CHELSA-TraCE21k – 1km climate timeseries since the LGM

Long term, transient climate data at 1km resolution since the LGM.

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CHELSA-TraCE21k v1.0: Technical documentation

Karger, D.N., Nobis, M.P., Normand, S., Graham, C.H., Zimmermann, N. (2023) CHELSA-TraCE21k – High resolution (1 km) downscaled transient temperature and precipitation data since the Last Glacial Maximum. Climate of the Past. https://doi.org/10.5194/cp-2021-30

Karger, D. N., Nobis, M. P., Normand, S., Graham, C. H., Zimmermann, N. E. (2020). CHELSA-TraCE21k: Downscaled transient temperature and precipitation data since the last glacial maximum. EnviDat. https://www.doi.org/10.16904/envidat.211.

CHELSA-TraCE21k data provides monthly climate data for temperature and precipitation at 30 arcsec spatial resolution in 100-yeartime steps for the last 21,000 years. Paleo orography at high spatial resolution and at each timestep is created by combining high resolution information on glacial cover from current and Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) glacier databases with the interpolation of a dynamic ice sheet model (ICE6G) and a coupling to mean annual temperatures from CCSM3-TraCE21k. Based on the reconstructed paleo orography, mean annual temperature and precipitation was downscaled using the CHELSA V1.2 algorithm.

Mean annual near surface air temperature for time periods before present (BP) that showed exceptional climate dynamics in the northern Atlantic region, from the CHELSA_TraCE21k model. The interpolated extent of the glaciers at each time step is shown as shaded black polygons. The approximated coast lines are delineated in white. The last glacial maximum is shown for 22k-BP. The Heinrich I event, during which the northern Atlantic was actually colder compared to the LGM, is shown in 16.6k-BP. The extreme warming at the Bølling-Allerød is evident from the comparison of 14.7k-BP, shortly before the onset-, and 14.3k-BP, the maximum of the Bølling-Allerød warming. The middle of the Younger Dryas cold period is shown at 12.2k-BP. The 8.2 kiloyear event is shown at 8.2k-BP