Remote influences on European climate

In this project a number of topics are addressed that are relevant for the construction of climate scenarios for the Netherlands. Central theme is the impact of remote influences on the climate in the Netherlands with a focus on extreme events. A new methodology has been developed to estimate return times of meteorological extremes on the basis of short time-series and this has been applied to extreme winds and storm surges in the present and a warmer climate as input into the report of the Delta commission. In addition the influence of a warmer North Sea on extreme rainfall in summer has been quantified and it turned out to be a factor of importance. Changes in the statistics of wind direction in summer in a warmer climate are important for the local climate change and have been analysed and attributed to the drying of the soils in Southern Europe. Finally, the EC-Earth climate model that is being used for the KNMI next scenarios has been improved by implementing changes to the parameterization of deep convection in the tropics. These changes not only improved the simulation of the mean and variability of the tropical precipitation, but also improved the atmospheric circulation over Europe through the remote influence of the tropics on our latitudes.