The climate projections for Belgium are available as different data types:
1/ Daily climate model simulations and projections at a high spatial resolution of 0.025° or 2.8km for 3 Regional Climate Models (download service with NetCDF files):
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ALARO-0 forced with the Global Climate Model ‘CNRM-CERFACS-CNRM-CM5’, calculated by RMIB-UGent;
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COSMO-CLM5.0-TERRA-URB forced with the Global Climate model ‘ICHEC-EC-EARTH’, calculated by KULeuven;
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COSMO-CLM5.0 forced with the Global Climate Model ‘MPI-M-MPI-ESM-LR’, calculated by UCLouvain.
2/ Climate indicators for a present (1975) and future (2085) target year under a mean and high impact scenario (view and download service with raster files). The climate indicators for Belgium were obtained by a statistical downscaling based on the high-resolution Belgian climate model projections, as well as on a large set of both Global Climate Model runs (CMIP5) and Regional Climate Model runs for Europe (EURO-CORDEX).
Statement
1/ Daily climate model simulations and projections at a high spatial resolution of 0.025° or 2.8km for 3 Regional Climate Models (download service with NetCDF files):
The daily climate simulations and projections for Belgium were produced in the context of the Belspo funded CORDEX.be I project (2015-2017). These climate model data in NetCDF format for 3 Regional Climate Models (ALARO-0, COSMO-CLM5.0-TERRA-URB and COSMO-CLM5.0) were obtained through a dynamical downscaling of Global Climate Modeldata, after which a regridding to a common 0.025° or 2.8km grid has been applied. Historical model simulations (1975-2005) and projections according to multiple emission scenarios or Representative Concentration Pathways (rcp26, rcp45, rcp85) as used in the Fifth Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Assessment Report are available for the parameters:
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huss = near-surface specific humidity at 2 m [1]
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hurs = near-surface relative humidity at 2 m [%]
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pr = precipitation [kg m-2 s-1]; to get precipitation in mm/day, the data should be multiplied by 606024 = 86400
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ps = surface air pressure [Pa]
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rsds = surface incoming shortwave radiation [W m-2]
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tas = average near-surface air temperature at 2 m [K]
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tasmax = maximum near-surface air temperature at 2 m [K]
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tasmin = minimum near-surface air temperature at 2 m [K]
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uas = eastward near-surface wind at 10 m [m s-1]
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vas = northward near-surface wind at 10 m [m s-1]
All information and background on the use of the data can be found in the user guide (see link below).
More information on the Regional Climate Models as used in the CORDEX.be I project can be found in the scientific paper Termonia et al. (2018), Tables 2 and 3: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2405880717300195?via%3Dihub or https://www.belspo.be/belspo/brain-be/projects/FinalReports/CORDEXbe_FinRep_AD.pdf.
Climate model simulations and projections for Belgium from the Regional Climate Model called ‘MAR’, which are forced by the latest CMIP6 Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (or SSP) as used in the Sixth and latest IPCC Assessment Report, are available through the University of Liège by:
The model outputs are available by degree of warming (ref/, 2deg/ using ssp370, 3deg/ using ssp370, 4deg/ using ssp585) or by full time series (the 4 SSP) in src/.
Belgian climate simulations and projections for other Regional Climate Models (ALARO-0 – RMIB-UGent, COSMO-CLM - KULeuven) in line with the latest emission scenarios or Shared Socioeconomic Pathways are currently produced in the CORDEX.be II project and will be available by 2026 (https://cordex.meteo.be/).
2/ Climate indicators for a present (1975) and future (2085) target year under a mean and high impact scenario (view and download service with raster files):
In the follow-up Belspo funded 'CICADA' project (2019-2021, https://www.belspo.be/belspo/brain-be/projects/FinalReports/CICADAbe_FinRep.pdf ), these Belgian climate model projections were used to adjust the spread of climate change signals based on the larger model ensemble of all available CMIP5 Global Climate Model runs (https://pcmdi.llnl.gov/mips/cmip5/) and EURO-CORDEX Regional Climate Model runs (https://euro-cordex.net/060378/index.php.en). This multi-model ensemble of climate change signals or factors were used to apply a statistical downscaling or more specifically a quantile perturbation method on the observational climate grid from the Royal Meteorological Institute of Belgium. From those ensembles, 5th, 50th, and 95th percentiles of changes, corresponding to a mean (50th percentiles) and high (5th or 95th percentiles) impact scenario, were obtained for the variables: precipitation, temperature, relative humidity, wind speed, global solar radiation and potential evapotranspiration.