A toy model of climatic variability with scaling behaviour

Koutsoyiannis, D

dc.contributor.author	Koutsoyiannis, D	en
dc.date.accessioned	2014-03-01T01:23:32Z
dc.date.available	2014-03-01T01:23:32Z
dc.date.issued	2006	en
dc.identifier.issn	0022-1694	en
dc.identifier.uri	https://dspace.lib.ntua.gr/xmlui/handle/123456789/17000
dc.subject	Climatic change	en
dc.subject	Climatic variability	en
dc.subject	Hurst phenomenon	en
dc.subject	Hydrological persistence	en
dc.subject	Predictability	en
dc.subject	Scaling	en
dc.subject	Uncertainty	en
dc.subject.classification	Engineering, Civil	en
dc.subject.classification	Geosciences, Multidisciplinary	en
dc.subject.classification	Water Resources	en
dc.subject.other	Chaos theory	en
dc.subject.other	Climate change	en
dc.subject.other	Hydrodynamics	en
dc.subject.other	Hydrology	en
dc.subject.other	Mathematical models	en
dc.subject.other	Uncertain systems	en
dc.subject.other	Climatic variability	en
dc.subject.other	Hurst phenomenon	en
dc.subject.other	Hydrological persistence	en
dc.subject.other	Predictability	en
dc.subject.other	Climatology	en
dc.subject.other	Chaos theory	en
dc.subject.other	Climate change	en
dc.subject.other	Climatology	en
dc.subject.other	Hydrodynamics	en
dc.subject.other	Hydrology	en
dc.subject.other	Mathematical models	en
dc.subject.other	Uncertain systems	en
dc.subject.other	climate modeling	en
dc.subject.other	climate variation	en
dc.subject.other	hydrological modeling	en
dc.subject.other	uncertainty analysis	en
dc.title	A toy model of climatic variability with scaling behaviour	en
heal.type	journalArticle	en
heal.identifier.primary	10.1016/j.jhydrol.2005.02.030	en
heal.identifier.secondary	http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2005.02.030	en
heal.language	English	en
heal.publicationDate	2006	en
heal.abstract	It is demonstrated that a simple deterministic model in discrete time can reproduce the scaling behaviour of hydroclimatic processes at timescales coarser than annual, a behaviour more widely known in hydrology as the Hurst phenomenon. This toy model is based on a generalised `chaotic tent map', which may be considered as the compound result of a positive and a negative feedback mechanism, and involves two degrees of freedom. The model is not a realistic representation of a climatic system, but rather a radical simplification of real climatic dynamics. However, its simplicity helps understand the physical mechanisms that cause the scaling behaviour and simultaneously enables easy implementation and convenient experimentation. Application of the toy model gives traces that can resemble historical time series of hydroclimatic variables, such as temperature and river flow. In particular, such traces exhibit scaling behaviour with a Hurst coefficient greater than 0.5 and their statistical properties are similar to that of observed time series. Moreover, application demonstrates that large-scale synthetic `climatic' fluctuations (like upward or downward trends) can emerge without any specific reason and their evolution is unpredictable, even when they are generated by this simple fully deterministic model with only two degrees of freedom. Thus, the model emphasises the large uncertainty associated with the scaling behaviour, rather than enhances the prediction capability, despite the simple deterministic dynamics it uses, which obviously, are only a caricature of the much more complex dynamics of the real climatic system. (c) 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.	en
heal.publisher	ELSEVIER SCIENCE BV	en
heal.journalName	Journal of Hydrology	en
dc.identifier.doi	10.1016/j.jhydrol.2005.02.030	en
dc.identifier.isi	ISI:000237768100004	en
dc.identifier.volume	322	en
dc.identifier.issue	1-4	en
dc.identifier.spage	25	en
dc.identifier.epage	48	en