Rapid attribution of extreme events in Canada
Date
2026
Authors
Gillett, Nathan
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC)
Abstract
In recent years, Canada has experienced a number of impactful extreme events, such as the 2021 BC heatwave, which was the deadliest natural disaster on record in Canada, and the 2021 BC floods, which were the costliest natural disaster on record in BC. Quantification of the influence of human-induced climate change on the probability of such extreme events can help inform climate change adaptation and public understanding of the effects of climate change, and such information is much more impactful if available shortly after an event. This has prompted Environment and Climate Change Canada to develop a rapid event attribution system for extreme events in Canada. The system runs automatically on a daily basis and provides information on the human influence on hot extremes, cold extremes and precipitation extremes for extreme events across Canada shortly after they are observed. This talk will describe the current event attribution system, based on existing CMIP6 coupled climate model simulations, and describe its extension to higher resolution atmosphere model simulations using Canadian climate and weather predictions models, which will allow the better representation of impactful phenomena such as atmospheric rivers and post-tropical cyclones. Examples of results for recent extreme events in BC will also be presented.
Description
Keywords
PCIC seminar, #video recording, Canadian Centre for Climate Modelling and Analysis (CCCma), Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC)