JOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH: ATMOSPHERES, VOL. 118, 3053–3065, doi:10.1002/jgrd.50258, 2013

Monsoons in a changing world: A regional perspective in a
global context
Akio Kitoh,1 Hirokazu Endo,1 K. Krishna Kumar,2 Iracema F. A. Cavalcanti,3Prashant Goswami,4 and Tianjun Zhou5
Received 15 September 2012; revised 8 February 2013; accepted 11 February 2013; published 19 April 2013.

[1] We provide a new view of global and regional monsoonal rainfall, and their changes in
the 21st century under RCP4.5 and RCP8.5 scenarios as projected by 29 climate models
that participated in the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project phase 5. The model results
show that the global monsoon area deﬁned by the annual range in precipitation is projected
to expand mainly over the central to eastern tropical Paciﬁc, the southern Indian Ocean,and eastern Asia. The global monsoon precipitation intensity and the global monsoon total
precipitation are also projected to increase. Indices of heavy precipitation are projected toincrease much more than those for mean precipitation. Over the Asian monsoon domain,
projected changes in extreme precipitation indices are larger than over other monsoon
domains, indicating the strong sensitivity of Asian monsoon to global warming. Over theAmerican and African monsoon regions, projected future changes in mean precipitation are
rather modest, but those in precipitation extremes are large. Models project that monsoon
retreat dates will delay, while onset dates will either advance or show no change, resulting
in lengthening of the monsoon season. However, models’ limited ability to reproduce thepresent monsoon climate and the large scatter among the model projections limit the
conﬁdence in the results. The projected increase of the global monsoon precipitation can be
attributed to an increase of moisture convergence due to increased surface evaporation andwater vapor in the air column although offset to a certain extent by the weakening of themonsoon circulation.
Citation: Kitoh, A., H. Endo, K. Krishna Kumar, I. F. A. Cavalcanti, P. Goswami, and T. Zhou (2013), Monsoons in achanging world: A regional perspective in a global context, J. Geophys. Res. Atmos., 118, 3053–3065, doi:10.1002/jgrd.50258.

1. Introduction[2] The monsoon is conventionally deﬁned as a seasonal
reversal of prevailing surface winds, driven by the seasonal
cycle of solar heating and difference in thermal inertias ofland and ocean that establish a land-sea temperature
difference [Webster and coauthors, 1998]. This large-scalewind reversal creates favorable conditions for the occurrenceof convection in the summer hemisphere. As the monsoon
season matures, latent heat released by convection highabove the land surface helps to draw additional moisture overthe land from nearby oceans, maintaining the wet season.

1

Meteorological Research Institute, Tsukuba, Ibaraki, Japan.
Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology, Pune, India.
Center for Weather Forecasting and Climate Studies (CPTEC), National
Institute for Space Research (INPE), Cachoeira Paulista, SP, Brazil.
4
CSIR Centre for Mathematical Modelling and Computer Simulations(C-MMACS), Bangalore, India.
5
LASG, Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences,
Beijing, China.
2
3

Corresponding author: A. Kitoh, Climate Research Department, Meteorological Research Institute, 1-1 Nagamine, Tsukuba, Ibaraki 305-0052, Japan.
(kitoh@mri-jma.go.jp)©2013. American Geophysical Union. All Rights Reserved.
2169-897X/13/10.1002/jgrd.50258

Monsoons are responsible for the majority of summer rainfall
within the tropics, where billions of people depend on the
monsoon-related rainfall. Patterns of projected global-scalechanges in the surface temperatures are robust among models,with greater warming over land than over ocean and at mosthigh latitudes [Meehl and coauthors, 2007]. Therefore, theland-sea temperature contrast is projected to become larger
in summer, together with ample moisture available in a
warming world, leading to a more intense monsoon. However,in spite of their common basic mechanism, monsoons overdifferent regions are subject to diverse forcing; thus the
responses of the various regional monsoons to a changing
climate are expected to vary [Meehl et al., 2007; Turner andAnnamalai, 2012].
[3] The monsoon region is distributed over all the tropicalcontinents, and over the tropical oceans in the western North
Paciﬁc, eastern North Paciﬁc, and the southern Indian Ocean[Wang and Ding, 2006]. Although the American monsoons
are not characterized by a seasonal reversal of wind, there
are large differences in precipitation, humidity, andatmospheric circulation between summer and winter [Veraand coauthors, 2006; Raia and Cavalcanti, 2008; Marengo
and coauthors, 2010]. While different indices have beenused to identify the lifecycle of monsoons, the deﬁnition of
the monsoon in terms of the precipitation characteristics[Wang and LinHo, 2002; Wang and Ding, 2006] rather than3053

KITOH ET AL.: GLOBAL MONSOONS IN CMIP5 MODELS

the wind reversal, permits the use of similar monsoon indices for all the monsoon regions (keeping in mind that rainfall
is the lifeline for billions of people living there). Thus, froma global point of view, precipitation characteristics overSouth Asia, East Asia, Australia, Africa, and the Americas
can be viewed as an integrated global monsoon system, associated with a global-scale persistent atmospheric overturning
circulation [Trenberth et al., 2000]. Wang and Ding [2008]
have demonstrated that the global monsoon is the dominantmode of the annual variation of the tropical circulation,
characterizing the seasonality of the tropical climate.
[4] Examination of historical precipitation records overthe monsoon regions around the globe reveals a decreasing
trend in the global land monsoon precipitation over the last
half of the 20th century (1948–2003), with primary contributions from a weakening of the summer monsoon systems in
the Northern Hemisphere (NH) [Wang and Ding, 2006;
Ramesh and Goswami, 2007; Zhou et al., 2008b]. Changes
in both the monsoon area and monsoon intensity contributeto this decreasing tendency [Zhou et al., 2008a]. However,the combined (oceanic and land) monsoon precipitation
has increased for the more recent 1979–2008 epoch mainly
due to a signiﬁcant upward trend in the NH summer
monsoon precipitation [Wang et al., 2012]. When thechange in monsoon-affected domain is considered, thefractional increase in monsoon area is greater than in total
precipitation, so that the ratio of these two measures (which
serves as an index of the global monsoon intensity) exhibitsa decreasing trend for the most recent 30 year (1979–2008)
period [Hsu et al., 2011].
[5] Kim et al. [2008] investigated the reproducibility of
global monsoon climate variability simulated by the coupled
global climate models (CGCM) that participated in the
Coupled Model Intercomparison Project phase 3 (CMIP3).
They found that the CMIP3 CGCM multimodel ensemble
simulates a reasonably realistic climatology of the global
monsoon precipitation and circulation, but models have common biases such as a northeastward shift of the Intertropical
Convergence Zone (ITCZ) over the tropical North Paciﬁc.
Kim et al. [2008] also pointed out that models with higher
resolution generally reproduced a better spatial pattern of the
global monsoon precipitation compared to lower-resolution
models. Hsu et al. [2012] investigated global monsoon
area and precipitation in the late 21st century using threehigh-resolution atmospheric GCMs (40 km MPI ECHAM5,
20 km MRI/JMA, and 50 km GFDL HiRAM) that were forcedby different future sea surface temperature (SST) warming
patterns. They found a consistent increase in the global
monsoon area, precipitation, and intensity among the model
projections.
[6] Recently, many climate modeling groups aroundthe world have participated in the Coupled Model
Intercomparison Project phase 5 (CMIP5), under which aseries of experiments including the 20th century historicalsimulation and 21st century climate projections with four
different representative concentration pathway (RCP)
scenarios were performed [Taylor et al., 2012]. There isevidence that the CMIP5 models are better than the CMIP3
models in simulating the Asian-Australian monsoon system.
Several works [Li et al., 2012; Sperber et al., 2012] havereported that the CMIP5 multimodel mean is more skillfulthan the CMIP3 multimodel mean; however, the CMIP5

models’ simulation of El Niño-Southern Oscillation-monsoon
relationships is still found to be poor (correlation is too weak).
Lee and Wang [2012] and Hsu et al. [2013] found an increaseof global monsoon area and precipitation intensity under the
RCP4.5 scenario in CMIP5 model simulations of futurechanges in the global monsoon. These results are essentiallyconsistent with CMIP3 model results [Hsu et al., 2012,2013] but with some regional differences [Lee and Wang,2012]. The objective of this paper is to provide an updated
view of global and regional monsoonal rainfall and changes
in the 21st century as projected by 29 CMIP5 models under
the RCP4.5 and RCP8.5 scenarios: our analysis includes not
only mean precipitation but also some precipitation extreme
indices and monsoon seasonality changes for seven landmonsoon regions across the world.

2. Data
2.1. Global Climate Model Data
[7] Table 1 lists the models used in our analysis. We usedmonthly mean data from 29 CMIP5 models and daily
precipitation data from 21 CMIP5 models. Results from
historical (1986–2005), RCP4.5 (2080–2099), and RCP8.5(2080–2099) experiments were investigated. Only one
ensemble member from each model was used. The gridsquares where the land fraction exceeds 10% were regarded
as land area in the analysis. Further information on theexperiments and the models is available from the CMIP5
web site (http://cmip-pcmdi.llnl.gov/cmip5/).
2.2. Observed Precipitation Data for Validation[8] We used Climate Prediction Center Merged Analysis
of Precipitation (CMAP) [Xie and Arkin, 1997], Global
Precipitation Climatology Project (GPCP) [Huffman et al.,2009], Climatic Research Unit Time-Series 3.1 (updated
from Mitchell and Jones [2005]), Global Precipitation
Climatology Centre Full Reanalysis version 6 (GPCC v.6)
(updated from Rudolf et al. [1994]), Variability Analysis ofSurface Climate Observations (GPCC-VASClimO) [Becket al., 2005], GPGP One-Degree Daily data (GPCP 1DD)
Version 1.2 [Huffman et al., 2001], and Tropical Rainfall
Measuring Mission (TRMM) 3B42 product in version 6[Huffman et al., 2007]. Note that GPCC-VASClimO is
gridded data (0.5 degrees  0.5 degrees) designed forclimate variability and trend studies, based on timeseries of 9343 stations covering at least 90% of the period
1951–2000. All the observational data were ﬁrst regridded
onto a common 2.5 degree  2.5 degree resolution(but GPCP 1DD and TRMM 3B42 were regridded onto
2.0 degree  2.0 degree resolution).
2.3. Deﬁnition of Monsoon Domains, Onset, Retreat,and Duration[9] A monsoon domain is deﬁned where the annual rangeof precipitation exceeds 2.5 mm d–1, based on the deﬁnitionof Wang et al. [2011]. Here the annual range is deﬁned as
the difference between the May-September (MJJAS) mean
and the November-March (NDJFM) mean. Monsoon onset
date, retreat date, and its duration are determined using thecriteria proposed by Wang and LinHo [2002] utilizing only
precipitation data. Based on the regionally averaged relative climatological mean daily precipitation, which is the difference

3054

KITOH ET AL.: GLOBAL MONSOONS IN CMIP5 MODELS
Table 1. List of CMIP5 Models Used in This Study
Model IDACCESS1-0
ACCESS1-3
bcc-csm1-1
CanESM2
CCSM4
CESM1-BGC
CESM1-CAM5
CNRM-CM5CSIRO-Mk3-6-0
FGOALS-g2
FGOALS-s2
GFDL-CM3
GFDL-ESM2G
GFDL-ESM2M
GISS-E2-R
HadGEM2-CC
HadGEM2-ES
INM-CM4
IPSL-CM5A-LR
IPSL-CM5A-MR
IPSL-CM5B-LR
MIROC-ESM
MIROC-ESM-CHEM
MIROC5MPI-ESM-LR
MPI-ESM-MR
MRI-CGCM3
NorESM1-M
NorESM1-ME

Institute ID

Country

CAWCR
CAWCR
BCC
CCCMA
NCAR
NCAR
NCAR
CNRM/CERFACSCSIRO/QCCCELASG/IAPLASG/IAP
GFDL
GFDL
GFDL
GISS
MOHC
MOHC
INM
IPSL
IPSL
IPSL
MIROC
MIROC
MIROC
MPI-M
MPI-M
MRI
NCC
NCC

Australia
Australia
China
CanadaUSA
USA
USA
FranceAustralia
China
China
USA
USA
USA
USA
UK
UK
RussiaFranceFranceFrance
Japan
Japan
Japan
Germany
GermanyJapan
NorwayNorwayHorizontal (Lon.  Lat.)
19214519214512864
12864288192288192288192256128
19296
1286012810814490144901449014490
1921451921451801209696
1441439696
12864
12864256128
19296
19296320160
1449614496

between the climatological daily precipitation and dry month(January in NH and July in the Southern Hemisphere (SH))
mean precipitation, the onset (retreat) date is deﬁned as thedate when the relative precipitation ﬁrst exceeds (last drops
below) 5 mm d–1, and the duration is deﬁned as their difference. The daily climatology of precipitation was deﬁned as
the sum of the ﬁrst 12 harmonics of daily average precipitation.
2.4. Extreme Precipitation Indices[10] We used four precipitation indices: average precipitation (Pav), simple precipitation daily intensity index (SDII),

1.8751.25
1.8751.25
T42
T63 (TL63)
1.250.942
1.250.942
1.250.942
TL127
T63
2.83.1
R42
2.52
2.52
2.52
2.52
1.8751.25
1.8751.25
21.5
3.751.895
2.51.268
3.751.895
T42
T42
T85
T63
T63
TL159
2.51.895
2.51.895

Monthly

Daily

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seasonal maximum 5 day precipitation total (R5d), andseasonal maximum consecutive dry days (CDD). Here SDII
is deﬁned as the total precipitation divided by the number ofdays with precipitation greater than or equal to 1 mm. R5d is
deﬁned as the seasonal maximum precipitation total in ﬁve
consecutive days. CDD is deﬁned as the seasonal maximum
number of consecutive dry days with precipitation less than
1 mm. These indices were calculated for the summer season(MJJAS in NH and NDJFM in SH). All the extreme precipitation indices for the models were at ﬁrst calculated for their
original grid, and then averaged over each monsoon domain.

Figure 1. Observed (thick contour) and simulated (shading) global monsoon domain, based on thedeﬁnition by Wang et al. [2011]. The observation is based on GPCP data, and the simulations are basedon 29 CMIP5 multimodel mean precipitation with a common 2.5 by 2.5 degree grid in the present-day(1986–2005) and the future (2080–2099; RCP8.5 scenario). Warm yellow (dark blue) shading: monsoon
domain only in the present-day (future). Blue shading: monsoon domain in the both periods.
3055

KITOH ET AL.: GLOBAL MONSOONS IN CMIP5 MODELS

3. Global Monsoon: Area and Intensity[11] Figure 1 shows the observed and simulated global
monsoon domains for the present climate. The multimodel
ensemble mean of 29 CMIP5 models generally reproduces
the observed global monsoon domain, although it tends tooverestimate the areal extent in the NH and underestimate
it in the SH, except in the African monsoon region(overestimate) and in North American monsoon region (underestimate). Models also have some difﬁculty in reproducing monsoon rainfall in East Asia. This underestimation of
monsoon domain in East Asia was pointed out by Kim etal. [2008] for the CMIP3 models, and is not improved muchin CMIP5 models.
[12] Changes in the global monsoon domain at the end of
the 21st century under RCP8.5 scenario are also demarcatedin Figure 1 with yellow and dark blue shadings, where
yellow shading denotes shrinkage and dark blue shading
denotes expansion of the monsoon domain, respectively.
The CMIP5 model projections show that global monsoon
area (GMA) expanding mainly over the central to eastern
tropical Paciﬁc, the southern Indian Ocean, and eastern Asia.
A small area that extends from northeastern South America
toward the ocean and another in the central tropical North
Atlantic could represent also an expansion of the SouthAmerican monsoon system and the tropical African
monsoon, although the models overestimate monsoon area
in northeastern South America. It is notable that thesouthwestern Japan and some part of the Korean peninsula,where the historical experiments underestimate precipitation
amount, become monsoon domains due to increased
precipitation in the RCP8.5 scenario.
[13] Figure 2 shows the scatter diagram of GMA and theglobal monsoon precipitation intensity (GMI) of two
observed data sets (GPCP and CMAP) and each of 29 models
for the present climate. Here GMI is the global monsoon

Figure 2. Scatter diagram between global monsoon area
(GMA) and global monsoon intensity (GMI; mm d–1) for
observations and simulations. GPCP and CMAP values areshown as crosses. The present-day (future) simulations are
displayed as closed circles, with plus signs for RCP4.5
future values and squares for RCP8.5). The large closed
circle, large plus sign and large square denote the 29 CMIP5
multimodel means. GMA is scaled by global surface area.

precipitation amount per unit area [Hsu et al., 2011]. The
observations themselves have about 10% uncertainty inestimating the GMA, with CMAP being larger than GPCP.
Differences in aspects of the global monsoon assessed using
GPCP and CMAP are discussed in Hsu et al. [2011]. Models
have large variability both in reproducing GMA and GMI, but
the multimodel ensemble closely matches the observations
although with a slight overestimation. The future projections
indicate larger values of GMA and GMI compared to present
values. This feature is summarized in Figure 3, where GMA,
GMI, and the global monsoon total precipitation (GMP) show
an increase in the RCP4.5 scenario and more so in the RCP8.5
scenario at the end of the 21st century. This feature is consistent with other analyses using CMIP5 models [Lee and Wang,2012; Hsu et al., 2012, 2013], and also similar to the ﬁndings
using earlier CMIP3 models [Hsu et al., 2012, 2013]. The
rates of change of GMA by the end of the 21st century compared with the present are –0.7, +5.4, and +9.4%(+0.4, +9.4, and +17.4%) for RCP4.5 (RCP8.5) at the 10th,
50th, and 90th percentiles, respectively. Almost all models
show an increase, and only 3 out of 29 models show a decreaseof GMA for RCP4.5, and two models for RCP8.5. Those twomodels are FGOALS-g2 and MIROC5 (as pointed out by Hsu
et al. [2013]), where both models project a large precipitation
decrease over the South Paciﬁc Convergence Zone and overthe Philippines Sea. This may be related to a projected
strong La Niña-like SST anomaly in FGOALS-g2 and alarge north-south hemispheric warming contrast in surface
temperature in MIROC5. Both models failed to generate
the western Paciﬁc monsoon in their historical simulations[Hsu et al., 2013].
[14] Figure 3 shows that the rates of change of GMI are –0.5, +3.6, and +4.9% (–0.2, +5.5, and +8.5%) and those for
GMP are –0.3, +9.0, and +12.6% (+4.9, +16.6, and +26.7%)
for RCP4.5 (RCP8.5) at the 10th, 50th, and 90th percentiles,
respectively. Based on the above multimodel results weconclude that monsoon-related precipitation is likely tosigniﬁcantly increase in a warmer climate.
[15] It is known that there is a linear relationship between
global temperature change and global precipitation change
among different models under one scenario and also among
different scenarios [Allen and Ingram, 2002]. However, thisFigure 3. Future change (%) in GMA, GMI, and global
monsoon total precipitation (GMP). Box-whisker plots inblue (red) are for the RCP4.5 (RCP8.5) scenario. The 10th,
25th, 50th, 75th, and 90th percentiles refer to 3rd, 8th,
15th, 22nd, and 27th values in ascending order among the
29 CMIP5 models, respectively.

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KITOH ET AL.: GLOBAL MONSOONS IN CMIP5 MODELS

is not the case for monsoon precipitation changes. Hsu et al.
2013 found no signiﬁcant linkage between the increase inglobal mean surface temperature and the GMP/GMI change
rates in CMIP5 models with the RCP4.5 scenario. The ratioof surface air temperature change between the present(1986–2005) and future (2080–2099) in RCP8.5 to that in
RCP4.5 is about 2.0. However, the ratio in GMI is far lessthan this value. No linkage between the temperature change
and the monsoon precipitation change is found in any
regional monsoon domain except for South Asia, where apositive correlation is found (not shown).
[16] Time series of summer precipitation anomalies overthe land global monsoon domain are displayed in Figure 4a.
Figures 4b and 4c show those for the NH land and SH land,
while Figure 4d is for the ocean-only parts of the global
monsoon domain. Previous results showed that the observed
global monsoon precipitation over land experienced a slightincreasing trend from 1900 through the early 1940s, then an
overall decreasing trend from the 1940s to the 1980s,
followed by a recovering trend until the present [e.g., Zhang
and Zhou, 2011; Hsu et al., 2011]. The different observed
data sets shown in Figure 4a support these ﬁndings. CMIP5
models are not able to reproduce the mid-20th century
maximum, but reproduce a gradual decline from the early
20th century until the 1980s, and project an increase

throughout the 21st century. The recent trend of global landsummer monsoon precipitation during 1985–2004 is +0.157
mm d–1 per 20 years in GPCP and +0.263 mm d–1 per 20
years in CMAP. The 29 CMIP5 models’ mean trend is+0.090 mm d–1 per 20 years, which is about a half of the observations, but the positive trend simulated by models is consistent in sign with the observed trend during this period.
However, regional-scale model-data comparisons of precipitation trends are difﬁcult because of various problems including model skill, nature variability, and uncertainty in the observations, although there have been some attempts to detectand attribute zonal mean precipitation trends [Zhang et al.,2007] and precipitation extremes at the hemispheric scale[Min et al., 2011].
[17] The CMIP5 multimodel mean shows a larger increaseof precipitation over the global land monsoon domain in the
RCP8.5 scenario than in the RCP4.5 scenario. As indicatedby the 10th and 90th percentile lines, model spread is quite
large (and larger in RCP8.5 than in RCP4.5). As shown in
Figures 4b and 4c, there is a clear contrast between NH
and SH. The decreasing trend observed in the land global
monsoon from the 1940s to the 1980s (Figure 4a) is evident
in the NH land monsoon domain. Future projected increases
are larger in NH than in SH as pointed out by Lee and Wang[2012]. The spread is larger over SH land than over NH

Figure 4. Time series of observed and simulated summer precipitation anomalies (%; 20 year runningmeans) relative to the base period average (1986–2005, except GPCC VASClimO (1986–2000)) for theland monsoon domain over (a) globe, (b) Northern Hemisphere, (c) Southern Hemisphere, and for(d) the ocean global monsoon domain. The monsoon domains deﬁned for the base period are ﬁxed forthe whole period. For the time series of simulations, Historical (grey), RCP4.5 (blue), and RCP8.5 (red)simulations by 29 CMIP5 model ensembles are shown in the 10th and 90th percentile (shading), and in
all model averages (thick lines). For the time series of observations, Climatic Research Unit Time-Series
3.1 (dark blue), and GPCC v.6 (deep green with solid line) are calculated using only grid boxes (2.5 degree
in lon./lat.) where at least one observation site exists for more than 80% of the target period (1921–2005).
GPCC VASClimO (light green), GPCC v.6 (deep green with dots), GPCP (black), and CMAP (black withdots) are calculated using all grids for the period (1901–2010 for GPCC v.6; 1951–2000 for GPCC
VASClimO; 1979–2010 for GPCP and CMAP).
3057

KITOH ET AL.: GLOBAL MONSOONS IN CMIP5 MODELS

land. Over NH land, more than 90% of models project anincrease of monsoon precipitation in the late 21st century
for both scenarios. Over the ocean monsoon domain,models simulate an increasing trend both in the 20th and21st centuries (Figure 4d). The differences in the rainfall
trends between RCP4.5 and RCP8.5 results are not statistically signiﬁcant, despite remarkable temperature differences
between the two scenarios, probably due to large variability
among the models.

4. Regional Aspects of Future Monsoon
Precipitation Changes
4.1. Validation of Regional Monsoons[18] Despite an overall projected trend toward increasing
global monsoon precipitation, the regional monsoons may

have different responses in terms of precipitation andcirculation features because the mechanisms at work may bedifferent [Cherchi et al., 2011]. Here we deﬁne seven monsoon regions: North America (NAM), South America(SAM), North Africa (NAF), South Africa (SAF), East Asia
(EAS), South Asia (SAS), and Australia (AUS) (see Figure 5afor each domain). Figure 5 compares the present-day climateof CMIP5 models against two observational data sets foraveraged precipitation (Pav), simple precipitation daily
intensity index (SDII), seasonal maximum 5 day precipitation
total (R5d), seasonal maximum consecutive dry days (CDD),
monsoon onset date (ONS), retreat date (RET), and duration(DUR) over each regional land monsoon domain. The crossand rectangle denote TRMM3B42 and GPCP 1DD, respectively, calculated from 2.0  2.0 degree regridded data during
the period 1998–2010. The extreme precipitation indices for

Figure 5. Validation of CMIP5 models against two observational data sets for (b) averaged precipitation(Pav), (c) simple precipitation daily intensity index (SDII), (d) seasonal maximum 5 day precipitation total(R5d), (e) seasonal maximum consecutive dry days (CDD), (f) monsoon onset date (ONS) and retreat date
(RET), and (g) duration (DUR) over each regional land monsoon domain, based on daily data withoriginal horizontal resolution from 21 CMIP5 models. Units are mm day–1 in Figures 5b and 5c, mm in
Figure 5c, and days in Figures 5e–5g. The crosses and triangles denote TRMM3B42 and GPCP1DD,
respectively, calculated from 2.0  2.0 degree regridded data during the period 1998–2010. Box-whisker
plots are for the historical simulation (1986–2005). The 10th, 25th, 50th, 75th, and 90th percentiles refer tothe 3rd, 6th, 11th, 16th, and 19th values in ascending order among the 21 models, respectively. All these
indices are calculated over land monsoon domains determined by each model for the summer season(NH: MJJAS, SH: NDJFM) for the present-day. As an example, the regional land monsoon domain basedon 21 multimodel mean precipitation in the present-day is shown in Figure 5a. For regional divisions, theequator separates the northern monsoon domains (EAS, NAM, NAF, and SAS) from the southernmonsoon domains (SAM, SAF, and AUS), 60 E separates NAF from SAS, and 20 N and 100 E separates
SAS from EAS. All the regional domains are within 40 S to 40 N.
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KITOH ET AL.: GLOBAL MONSOONS IN CMIP5 MODELS

the models are at ﬁrst calculated on their original gridand then averaged over the regional monsoon domains determined by each model.
[19] It is revealed that the CMIP5 models in their present-day
climate simulations reproduce the observations reasonably
well in various aspects of regional monsoon precipitation,although scatter among models is large and with some outliers.
For SAF, models systematically overestimate Pav, SDII, andR5d. For EAS, models underestimate Pav. These biases leadto overestimation or underestimation of regional monsoon
area in these regions, depending on the sign of bias (Figure 1).
Models tend to overestimate CDD except for NAF wheremodels underestimate CDD. In other regions, more than halfof the models are close to the observations of precipitationand its extremes.
[20] Monsoon seasonality (ONS, RET, and DUR) is more
difﬁcult to simulate. Only for NAM and AUS do models
reasonably well simulate ONS, RET, and DUR. For SAM,
simulated monsoon duration is longer than the observed due
to earlier onset and slightly later retreat. For NAF, scatter
among models is very large with earlier onset, later retreat
and longer duration. For SAF, earlier onset results in longer
duration. For EAS, models show earlier onset, while forSAS, later onset and earlier retreat result in shorter monsoon
duration. Therefore, based on analysis of the above regions
and variables, caution may be needed for interpretation of
the future projections presented below.
4.2. Change Ratio of Pav, SDII, R5d, and DD for Seven
Monsoon Regions Over Land[21] Figure 6 shows geographical distributions of futurechange ratios (%) in Pav, SDII, R5d, and CDD during local
summer season (MJJAS in NH; NDJFM in SH), based on 21
CMIP5 models. As with CMIP3 model results [Meehl andcoauthors, 2007], CMIP5 models show Pav increases inthe tropics and Pav decreases in the subtropics. Spatial
patterns of SDII and R5d generally agree with those ofPav, but over some areas, where Pav decreases such as over
the Mediterranean region and Central America, precipitation
intensity is projected to increase. CDD is projected toincrease over most tropical and subtropical regions except
for the equatorial Paciﬁc.
[22] Figure 7 shows change ratios (%) in Pav, SDII, R5d,
and CDD during local summer season over each of theregional land monsoon domains, as determined by eachmodel in the present-day climate. Table 2 shows the model

Figure 6. Future change ratio (%) for (a) averaged precipitation (Pav), (b) simple precipitation daily
intensity index (SDII), (c) seasonal maximum 5 day precipitation total (R5d), and (d) seasonal maximum
consecutive dry days (CDD) for the summer season (MJJAS in NH; NDJFM in SH), based on 21 CMIP5
model projections under the RCP8.5 scenario. Hatching denotes areas where the changes are statisticallysigniﬁcant at the 5% level.
3059

KITOH ET AL.: GLOBAL MONSOONS IN CMIP5 MODELS

Figure 7. As in Figure 5, except for future change ratio (%) for averaged precipitation (Pav), simple
precipitation daily intensity index (SDII), seasonal maximum 5 day precipitation total (R5d), and seasonal
maximum consecutive dry days (CDD) over (a) global land monsoon domain, and (b)-(h) each regional
land monsoon domain, based on daily data from 21 CMIP5 models. Box-whisker plots in blue (red) arefor the RCP4.5 (RCP8.5) scenario.

