Modeling of Short-Duration Precipitation and Temperature Processes for Climate-Related Impact Assessment Studies in Urban Areas

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The overall objective of the present study is to develop innovative methods for modeling the two fundamental hydrologic processes (precipitation and temperature) over a wide range of scales in order to provide an accurate description of these processes within the framework of climate change. More specifically, statistical downscaling models for simulating short-duration precipitation and temperature time series will be developed to respect the observed temporal variability of these variables at a given site in a region as well as their spatial dependence over the entire region. The use of a hybrid approach based on a combination of scale-invariance methods and multivariate statistical and multidimensional stochastic techniques is useful in this case because the proposed models should be able to account for important statistical properties (average, variability, trend, and extreme) of the underlying processes over different temporal and spatial scales. In addition, the parameters of these models could be conditioned on suitable climate variables so that sensitivity analyses could be performed to study, for instance, how the frequency of extreme precipitations and temperatures would change as the model parameters change according to some variation in climate patterns. The proposed research deals exclusively with issues that have been received considerable attention due substantial investment involved. For instance, recent estimates of water's measurable contribution to the Canadian economy range from $7.5 to $23 billion annually. However, climate variability can stress Canada's water systems and even lead to water shortages. It is hence expected that results of this research will enhance our collective understanding of climate variations and their hydrological effects, will provide improved tools and methods for more effective water management in the context of a changing climate, and ultimately will help policy-makers in developing appropriate adaptive strategies and robust mitigating policies.