Publication Details |
| Category | Data Publication |
| DOI | 10.5281/zenodo.18469055 |
| Licence |
|
| Title (Primary) | Storyline-based climate attribution reveals strong intensification of 2018–2022 multi-year droughts in Europe [Data set] |
| Author | Kettaren, R.; Sánchez‐Benítez, A.; Goessling, H.; Athanase, M.; Kumar, R.
; Samaniego, L.
; Rakovec, O. |
| Source Titel | Zenodo |
| Year | 2026 |
| Department | CHS |
| Language | englisch |
| Topic | T5 Future Landscapes |
| Abstract | Prolonged summer droughts represent a significant threat across Europe, as their persistence hinders hydrological recovery and severely impacts water resources, ecosystems, and agricultural systems under ongoing warming. Here, we investigated the 2018–2022 European multi-year drought across different warming levels using an innovative storyline attribution framework, applying nudged AWI-CM-1-1-MR simulations to force the mesoscale Hydrologic Model. Under present-day climate, the 2018–2022 drought caused a soil-moisture deficit of -44 (+/-11.1) km3, affecting 0.63 (+/-0.08) million km2 (12% of the study area). The 2018–2022 multi-year soil moisture state would overall show a surplus roughly 1.5 times the magnitude of the present-day deficit, with less than half of the area still experiencing drought. With warming of 2 K or 4 K, the losses increase to -82 (+/-6.7) or -256 (+/-6.7) km3, while drought extent expands to approximately 16% or 43%. These findings highlight that higher warming levels intensify multi-year droughts, both broadening their spatial footprint and deepening their severity. As warming transforms single-year droughts into extended multi-year events, their prolonged impacts underscore the need for effective climate adaptation and mitigation strategies. |
| linked UFZ text publications | |
| Kettaren, R., Sánchez‐Benítez, A., Goessling, H., Athanase, M., Kumar, R., Samaniego, L., Rakovec, O. (2026): Storyline-based climate attribution reveals strong intensification of 2018–2022 multi-year droughts in Europe [Data set] Zenodo 10.5281/zenodo.18469055 |
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