Table 2. Median (50th Percentile) Values of Precipitation Indices in Median (50th Percentile) Over Each Regional Land Monsoon
Domain. (a) Present-Day Climate Simulation. (b) Future Change. (c) Future Percentage Change (%)(a) Present-day climate
Pav

SDII

R5d

CDD

NAM
SAM
NAF
SAF
EAS
SAS
AUS

9.6
10.2
7.7
9.3
9.6
10.1
10.0

124.8
114.3
95.8
123.4
133.7
149.8
145.6

9.0
8.9
7.4
11.3
13.7
15.3
13.0

RCP4.5

RCP8.5

RCP4.5

RCP8.5

RCP4.5

RCP8.5

RCP4.5

RCP8.5

–0.12
0.11
0.17
0.12
0.31
0.55
0.19

–0.46
0.19
0.13
0.15
0.44
0.91
0.53

0.01
0.32
0.17
0.32
0.71
0.71
0.44

–0.06
0.69
0.47
0.67
1.30
1.48
0.85

3.8
9.5
5.4
7.6
14.5
18.7
11.7

9.6
21.0
14.6
21.1
24.8
33.7
23.6

0.99
0.72
0.13
1.05
0.28
-0.21
0.42

2.40
1.50
0.76
2.19
0.71
0.80
0.68

RCP8.5
–6.5
2.4
2.4
2.7
6.8
12.9
7.3

RCP4.5
0.2
3.4
1.9
3.5
7.3
7.0
4.3

RCP8.5
–0.7
7.1
6.6
7.5
14.1
14.7
8.2

RCP4.5
2.9
7.9
6.6
6.2
10.1
11.2
6.7

RCP8.5
6.2
17.8
13.8
16.8
18.9
22.1
15.0

RCP4.5
10.9
6.9
1.9
9.2
2.5
–1.2
3.6

7.2
7.5
6.1
6.9
5.8
7.3
7.3

(b) Future change
Pav
NAM
SAM
NAF
SAF
EAS
SAS
AUS

(c) Future percentage change
Pav
RCP4.5
NAM
–1.6
SAM
1.5
NAF
2.4
SAF
2.1
EAS
5.3
SAS
7.3
AUS
2.9

SDII

R5d

SDII

CDD

R5d

3060

CDD
RCP8.5
23.1
17.7
8.8
19.7
5.4
4.7
6.8

KITOH ET AL.: GLOBAL MONSOONS IN CMIP5 MODELS

median (50th percentile) values of precipitation indices, interms of mm d–1 or days, over each regional land monsoon
domain for the present-day climate, and for future changes.
[23] In the NAM region, Pav is projected to decrease,more so in RCP8.5 than in RCP4.5. The average projected
SDII change is around zero with the models evenly divided
on positive or negative changes, but R5d is projected toincrease in more than two thirds of models. In the SAM
region, although the median Pav change is small, two thirdsof models indicate an increase of precipitation in thisregion. In SAM, most models project an increase in the
precipitation extreme indices (SDII and R5d) in both
RCP4.5 and RCP8.5 scenarios, with larger change ratios
in the latter. The number of consecutive dry days is
projected to increase both in NAM and SAM.
[24] In Africa, changes in Pav are insigniﬁcant both in the
NAF region and in the SAF region in both scenarios. SDII
and R5d are projected to increase in both scenarios for both
African monsoon regions. Model agreement is higher in the
RCP8.5 scenario in NAF. This is also the case with theincrease in consecutive number of dry days in the future.
[25] Over the Asian monsoon domain, the median increase
rate for precipitation is larger than that over other monsoon
domains, indicating that the sensitivity of Asian monsoon
to global warming is stronger than that of other monsoons.
Over the EAS region, more than 85% of models show anincrease in Pav, while more than 95% of models project
an increase in SDII and R5d. Also, many models project
an increase in CDD. Future increases in precipitation extremes

in the SAS region are projected by all models in both scenarios. However, agreement among models in projecting changes
in CDD is low. Given the large population residing in these
two regions, the variability of extreme events needs to bestudied more comprehensively.
[26] Over the AUS region, many models agree in projecting
an increase of Pav and SDII in both scenarios, while
agreement is better for R5d increase. CDD is also projected
to increase in the future but model scatter becomes large
in RCP8.5.
[27] There are differences in the projections in NAM
depending on whether the regional monsoon domains are
ﬁxed at the present-day domains (Figure 7c), or determined
separately for the present-day and for the future. In the latter
case, the percentage changes in median values under RCP8.5
are –0.3%, +5.6%, and +13.4% for Pav, SDII, and R5d,
respectively, indicating more intense heavy precipitation.
[28] In summary, heavy precipitation indices are projected
to increase much more than the mean precipitation over all
regional monsoon domains. As the atmosphere becomes morestable, the frequency of precipitating events decreases (CDD
increases), but the precipitation intensity can be stronger once
an event occurs because more moisture is available in a
warmer atmosphere. It is also found that the change rates for
SDII, R5d, and CDD depend more on the emission scenario
compared to those for mean precipitation. Over the Asianmonsoon regions, projected changes in extreme precipitation
indices of Pav, SDII, and R5d are larger than those in the othermonsoon regions. On the other hand, over the American and

Figure 8. As in Figure 7, except for future changes (days) in monsoon onset date (ONS), retreat date
(RET) and duration (DUR) over each regional land monsoon domain. For calculation of the global
monsoon domain statistics in Figure 8a, the seven regional monsoon domain statistics were averaged withweighting based on their area in the present-day.
3061

KITOH ET AL.: GLOBAL MONSOONS IN CMIP5 MODELS

African monsoon regions, expected future changes in Pav arerather modest, but those in R5d are large and comparable tothose noted over the Asian monsoon regions.
4.3. Change of Monsoon Seasonality[29] Timings of monsoon onset, retreat, and thus the
monsoon duration are also expected to change in the future.
Many indices have been proposed to deﬁne monsoon onset
and retreat [e.g., Zeng and Lu, 2004; Wang et al., 2004;

Silva and Carvalho, 2007; Kajikawa et al., 2010]. In thisstudy, we follow the method proposed by Wang and LinHo[2002] based on precipitation exceeding (or dropping below)
a threshold value (see section 2.3). Figure 8 shows projected
future changes in monsoon onset date, retreat date, andduration over each of the regional land monsoon domains.
Here positive numbers for onset and retreat indicate a delay.
The CMIP5 models project that monsoon retreat dates will
delay, while onset dates will either advance or show no

Figure 9. Changes in vertically integrated water vapor ﬂux (vector; kg m–1 s–1) and its convergence(shading; mm d–1) between the present-day (1986–2005) and the future (2080–2099) in the RCP8.5 scenario
for (a) MJJAS and (b) NDJFM, based on the 23 CMIP5 multimodel mean. Only changes that have the same
sign in more than 80% of models (i.e., 19 models) are shown.

Figure 10. Time series of simulated anomalies over global land monsoon domain for (a) precipitation(mm d–1), (b) evaporation (mm d–1), (c) water vapor ﬂux convergence in the lower (below 500 hPa)
troposphere (mm d–1) and (d) wind convergence in the lower troposphere (10–3 kg m–2 s–1), relative tothe base period average (1986–2005), based on 23 CMIP5 model monthly outputs. Historical (grey),
RCP4.5 (blue), and RCP8.5 (red) simulations are shown in the 10th and 90th percentile (shading), andin all model averages (thick lines).
3062

KITOH ET AL.: GLOBAL MONSOONS IN CMIP5 MODELS

change, resulting in lengthening of the monsoon season in
many regions. In particular, such features are very conspicuous in SAS, where model agreement is high with earlier
onset, later retreat and longer duration. More than 85%(95%) of models project later retreat in SAS in RCP4.5(RCP8.5). The same is found with the CMIP3 models[Kumar and coauthors, 2011]. This is also consistent withrecent observation of advanced South Asian monsoon onset
in recent decades [Kajikawa et al., 2012]. In AUS, earlier
onset, later retreat, and longer duration are projected. In
EAS, many models also project earlier onset and longer
duration, but the spread among models is very large.
Kitoh and Uchiyama [2006] investigated the changes inmonsoon seasonality of 15 CMIP3 models, and found lateretreat over the region extending from Taiwan, Ryukyu Islands
to the south of Japan. In their study, however, signiﬁcantchanges were found over the East Asian oceanic monsoon
region, where recent CMIP5 models’ performance is very poor
in reproducing monsoon rainfall (Figure 1).
[30] In contrast to other regions, slightly later onset isprojected in NAF in RCP4.5, where many models show later
retreat. Monsoon duration is not projected to change(RCP4.5) or becomes longer (RCP8.5). In SAF, only in
RCP8.5, later onset and later retreat (no change in duration)
are projected. There is low agreement among models in thechange of onset, retreat and duration in NAM and SAM.
[31] As implied by the large spread among models in mostregions, projection of changes in monsoon seasonality may
be sensitive to the way the monsoon onset and retreat aredeﬁned. However, we ﬁnd that monsoon onset dates are
generally projected to come earlier or not change much,and monsoon retreat dates are projected to be delayed,
resulting in a general lengthening of the monsoon season.

5. Discussions and Summary[32] Future projections indicate an overall increase of
monsoon precipitation over land that is primarily explainedby anomalous water vapor ﬂux convergence into theseregions (Figure 9). However, this is not a direct consequenceof tropical circulation changes. Model experiments projectsurface as well as air temperature increases in the 21st
century. At the surface, warming is greatest over land andat high northern latitudes [Meehl and coauthors, 2007]. This
leads to greater land-sea surface temperature contrast withlower surface pressures over land and higher surfacepressures over ocean in summer. Due to a rise in air temperature, water vapor in the atmosphere increases nonlinearlywith temperature. This increase in precipitable water is, toﬁrst order, responsible for the increase in precipitation,
particularly in middle to high latitudes. In the global monsoon
region, the situation is more complex, where changes in theatmospheric circulation also matter and land-ocean contrast
is a key mechanism [Fasullo, 2012]. The tropical atmosphereresponds in such a way that the strength of the atmospheric
overturning circulation decreases as the climate warms[Vecchi and Soden, 2007]. The explanation is based onthermodynamic arguments [Allen and Ingram, 2002; Heldand Soden, 2006] and is also related to a reduction of radiative cooling in the lower troposphere due to CO2 increase
where the overlap effect of the CO2 and water vapor absorption bands play a crucial role [Sugi and Yoshimura, 2004].

Figure 10 shows the time-series of precipitation, evaporation,
lower-troposphere water vapor ﬂux convergence, andlower-troposphere wind convergence averaged over the
global monsoon domain over land. From Figure 10d, it isclear that the CMIP5 models show a decreasing trend oflower-troposphere wind convergence (dynamical factor)
throughout the 20th and 21st centuries. When moisturebuild-up effect is considered, moisture ﬂux convergenceshows a different story (thermodynamic factor, Figure 10c).
In the 20th century, moisture convergence over the global
land monsoon domain is almost constant until around1980, and then turns into an increasing trend in the 21st
century. This implies that the moisture increase due totemperature rise overwhelms the weakening of the large-scale
circulation, thus resulting in increased moisture ﬂux and its
convergence around 1980, which is responsible for theintensiﬁcation of mean monsoon rainfall, leading to the “wetget-wetter” [Held and Soden, 2006] or “warmer-get-wetter”[Xie and Coauthors, 2011] paradigms. Surface evaporation
showed a decreasing trend from the mid-20th century probably due to aerosol increase [Turner and Annamalai, 2012],
but it also turned to an increase around the 1980s due towarmer surface temperatures (Figure 10b). Therefore, theincrease of the global monsoon precipitation in the future
can be attributed to the increase of moisture convergence
due to increased water vapor in the air column and surface
evaporation, offset to a certain extent by the weakening of
the monsoon circulation.
[33] Contributions from other factors are plausible for thechanges in each regional monsoon. The weakening circulation over the Indian monsoon region [Ramesh and Goswami,
2007] is perhaps a regional phenomenon, brought about bychanges in local gradients and convergence. Existence of
the Tibetan high is associated with an establishment of alarge-scale thermal contrast between the Asian land massand neighboring oceans [Li and Yanai, 1996; Wu et al.,2012]. However, in the air above, models consistently
project enhanced upper-tropospheric warming in the tropics[Meehl and coauthors, 2007]. This is related to increasingcondensational heating in the future climate. The uppertroposphere over the Indian Ocean warms more than over
the Tibetan plateau, reducing the meridional thermal gradient
between the Asian continent and adjacent oceans, thus leading
to a weakening of the Asian summer monsoon circulation[Ueda et al., 2006].
[34] Changes in global monsoon precipitation were also
investigated by Hsu et al. [2012, 2013] and Lee and Wang[2012]. Hsu et al. [2012] used 24 CMIP3 models under the
SRES A1B scenario and 11 CMIP5 models under the
RCP4.5 scenario, Hsu et al. [2013] used 19 CMIP5 models
under the RCP4.5 scenario, while Lee and Wang [2012]used four selected models from 20 CMIP5 models under
the RCP4.5 scenario along with the same four CMIP3
models under the SRES A1B scenario. They all reached
the conclusion that global monsoon precipitation is likely
to increase in the 21st century. Lee and Wang [2012] also
noted a greater northern-southern hemispheric asymmetry
and eastern-western hemispheric asymmetry in the future.
Our conclusion based on 29 CMIP5 models is consistent
with the above ﬁndings. Our comparison between RCP4.5
and RCP8.5 scenarios indicates larger and more robustchanges in global monsoons in a warmer RCP8.5 world.

