@Article{PintoJśniorPint:2020:LiChRe,
               author = "Pinto J{\'u}nior, Osmar and Pinto, Iara Regina Cardoso de 
                         Almeida",
          affiliation = "{Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas Espaciais (INPE)} and {Instituto 
                         Nacional de Pesquisas Espaciais (INPE)}",
                title = "Lightning changes in response to global warming in Rio de Janeiro, 
                         Brazil",
              journal = "American Journal of Climate Change",
                 year = "2020",
               volume = "9",
               number = "3",
                pages = "266--273",
             keywords = "Lightning, Global Change, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.",
             abstract = "Physical concepts based on the Clausius-Clapeyron relation and on 
                         the thermodynamics and aerosol characteristics associated with 
                         updrafts, global climate models assuming different 
                         parametrizations and lightning-related output variables, and 
                         lightning-related data (thunderstorm days) are being used to infer 
                         the lightning incidence in a warmer planet, motivated by the 
                         global warming observed. In all cases, there are many gaps to be 
                         overcome making the lightning response to the global temperature 
                         increase still unpredicted. Values from almost 0% (no increase) to 
                         100% have been estimated, being 10% the most common value. While 
                         the physical concepts address only part of the problem and the 
                         global climate models need to make many simple assumptions, 
                         lightning-relate data have strong time and space limitations. In 
                         this context, any new evidence should be considered as an 
                         important contribution to better understand how will be the 
                         lightning incidence in the future. In this article, we described 
                         new results about the occurrence of thunderstorms from 1850 to 
                         2010 (a period of 160 years) in the city of Rio de Janeiro, in the 
                         Southeast of Brazil. During this period thunderstorm days were 
                         recorded in the same location, making this time series one of the 
                         longest series of this type available worldwide. The data support 
                         an increase of 21% in the mean annual thunderstorm days during the 
                         period, while surface temperature increased by 0.6°C during the 
                         period. Considering that the mean annual number of thunderstorm in 
                         the beginning of this period was 29, we found an increase of one 
                         thunderstorm day per 0.1°C of increase in the surface temperature. 
                         Assuming that the number of lightning flashes per thunderstorm 
                         remains approximately constant during the period, this number 
                         corresponds to an increase in the lightning flash rate of 
                         approximately 35% per °C of increase of temperature. In addition, 
                         considering that the increase of the global temperature during the 
                         period was almost the same that observed in Rio de Janeiro, we can 
                         conclude that this increase in the lightning flash rate is due to 
                         the global warming with no effect of urban activity. Finally, we 
                         found that monthly thunderstorm days and monthly mean surface 
                         temperature show a linear correlation with a coefficient of 0.9 
                         along the period.",
                  doi = "10.4236/ajcc.2020.93017",
                  url = "http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/ajcc.2020.93017",
                 issn = "2167-9495 and 2167-9509",
             language = "en",
           targetfile = "pinto_lightning.pdf",
        urlaccessdate = "27 abr. 2024"
}