Increasing precipitation variability on daily-to-multiyear timescales in a warmer world

This is the final version. Available on open access from the American Association for the Advancement of Science via the DOI in this recordData and materials availability: All data needed to evaluate the conclusions in the paper are present in the paper, supplementary materials, and/or linked repositories. The GPCP precipitation data is acquired from https://climatedataguide.ucar.edu/climate-data/gpcp-daily-global precipitation-climatology-project. The IMERG precipitation data is acquired from https://gpm.nasa.gov/data/directory. For the HadGEM3-GC3.05 PPE simulations, two-dimensional fields can be accessed from https://catalogue.ceda.ac.uk/uuid/f1a2fc3c120f400396a92f5de84d596a, and post-processed three dimensional fields can be accessed from https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/GHWGG0.The hydrological cycle intensifies under global warming with precipitation increases. How the increased precipitation varies temporally at a given location has vital implications for regional climates and ecosystem services. Based on ensemble climate model projections under a high emission scenario, here we show that approximately two-thirds of land on Earth will face a “wetter and more variable” hydroclimate on daily to multiyear timescales. This means wider swings between wet and dry extremes. Such an amplification of precipitation variability is particularly prominent over climatologically wet regions, with percentage increases in variability more than twice those in mean precipitation. Thermodynamic effects, linked to increased moisture availability, increase precipitation variability uniformly everywhere. It is the dynamic effects (negative) linked to weakened circulation variability that make precipitation variability changes strongly region dependent. The increase in precipitation variability poses a new challenge to the climate resilience of infrastructures and human society.National Natural Science Foundation of ChinaChina Postdoctoral Science FoundationInternational Partnership Program of Chinese Academy of SciencesUK–China Research Innovation Partnership Fun