Homogeneous climate risk zones in Brazil

Zonas de risco climático homogêneo no Brasil

ABSTRACT

Brazil has a heterogeneous climate throughout its territory which makes it difficult to outline a single climate risk management strategy. However, this unification can occur within sub-regions that present homogeneous climatic risk. In this context, the aim of this study was to delineate homogeneous climate risk zones in Brazil. For this we used monthly precipitation data for the Brazilian territory provided by the Global Precipitation Climatology Center. These time series were standardized using the Standard Precipitation Index and then their homogeneous clusters were defined using the K-means method. In addition, the joint variability patterns between the clusters’ centroid time series and high- and low-frequency climate variability modes were evaluated using Cross-Wavelet Analysis. The analyses carried out enabled the delineation of 7 homogeneous climate risk zones in Brazil, which showed different variability patterns and were modulated differently by the climate variability modes assessed.

Keywords:
Climate risk; SPI; K-Means; Cross-wavelet analysis; Climate indices