Abstract
In a medium-sized country (area 104–105 km2) horizontal climatic variations are smaller and less important than time variability, a fact often neglected in standard texts and tables. Extreme months, seasons and years are often responsible for scarcity of food (and thus high prices), cause high demands of water or energy supply and many economic disruptions. The frequency of such events varies with time and distance, expressed in statistical terms like variance, standard deviation or interannual variability. For selected European stations and areas running 30-year averages of long records (temperature, precipitation, runoff and water budget terms) are given, together with similar values of interannual variability. In general terms, high interannual variability occurred during the early 19th century, i.e. in the final phase of the “Little Ice Age”; in some areas (not all) low variability was observed during the early 20th century. 30-year seasonal averages of rainfall vary by 20–25 percent, in the Mediterranean by 30–50 percent. The interannual variability varies substantially with time.
Anomalies of temperature, precipitation, pressure (resp. geopotential) and wind are not only mutually correlated, they are also rather distinctly correlated in the space domain. Bjerknes and Namias investigated the possible use of sea-surface temperatures to understand the physical mechanism of extreme anomalies; in this case the autocorrelation often remains significant for periods up to 6–9 months, and large-scale teleconnections such as the “Southern Oscillation” or the Walker circulation have demonstrated unexpected and promising results. Examples of such teleconnections within the tropics and between different climatic belts are presented.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Abel, W.: 1966, Agrarkrisen and Agrarkonjunktur. 2. Auflage. Parey, Hamburg, Berlin 290 pp.
Abel, W.: 1974, Massenarmut und Hungerkrisen im vorindustriellen Europa. Parey, Hamburg, Berlin, 427 pp.
Baur, F.: 1975, Beil. Berliner Wetterkarte 24.6. 1975.
Berlage, H.P.: 1966, Med. Verh. Kon. Nederl. Meteor. Inst. 88.
Bjerknes, J.: 1969, Monthly Weather Review 97, pp. 163–172.
Bourke, A.: 1981, Chapter 6 in “Whither Climate Now?” (ed. H. Flohn, R. Fantechi, in press).
Caviedes, C.: 1973, Proc. Assoc. Amer. Geographers 5, pp. 44–49.
Craddock, J.M., Wales-Smith, B.G.: 1977, Meteor. Mag. 106, pp. 97–111.
Doberitz, R.: 1968, 1969, Bonner Meteor. Abhandl. 8 and 11.
Eickermann, W., Flohn, H.: 1962, Bonner Meteor. Abhandl. 1.
Elsas, M.: 1936, 1940, Umriß einer Geschichte der Preise and Löhne in Deutschland. 2 Bände, Leiden.
Fleer, H.: 1981, Bonner Meteor. Abhand1. 26.
Flohn, H,: 1973, Naturwissenschaften 60, pp. 340–348.
Flohn, H.: 1974, Ann. Meteor. N.F. 9, pp. 25–31.
Flohn, H.: 1975, Bonner Meteor. Abhandl. 21.
Flohn, H.: 1981, in: “Climate and History”, Symposium Norwich (in print).
Flohn, H., Nicholson, Sh.: 1980, Palaeoecology of Africa 12, pp. 3–21.
Flohn, H., Rodewald, M.: 1975, Beil. Berliner Wetterkarte 17. 17. 7. 1975.
Hastenrath, St., Heller, L.: 1977, Quart. Journ. Roy. Meteor. Soc. 103, pp. 77–92.
Hastenrath, St., Lamb, P.M.: 1978, Heat budget Atlas of the Tropical Atlantic and Eastern Pacific Oceans. Madison, Wisc.
Henning, D., Flohn, H.: 1980, Contrib. Atmos. Phys. 53, pp. 430–441.
Hoskins, W.G.: 1964, 1968, Agricult. Hist. Review 12, pp. 28–46; 16, pp. 15–31.
Lamb, H.H.: 1977, Climate, Present, Past and Future. Methuen, London Vol. I I.
Lamb, H.H.: 1979, Quatern. Res. 11, pp. 1–20.
Manley, G.: 1974, Quart. Journ. Roy. Meteor. Soc. 100, pp. 389–405.
Markham, C.G., McLain, D.R.: 1977, Nature 265, PP. 320–323.
Namias, J.: 1968, Bull. Amer. Meteor. Soc. 49, PP. 438–470.
Namias, J.: 1970, 1974, Journ. Geophys. Res. 75, PP. 565–582, 5952–5955, 79, PP. 797–798.
Namias, J.: 1972, Tellus 24, pp. 336–343.
Namias, J.: 1975, Short Period Climatic Variations. Collected Works 1934–1974, 2 Vol. San Diego.
Neumann, J.: 1977, Bull. Amer. Meteor. Soc. 58, pp. 163–168.
Nicholson, Sh.: 1979, 1980, Monthly Weather Review 107, pp.620–623; 108, pp. 473–487.
Nicholson, Sh.: 1980a, in M.A.J. Williams, H. Faure: The Sahara and the Nile. Balkema, Rotterdam, pp. 173–200.
Oeschger, H., Messerli, B., Svilar, M.: 1980, Das Klima. Analysen und Modelle, Geschichte und Zukunft. Springer Verlag Berlin, Heidelberg, 296 pp.
Pfister, Chr.: 1975, Beiheft 2, Jahrb. Geogr. Ges. Bern.
Post, J.D.: 1977, The Last Great Subsistence Crisis in the Western World. Baltimore.
Ramaswamy, C., Pareek, R.S.: 1978, Tellus 30, pp. 126–135.
Ratcliffe, R.A.S. et al.: 1978, Quart. Journ. Roy. Meteor. Soc. 104, pp. 243–255.
Rauner, Yu. L.: 1979, Paper USSR-USA Symposium on Climate Modelling, Climate Change and Statistics, Tbilisi (USSR).
Riehl, H. et al.: 1979, Monthly Weather Review 107, pp. 1546–1553.
Schuurmans, C., Flohn, H.: 1981, Chapter 3 in: “Whither Climate Now?” (eds. H. Flohn, R. Fantechi, in press.)
Takahashi, K., Yoshino, M.M. (Eds.): 1978, Climatic Change and Food Production. Univ. of Tokyo Press, XI + 433 pp.
Titow, J.: 1960, Econ. Hist. Reviews 12, pp. 360–407.
Titow, J.: 1970, Annales Econ. Soc. Civil. 25, pp. 312–350.
van Loon, H., Rogers, J.C.: 1978, Monthly Weather Review 106, pp. 296–310.
Verlinden, C.: 1965, Dokumenten voor de Geschiedenis von Prijzen en Lonen in Vlaanderen en Brabant, Deel I I.
Wacker, U.: 1979, Dipl. Thesis. Bonn.
Wang Shao, Zhao Zengci: 1981, “Climate and History”, Symposium Norwich (in print).
Wigley, T.M.L., Atkinson, T.C.: 1977, Nature 265, PP. 431–434.
Winstanley, D.: 1973, Nature 243, pp. 464–465; 245, pp. 110–114.
Yamamoto, T.: 1971, Geophys. Mag. 35, pp. 187–206.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 1981 D. Reidel Publishing Company, Dordrecht, Holland
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Flohn, H. (1981). Climatic Variability and Coherence in Time and Space. In: Bach, W., Pankrath, J., Schneider, S.H. (eds) Food-Climate Interactions. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-8563-6_19
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-8563-6_19
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-90-277-1354-4
Online ISBN: 978-94-009-8563-6
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive