Research from University of Southampton Highlights Climate Change Paradox with Intensifying Monsoon Winds in Northwest India
Stronger monsoon winds are contributing to a climate change contradiction in northwest regions of India, according to new research led by the University of Southampton.
Scientists have found that there has been a “surprising” 40 per cent increase in summer monsoon rainfall over northwest India – a typically semi-arid region – in the last decade, compared to the 1980s.
Ligin Joseph , postgraduate researcher in Ocean and Earth Science at the University of Southampton, and lead author of the research paper, said: “The 40 per cent increase in summer monsoon rains came as a surprise to us, as it contradicts the widely accepted narrative that global warming is leading to dry regions becoming drier and wet regions becoming wetter. Here, we have the opposite.”
The Indian Meteorological Department recorded above-normal rainfall in northwest India, including the states of Delhi, Gujarat and Rajasthan, during the recently concluded monsoon season.
The research team, which included collaborators at the National Oceanography Centre and at IIT Bhubaneswar , has linked the unexpected phenomenon to stronger monsoon winds causing more evaporation over the Indian Ocean and, therefore, an increase in moisture being carried from the Arabian Sea, in the northern Indian Ocean, to northwest India.
Mr Joseph explained: “Our study attributes the strengthening of the monsoon winds to the rapid warming of the Indian Ocean and the enhanced Pacific Ocean trade winds – both of which are heavily fed by climate change and global warming.”
The study’s findings have implications for rainfall predictions in India in the future. The Clausius-Clapeyron relation states that the water-holding capacity of the air increases by seven per cent per degree of global warming.
“Our findings suggest that future changes in India’s precipitation patterns will largely hinge on shifts in monsoon atmospheric circulation,” concluded Mr Joseph.