Su et al. (2025) Widening Urban–Rural Precipitation Differences in China: Regionally Varied Intensification Since 2000

⚠️ Warning: This summary was generated from the abstract only, as the full text was not available.

Identification

• Journal: Earth s Future
• Year: 2025
• Date: 2025-09-01
• Authors: Jiajia Su, Chiyuan Miao, Jinlong Hu, Yi Wu, Jiachen Ji
• DOI: 10.1029/2025ef006657

Research Groups

Not specified in the provided text.

Short Summary

This study analyzes the impact of urbanization on precipitation patterns across 37 Chinese cities from 1980 to 2022, finding that urbanization generally increases total and extreme precipitation while reducing the overall number of wet days.

Objective

• To assess how urbanization differentially modulates various precipitation categories (all precipitation events versus extreme events) and to identify the anthropogenic and climatic drivers governing these shifts.

Study Configuration

• Spatial Scale: 37 urbanized regions across China, categorized by climate zone (e.g., cold, arid) and city size (e.g., medium-sized, megacities).
• Temporal Scale: 1980–2022.

Methodology and Data

• Models used: Not specified (analysis based on precipitation indices).
• Data sources: Not specified.

Main Results

• Precipitation Patterns: Urbanization generally led to a decrease in the number of wet days but an increase in the frequency of extreme precipitation.
• Quantitative Trends: Nationally, urbanization induced increases in total precipitation, the simple precipitation intensity index, and interannual variability.
• Spatio-Temporal Variability: Effects were initially more prominent in cold climate zones and medium-sized cities; however, from 2000 to 2022, effects intensified particularly in arid climate zones and megacities.
• Drivers:
  • General precipitation shifts are governed by anthropogenic drivers (urban area trend) and climatic drivers (relative humidity).
  • Extreme precipitation shifts are primarily modulated by climatic drivers, specifically convective available potential energy (CAPE).

Contributions

The research provides a nuanced understanding of the "urbanization effect" by distinguishing between general and extreme precipitation, highlighting that the direction and intensity of these effects vary by city size, climate zone, and time period.

Funding

Not specified in the provided text.

Citation

@article{Su2025Widening,
  author = {Su, Jiajia and Miao, Chiyuan and Hu, Jinlong and Wu, Yi and Ji, Jiachen},
  title = {Widening Urban–Rural Precipitation Differences in China: Regionally Varied Intensification Since 2000},
  journal = {Earth s Future},
  year = {2025},
  doi = {10.1029/2025ef006657},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.1029/2025ef006657}
}