is used to produce a new time series of historical Northern Hemisphere snow extent anomalies and trends; a subset of four of these products is used for snow mass. Trends in snow extent over 1981-2018 are negative in all months, and exceed -50 x 103 km2 during November, December, March, and May. Snow mass trends are approximately -5 Gt/year or more for all months from December to May. Overall, the CMIP6 multi-model ensemble better represents the snow extent climatology over the 1981-2014 period for all months, correcting a low bias in CMIP5. Simulated snow extent and snow mass trends over the 1981-2014 period are stronger in CMIP6 than in CMIP5, although large inter-model spread remains in the simulated trends for both variables. There is a single linear relationship between projected spring snow extent and global surface air temperature (GSAT) changes, which is valid across all scenarios. This finding suggests that Northern Hemisphere spring snow extent will decrease by about 8% relative to the 1995-2014 level per °C of GSAT increase. The sensitivity of snow to temperature forcing largely explains the absence of any climate change pathway dependency, similar to other fast response components of the cryosphere such as sea ice and near surface permafrost.

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Metadata Record Information

File Identifier
cc133287-1a07-4588-b3b8-40d714edd90e XML
Date Stamp
2022-06-28T19:58:31
Metadata language

eng; CAN
Character set
UTF8
Hierarchy Level
Dataset
Author
  Government of Canada; Environment and Climate Change Canada - Environment and Climate Change Canada ( Public inquiries centre )
Fontaine Building 12th floor, 200 Sacré-Coeur Blvd , Gatineau , Quebec , K1A 0H3 , Canada
1-800-668-6767
http://ec.gc.ca
 

Data identification

Date (Publication)
2020-05-05
Date (Creation)
2017-07-25
Status
Completed
Metadata language

eng
Character set
UTF8
Topic category
  • Climatology, meteorology, atmosphere
Maintenance and Update Frequency
Irregular
Spatial representation type
Text, table
Point of contact
  Government of Canada; Environment and Climate Change Canada; Science and Technology Branch/Climate Research Division - Climate Research Division ( Primary ECCC Author )

Keywords

Theme

  • CMIP6, snow extent, snow mass

  • Observation/Measurement

Government of Canada Core Subject Thesaurus

  • Climate

ECCC Information Category EN

  • Weather and Climate

Business Functions

  • Provide Climate Information Products and Services

  • Expand Scientific Knowledge for Climate Monitoring and Prediction

Geography

  • International

external.theme.EC_Branch

  • Science and Technology Branch

external.theme.EC_Directorate

  • Atmospheric Science and Technology

external.theme.GC_Security_Level

  • Unclassified
 
Use Limitation

Open Government Licence - Canada ( http://open.canada.ca/en/open-government-licence-canada )

Access Constraints
License
Use Constraints
License
Begin Date
1981-01-01
End Date
2018-12-31

Extent

N
S
E
W
thumbnail


 
 

Ref. system Reference Systems

Reference system identifier
http://www.epsg-registry.org / EPSG:4326 /
 

Distribution

Distribution Formats

Distribution format
  • NetCDF ( classic )

 
Distributor
  Government of Canada; Environment and Climate Change Canada - Environment and Climate Change Canada ( Public inquiries centre )
Fontaine Building 12th floor, 200 Sacré-Coeur Blvd , Gatineau , Quebec , K1A 0H3 , Canada
1-800-668-6767
http://ec.gc.ca
 
 

Overviews

N
S
E
W
thumbnail


Keywords

CMIP6, snow extent, snow mass Observation/Measurement
Business Functions
Expand Scientific Knowledge for Climate Monitoring and Prediction Provide Climate Information Products and Services
ECCC Information Category EN
Weather and Climate
Government of Canada Core Subject Thesaurus
Climate
external.theme.EC_Branch
Science and Technology Branch
external.theme.EC_Directorate
Atmospheric Science and Technology
external.theme.GC_Security_Level
Unclassified

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