South Asian Monsoon Climate Change Projections

Abstract

The Monsoons have always been a focus of great interest to CLIVAR, and this was further enhanced in 2015 when there was a reorganization of monsoon research efforts within the World Climate Research Programme (WCRP). Prior to 2015, CLIVAR used to have three separate regional panels on the topic, each focused on a specific geographical area dominated by monsoons: the Americas, Africa, and the Asian-Australian region. However, it has been recognized that the monsoons around the globe have many common elements and that overall progress in our scientific understanding of the monsoons would benefit from an active interaction of individuals and groups that study these various regional monsoons. Furthermore, the efforts of the Global Water and Energy Exchanges (GEWEX) project of the WCRP are highly relevant to the terrestrial and hydro-thermodynamic aspects of monsoons. As a result, a single Monsoons Panel spanning both CLIVAR and GEWEX was formed with membership drawn from both communities. To highlight this milestone, a special issue of the CLIVAR Exchanges magazine focusing on the monsoons was produced (see http://clivar.org/documents/exchanges-66). At the same time, the International CLIVAR Monsoon Project Office (ICMPO) was established at the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (IITM) of the Ministry of Earth Sciences under an agreement between WCRP and IITM approved by the Government of India. ICMPO has since been providing dedicated support to the activities of the Monsoons Panel.