The purpose of this paper is to present a methodology for estimating space-time stochastic properties of local climatic factors reflecting global climate change. Specifically, daily precipitation amount and daily mean temperature are considered and illustrated with application to the state of Nebraska, U. S. A. Furthermore, a drought index with and without global climate change is examined. The magnitude and consequences of regional response to anticipated climatic changes are uncertain (Houghton et al. , 1990). Typical questions to be answered are: can time series of hydrological events or 10cal climatic variables such as daily temperature be conditioned in scenarios of future climate change and if so, how can this be utilized ? Can extreme historical drought events be reproduced by a stochastic hydroc1imatological model ? Can such a model be used with General Circu1ation Model (GCM) outputs to evaluate the regional/local effects of climate change scenarios? The approach presented in this paper is an extension of the usual analysis of regional hydrometeorological impacts of climate change: we propose to examine time series of GCM produced daily atmospheric circulation patterns (CP), thought to be relatively accurate GCM output to estimate local climatic factors. The paper is organized as follows. First, daily CPs are classified and analyzed statistically, first for historical and then for GCM produced data. Next, the height of the 500 hPa pressure field is introduced as an additional physically relevant variable influencing local climatic factors within each CP type.

Zusammenfassung
Proceedings of the NATO Advanced Study Institute on `Engineering Risk and Reliability in a Changing Physical Environment, New Developments in Resources Management with Applications to Non-Steady Conditions', Deauville, France, May 24--June 4, 1993

Inhalt
Systems engineering of natural resources under changing physical conditions: A framework for reliability and risk.- Systems engineering of natural resources under changing physical conditions: State of the art in systems modeling.- Design and control of water systems under unsteady conditions.- Institutional analysis and water resources management.- Numerical models for the simulation of natural and anthropogenic climate variations.- Estimation of local climatic factors under climate change.- Synergistic effect of dam and forecast on flood probabilities: a Bayesian analysis.- Some reliability measures for nonstationary Markov chains.- Statistical detection of changes in geophysical series.- Risk analysis of hydrologic data: review and new developments concerning the Halphen distributions.- Estimation of extreme regional precipitation under climate change.- Detection and modeling of the impact of climatic change on river flows.- Sea level rise problems.- Climatic changes during the 20th century on the Laurentian Great lakes and their impacts on hydrologic regime.- Sediment yield and pollution from small watersheds under changing climatic conditions.- Water quality in coastal zones under variable climatic conditions.- Report of Panel 1: Global change, a statistical myth?.- Inference and decision under near ignorance conditions.- Design and control of water systems in presence of inflow scenarios.- Risk of extreme flood losses under uncertain physical conditions.- Sea level rise: A probabilistic design problem.- Quantitative analysis of uncertainties in water resources. Application for predicting the effects of changes.- Strategic decisions under nonstationary conditions: a stopping-control paradigm.- Report of Panel 2: When and how should we act?.- Managing water resources for adaptation to climate change.- The effects of climate change on storm surges.- Evaluating climate change impacts on the management of the Great Lakes of North America.- Water management in the Neste system.- Planning and management of water resources in the southwest of France in a dynamic physical, social and economic environment.- Balancing reservoir management and water conservation: Application to hydropower and irrigation.- Report of Panel 3: To act or not to act?.