Study of Current and Future Meteorological Drought Conditions using the CMIP5 Model Under RCP scenarios

Reducing or increasing the climate parameters such as temperature and rainfall as a result of the climate change process, causes a variety of droughts. In this study, the effect of climate change on meteorological drought in Yazd province is investigated. For this purpose, the drought time series were determined in two historical periods (1961-2005) and the future (2017-2100) by SPI and SPEI. Historical data from Yazd's synoptic station and future data were generated by the CanESM2 model under RCP scenarios. Drought characteristics such as severity, duration and frequency were extracted based on run theory in order to compare and evaluate the trend of drought changes. The results showed case study experiences more sever droughts in the future than historical period based on SPI under 3 RCP scenarios while based on SPEI index under RCP2.6 and RCP4.5, the drought characteristics will decrease in the future compared with historical period and under RCP8.5, the severity and duration of the drought will increase. The severity-frequency and duration-frequency curve showed that increasing the return period increases the severity and duration of drought.