The Effects of the Non-Climatic Inhomogeneities in Surface Weather Station Records on Long Term Trends in Canadian Fire Weather Index System Codes.
Abstract
With a wide interest in the effects of climate change on forest fire regimes, there has been a proliferation of studies analyzing the past fire weather trends using daily surface weather stations data. However, not all studies take account of such data's inherent inconsistencies (inhomogeneities) from non-climatic influences. This study shows their influence on the linear trends in the Canadian Forest Fire Weather Index System (CFFWIS) codes, commonly used as a fire weather proxies worldwide. Trend significance of up to 50\% of the Canadian weather stations considered was affected if computed using the homogenized data instead of the raw inhomogeneous records. Duff Moisture Code (DMC) is the most resistant to weather record inhomogeneities, followed by the Drought Code (DC). Monthly Drought Code (MDC) is recommended as an optimal fire weather proxy for long term analysis, as monthly data homogenization produces results that are superior to daily data homogenization.
Description
Keywords
Ecology
Citation
Tsinko, Y. (2016). The Effects of the Non-Climatic Inhomogeneities in Surface Weather Station Records on Long Term Trends in Canadian Fire Weather Index System Codes. (Master's thesis, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada). Retrieved from https://prism.ucalgary.ca. doi:10.11575/PRISM/28120