Indian Ocean Climate Initiative Stage 3 (IOCI3) - Downscaled Climate Projections for Western Australia

IOCI3, a climate research collaboration between CSIRO, BoM and the Government of Western Australia produced statistically downscaled projections for daily rainfall and maximum and minimum temperature for south-west WA (29 sites) and north-west WA (9 Kimberley sites and 10 Pilbara sites). These fine-scale projections for mid-century and end-of-century time periods are useful for climate change adaptation management and planning (but see caveats & limitations under "Lineage" and "Read me" files). These results are provided as CSV (comma-separated-values) files.\nLineage: These statistically downscaled rainfall simulations were produced using atmospheric predictors extracted from the historically based record using NCEP/NCAR reanalysis (NNR; 1959-2009) and five global circulation models (GCMs) for the SRES B1 (low), A1B (medium) and A2 (high) greenhouse gas emissions scenarios for baseline (1962-1999); mid-century (2047-2064) and end-of-century (2082-2099) time periods. Statistically downscaled temperature projections were produced from dynamically downscaled projections using the same GCMs and for the same periods but only under the SRES A2 (high) emission scenario. The NNR and GCM predictors were used to drive Non-homogeneous Hidden Markov Models (NHMMs) that were calibrated to networks of stations in south-west and north-west WA. The NHMM is a stochastic technique that can generate multiple realisations of rainfall and temperature. The application of these techniques was advanced under IOCI3 and applied to the tropics for the first time.