Climate Change Projections and Impacts for the Bay of Plenty Region
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Climate change projections and impacts for the Bay of Plenty Region October 2019 Prepared by: Petra Pearce Nava Fedaeff Brett Mullan Stephen Stuart Abha Sood Gregor Macara For any information regarding this report please contact: Petra Pearce Manager – Climate, Atmosphere and Hazards +64-9-375 2052 [email protected] National Institute of Water & Atmospheric Research Ltd Private Bag 99940 Viaduct Harbour Auckland 1010 Phone +64 9 375 2050 NIWA CLIENT REPORT No: 2019218AK Report date: October 2019 NIWA Project: BOP19101 Quality Assurance Statement Dr Sam Dean Reviewed by: Principal Scientist – Climate NIWA Wellington Formatting checked by: Petra Pearce Dr Andrew Tait Chief Scientist – Climate, Atmosphere Approved for release by: and Hazards NIWA Wellington © All rights reserved. This publication may not be reproduced or copied in any form without the permission of the copyright owner(s). Such permission is only to be given in accordance with the terms of the client’s contract with NIWA. This copyright extends to all forms of copying and any storage of material in any kind of information retrieval system. Whilst NIWA has used all reasonable endeavours to ensure that the information contained in this document is accurate, NIWA does not give any express or implied warranty as to the completeness of the information contained herein, or that it will be suitable for any purpose(s) other than those specifically contemplated during the Project or agreed by NIWA and the Client. Contents Executive summary ........................................................................................................... 11 1 Introduction ............................................................................................................ 13 1.1 Global and New Zealand climate change................................................................ 15 1.2 Year to year climate variability and climate change ............................................... 17 1.3 Representative Concentration Pathways ............................................................... 21 1.4 Climate modelling methodology ............................................................................ 23 2 Current and future climate of the Bay of Plenty Region ............................................. 24 3 Temperature ........................................................................................................... 24 3.1 Mean temperature ................................................................................................. 24 3.2 Maximum temperature .......................................................................................... 30 3.3 Minimum temperature ........................................................................................... 36 3.4 Diurnal temperature range ..................................................................................... 42 3.5 Hot days .................................................................................................................. 48 3.6 Extreme hot days .................................................................................................... 52 3.7 Heatwave days ........................................................................................................ 54 3.8 Frost days ................................................................................................................ 56 3.9 Growing degree days .............................................................................................. 60 4 Rainfall and Drought ................................................................................................ 63 4.1 Rainfall .................................................................................................................... 63 4.2 Wet days ................................................................................................................. 69 4.3 Heavy rain days ....................................................................................................... 76 4.4 99th percentile of daily rainfall ................................................................................ 82 4.5 Maximum 1-day rainfall .......................................................................................... 84 4.6 Maximum 5-day rainfall .......................................................................................... 86 4.7 Extreme, rare rainfall events (HIRDS v4) ................................................................ 89 4.8 Dry days .................................................................................................................. 90 4.9 Potential Evapotranspiration Deficit ...................................................................... 97 4.10 Soil moisture deficit ................................................................................................ 99 5 Wind and other variables ....................................................................................... 106 5.1 Mean wind speed ................................................................................................. 106 Climate change projections and impacts for the Bay of Plenty Region 5.2 Windy days ............................................................................................................ 110 5.3 99th percentile of mean wind speed ..................................................................... 111 5.4 Surface solar radiation .......................................................................................... 112 5.5 Relative humidity .................................................................................................. 116 6 Projections for storms affecting the Bay of Plenty ................................................... 122 6.1 Model simulations ................................................................................................ 122 6.2 Identifying storm tracks ........................................................................................ 124 6.3 Characteristics of storm track changes ................................................................. 127 6.4 Changes in Wet Spell Rainfalls .............................................................................. 134 6.5 Conclusions ........................................................................................................... 137 7 Climate change impacts for the Bay of Plenty Region .............................................. 139 8 Impacts of sea-level rise ......................................................................................... 139 8.1 Ministry for the Environment coastal hazards and climate change guidance ..... 139 8.2 Bay of Plenty sea-level rise, coastal erosion and inundation ............................... 148 8.3 More extreme SLR projections - Hansen et al. (2016) .......................................... 151 9 Impacts on biosecurity and pests ............................................................................ 152 9.1 Terrestrial biosecurity ........................................................................................... 152 9.2 Aquatic biosecurity ............................................................................................... 154 10 Impacts of drought and future pasture growth ....................................................... 155 11 Impacts on horticulture .......................................................................................... 156 12 Impacts on forestry ................................................................................................ 159 13 Impacts on health .................................................................................................. 160 13.1 Direct health impacts ............................................................................................ 161 13.2 Indirect health impacts ......................................................................................... 161 14 Summary and conclusions ...................................................................................... 163 15 Glossary of abbreviations and terms ...................................................................... 167 Appendix A Climate modelling methodology ..................................................... 170 16 References ............................................................................................................. 172 Climate change projections and impacts for the Bay of Plenty Region Tables Table 1-1: Projected change in global mean surface air temperature for the mid- and late- 21st century relative to the reference period of 1986-2005 for different RCPs. 22 Table 3-1: Modelled annual average number of hot days (maximum temperature >25°C) for the historic period and two climate change scenarios (RCP4.5 and RCP8.5) at two future time periods. 51 Table 3-2: Modelled annual average number of frost days (minimum temperature <0°C) for historic and two climate change scenarios (RCP4.5 and RCP8.5) at two future time periods. 59 Table 4-1: Modelled annual average rainfall for historic and two climate change scenarios (RCP4.5 and RCP8.5) at two future time periods. 69 Table 4-2: Modelled annual average number of heavy rain days (>25 mm) for historic and two climate change scenarios (RCP4.5 and RCP8.5) at two future time periods. 82 Table 4-3: Historic rainfall depths for a 1:50 year return period, 24 hour duration event (millimetres) and projected changes to the return period of this size event under two climate change