3063

KITOH ET AL.: GLOBAL MONSOONS IN CMIP5 MODELS[35] To sum up, the state-of-the-art climate models projectthat the global monsoon precipitation is likely to strengthen
in the 21st century with increase in its area as well as its intensity, while monsoon circulation weakens. Overall climatechange projections obtained with CMIP5 models are similar
to those from CMIP3 models. Considering the improvements
in CMIP5 models against CMIP3 models [Sperber et al.,2012], we have now more conﬁdence in the results. Changes
in climate phenomena such as El Niño-Southern Oscillation
can modulate regional monsoons. However, assessing possible roles of changes in such climate phenomena for eachmonsoon system is beyond the scope of this study. Currently,
atmospheric aerosol loading is inﬂuencing regional climate invarious ways, such as a black carbon-induced enhancement
and a sulfate-induced suppression of regional monsoon
precipitation [Turner and Annamalai, 2012]. Most CMIP5
models adopted in this study include both the direct
and indirect effect of aerosols. As we advance into the
21st century, the relative effect of aerosols may beoverwhelmed by the effect of increasing greenhouse gases,
but we do not yet know the exact consequences in a quantitative way. This is one of the uncertainties in precisely assessing
the future state of the monsoon.
[36] Acknowledgments. We acknowledge the World Climate
Research Programme’s Working Group on Coupled Modelling, which is
responsible for CMIP, and we thank the climate modeling groups for producing and making available their model output. For CMIP the U.S. Departmentof Energy’s Program for Climate Model Diagnosis and Intercomparison
provides coordinating support and led development of software infrastructure
in partnership with the Global Organization for Earth System Science Portals.
Work by H.E. was partially supported by the Environment Research andTechnology Development Fund (A-1201) of the Ministry of the Environment,
Japan. A.K. and H.E. thank Osamu Arakawa for the data management.
I.F.A.C. thanks CNPq for research support.

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JOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH: ATMOSPHERES, VOL. 118, 2303, doi:10.1002/jgrd.50267, 2013

Correction to “Future changes and uncertainties
in Asian precipitation simulated by multiphysics and multi-sea
surface temperature ensemble experiments withhigh-resolution Meteorological Research Institute atmosphericgeneral circulation models (MRI-AGCMs)”
Hirokazu Endo, Akio Kitoh, Tomoaki Ose, Ryo Mizuta, and Shoji Kusunoki
Received 9 February 2013; accepted 14 February 2013; published 8 March 2013.

Citation: Endo, H., A. Kitoh, T. Ose, R. Mizuta, and S. Kusunoki (2013), Correction to “Future changes anduncertainties in Asian precipitation simulated by multiphysics and multi-sea surface temperature ensemble experimentswith high-resolution Meteorological Research Institute atmospheric general circulation models (MRI-AGCMs)”,
J. Geophys. Res. Atmos., 118, 2303, doi:10.1002/jgrd.50267.

[1] In the paper “Future changes and uncertainties
in Asian precipitation simulated by multiphysics andmulti-sea surface temperature ensemble experiments withhigh-resolution Meteorological Research Institute atmosphericgeneral circulation models (MRI-AGCMs)” by H. Endo et al.
(Journal of Geophysical Research, 117, D16118, doi:10.1029/

2012JD017874, 2012), Figure 11b was incorrect. The corrected
ﬁgure is below (Figure 1). The error was made in plotting data.
Speciﬁcally, the same data were used for plotting Figures 11aand 11b, although the respective areas shaded or hatched weredifferent. However, any description and conclusions of theoriginal paper are not changed by this correction.

Figure 1. Future changes (F P; mm/day) in (a) Pav and (b) SDII in the 60 km model ensemble
simulations. Grid points where the future changes are statistically signiﬁcant (at the 5% level) are shaded,and grid points where at least 10 experiments show the same sign of change are hatched. Relative
contribution ratio (%) of variances among projections for (c) Pav and (d) SDII. The ratio is deﬁned as
the variance resulting from the different cumulus schemes relative to the variance resulting from thedifferent SSTs, based on the percentage changes ((F P)/P). The grid points shaded in blue (red)correspond to sites where the effect of the SST patterns (the cumulus schemes) is dominant. Note that
unshaded grid points are not signiﬁcantly affected by either factor (at the 1% level).
Corresponding author: H. Endo, Meteorological Research Institute, 1-1
Nagamine, Tsukuba, Ibaraki, 305-0052. (hendo@mri-jma.go.jp)©2013. American Geophysical Union. All Rights Reserved.
2169-897X/13/10.1002/jgrd.50267

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