Huth R., Kysely J., Dubrovsky M., 2003: Simulation of Surface Air Temperature by GCMs, Statistical Downscaling and Weather Generator: Higher-Order Statistical Moments. Studia Geophysica et Geodaetica 47, 203-216


Simulation of Surface Air Temperature by GCMs, Statistical Downscaling and Weather Generator: Higher-Order Statistical Moments

Radan Huth, Jan Kyselý, Martin Dubrovský

Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Acad. Sci. Czech Rep., Bocní II/1401, 141 31 Prague 4, Czech Republic


Abstract

The third and fourth statistical moments, that is, skewness and kurtosis, are compared for daily maximum temperature in summer and daily minimum temperature in winter between observations, outputs of two global climate models, four versions of statistical downscaling, and weather generator. The comparison is performed at six stations in central Europe. None of the simulation models can be considered as superior to the others. Causes of a good correspondence with and differences from observations are identified e.g. in the treatment of physics in the models, imperfections in physical parameterizations, or a linear transfer of properties from predictors onto predictands in statistical downscaling.


Keywords
daily temperature, higher-order statistical moments, global climate models, statistical downscaling, weather generator