North German Climate Office | Umweltbundesamt

The climate calculations used come predominantly from the German climate research centre's data archive, databases from EU projects on regional climate change (e.g. PRUDENCE) and the archive on coastal climate at the GKSS Institute for Coastal Research. Information about past and possible future climate change in Northern Germany can be taken from these climate calculations.

The different climate projections used are created using the RCAO (Rossby Centre, Sweden), REMO, CLM and WETTREG regional climate models. This is done using the two IPCC emission scenarios (SRES) A2 and B2, which are based on the following assumptions: The A2 scenario is a pessimistic scenario and anticipates a tripling of the pre-industrial level of atmospheric CO2 concentration by the end of the 21st Century. It describes a very heterogeneous world, with rapid economic growth but a lack of rapid innovations in the area of clean technology. The B2 scenario is slightly more optimistic, predicting only a doubling of CO2 concentrations. It also describes a heterogeneous world, but on in which the focus is on local solutions for sustainable action in terms of the economy and the environment.

The regional climate models contain the required information about large-scale atmospheric circulation from the two global climate models from the Hadley Centre Model (HadAM3H) and the Hamburg Max Planck Institute for Meteorology (ECHAM4/OPYC3).

The "Northern German climate atlas" was developed for this purposes to provide information about the current state of research on possible future climate change in Northern Germany. In this atlas, users can retrieve climate variables (temperature, precipitation, humidity etc.), periods (near future: 2011-2040, mid-21st Century: 2041-2070 and late 21st Century: 2071-2100) and information on changes as an annual average or in individual seasons, and represent this information in the form of maps. The climate atlas can be accessed online.

snow coverage

The following climate effects are studied for Northern Germany:

• Storms: Winter storms could become 3 to 7% stronger, with effects for the offshore sector, power generation and insurance;
• Sea level rises and storm floods: High storm floods could become more frequent, reach 60 to 80 cm higher and last longer, with effects for dyke building / coastal protection, urban planning and disaster protection;
• Dry periods and heat waves: In summer, 25 to 40% less rain could fall, heat records could be around 2.5 to 5°C warmer, winters could be 2 to 4°C warmer, with effects for agriculture, disaster protection and water supply;
• Heavy precipitation and flooding: The number of rainy days in summer could decrease, 20 to 45% more precipitation could fall in winter, more heavy precipitation and more precipitation could occur, with effects for disaster protection, urban planning and insurance.

Supporting decision making processes for adaptation to climate change with information and communication.

The flood of messages in the public climate debate makes it hard to distinguish genuine scientific knowledge from public discussion. The discussion often takes on a life of its own and unscientific data analyses and inadequate knowledge and evaluation can lead to incorrect assessments. In decision making processes, this can lead to huge bad investments when adaptations to climate change have to be financed. The Northern German climate office is aiming to provide a non-specialist professional audience confronted with climate change with understandable information about climate change in Northern Germany. These include climate calculation methods and assumptions in the context of climate change, as well as information about what is meant by "uncertainty" in climate research. This is intended to make it easier for users to interpret and ultimately apply research results.

On the other hand, the climate office plays a role in bringing scientific issues from climate-sensitive areas into the academic debate. The first issue is to establish what knowledge and what type of information the user requires in order to act and plan for the future. This knowledge enables climate research to respond more effectively to needs.