Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

Climate change

Future rise in rain inequality

Nature Geoscience volume 6, pages 337–338 (2013)Cite this article

Subjects

Rainfall disparities are expected to intensify in response to anthropogenic climate change. Model simulations suggest that wet regions and seasons will get wetter, and that a warmer equator will get wetter too.

In rain, as in wealth, the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer. As the climate warms, water-rich regions and seasons, in which rainfall is abundant and vastly exceeds local evaporation, are projected to become wetter1,2. In contrast, water-poor regions and seasons are expected to become drier. Writing in Nature Geoscience, Huang et al.3 confirm this view and add another twist: being in the right place — over warmer waters — will also bring a bonanza in terms of precipitation.

Your institute does not have access to this article

Relevant articles

Open Access articles citing this article.

Access options

Buy article

Get time limited or full article access on ReadCube.

$32.00

Buy

All prices are NET prices.

Figure 1: Trends in tropical rainfall.

References

  1. Held, I. M. & Soden, B. J. J. Climate 19, 5686–5699 (2006).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Chou, C. & Neelin, J. D. J. Climate 17, 2688–2701 (2004).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Huang, P., Xie, S-P., Hu, K., Huang, G. & Huang, R. Nature Geosci. 6, 357–361 (2013).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Xie, S-P. et al. J. Climate 23, 966–986 (2010).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  5. DiNezio, P. N. et al. J. Climate 22, 4873–4892 (2009).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. Chou, C., Chiang, J., Lan, C. W., Chung, C. H. & Liao, Y. C. Nature Geosci. 6, 263–267 (2013).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Lintner, B. R. et al. J. Geophys. Res. 117, D11106 (2012).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  8. Dwyer, J. G., Biasutti, M. & Sobel, A. H. J. Climate 25, 6359–6374 (2012).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  9. Seth, A., Rauscher, S. A., Rojas, M., Giannini, A. & Camargo, S. J. Climatic Change 104, 403–414 (2011).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  10. Biasutti, M. J. Geophys. Res. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/jgrd.50206 (2013).

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Michela Biasutti is at the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University, PO Box 1000, 61 Route 9W, Palisades, New York 10964, USA,

    Michela Biasutti

Authors
  1. Michela Biasutti
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Michela Biasutti.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Biasutti, M. Future rise in rain inequality. Nature Geosci 6, 337–338 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo1814

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo1814

Further reading

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing