Detection of climate change in Lorestan Province using climate extreme indices

Climate change can lead to changes in the frequency, intensity, and duration of extreme climate events in different parts of the world. The purpose of this research is to investigate temperature and precipitation extremes in Lorestan Province. The data used in this study included precipitation and the maximum and minimum daily temperature of nine synoptic stations in Lorestan Province during a 28-year (1990-2017) common period. The matrices of minimum and maximum temperatures and precipitation daily data for each station were prepared and used to compute the extreme climate indices (26 precipitation and temperature extreme indices based on the recommendation of CLIVAR \ CLL expert group) using the R programming software. The results of studying the trend of cold and hot extreme weather indicators during the period 1990-2017 in the province using the Mann-Kendall trend test showed that for all stations, the hot indices have increased and more cold indices have decreased. In different regions of the province, positive and negative trends of hot and cold indices with different intensities have occurred. The highest upward trend of the warm extreme indices has occurred for the hot night’s index. Among the cold indicators, the greatest decrease occurred for several frost days and cold days indices. The decreasing trend of ice days is significant for 45% of stations at 99% level and the decreasing trend of cold days for 77% of stations at different levels of 90, 95, and 99%. The results of the study of the frequency of occurrence and trend of precipitation extreme indicators in Lorestan province showed that the total rainfall of this province, like many regions of the country, has decreased. In contrast, the occurrence of maximum rainfall in addition to being significant in the province has an increasing trend during the period 2017-1990. These conditions can indicate an increase in the number of occurrences of heavy and short-term rainfall events and, shorten the period of the rainfall season in the region.