Climate projections of temperature and precipitation obtained by statistical downscaling models over Italian regions

The aim of the present work is the assessment of seasonal climate change scenarios of minimum, maximum temperature and precipitation over five italian regions, for the period 2021-2050 with respect to 1961-1990. The regions are those selected within the Agroscenari project, namely: the Po Valley, Marche, Beneventano, Destra Sele and Oristano. In order to achieve this goal a statistical downscaling technique applied to ENSEMBLES global climate simulations, A l B scenario, has been developed at ARPA-SIMC. The statistical downscaling models have been constructed using: large-scale fields derived from ERA40 re-analysis, 1959-2002 period, and the observed daily gridded data of temperature and precipitation that belong to CRA-CMA, 1951-2009 period. The results show that an increase, around I.5°C, couid be expected to occur under A lB scenario conditions in ali seasons, in both minimum and maximum temperature. As regards precipitation, the signal is more complex and varies in function of season and region.