We investigate the ability of a global atmospheric general circulation model (AGCM) to reproduce observed 20 year return values of the annual maximum daily precipitation totals over the continental United States as a function of horizontal resolution. We find that at the high resolutions enabled by contemporary supercomputers, the AGCM can produce values of comparable magnitude to high quality ...

Clouds and their interactions with radiation is recognized by the most recent IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change; 2001) report as the greatest uncertainty in future projections of climate, and, despite the considerable improvement of the physical realism of cloud representation in general circulation models, representation of clouds and their feedbacks is still the weakest componen...

Statistical downscaling methods seek to model the relationship between large scale atmospheric circulation, on say a European scale, and climatic variables, such as temperature and precipitation, on a regional or subregional scale. Downscaling is an important area of research as it bridges the gap between predictions of future circulation generated by General Circulation Models (GCMs) and the e...

The relationship between precipitation and large-scale measures of atmospheric circulation has received much attention in recent years (e.g. Bardossy & Caspary, 1990; Bardossy & Plate, 1992; Hughes et al., 1993; Woolhiser et al., 1993; Katz & Parlange, 1993). Some of the interest relates to quantifying the possible change in atmospheric circulation within the past two decades, with associated c...