Characteristics of Temperature Change in China over the Last 2000 years and Spatial Patterns of Dryness/Wetness during Cold and Warm Periods

This paper presents new high-resolution proxies and paleoclimatic reconstructions for studying climate changes in China for the past 2000 years. Multi-proxy synthesized reconstructions show that temperature variation in China has exhibited significant 50–70-yr, 100–120-yr, and 200–250-yr cycles. Results also show that the amplitudes of decadal and centennial temperature variation were 1.3℃ and 0.7℃, respectively, with the latter significantly correlated with long-term changes in solar radiation, especially cold periods, which correspond approximately to sunspot minima. The most rapid warming in China occurred over AD 1870–2000, at a rate of 0.56°± 0.42℃（100 yr）^（-1）; however, temperatures recorded in the 20 th century may not be unprecedented for the last 2000 years, as data show records for the periods AD 981–1100 and AD1201–70 are comparable to the present. The ensemble means of dryness/wetness spatial patterns in eastern China across all centennial warm periods illustrate a tripole pattern： dry south of 25°N, wet from 25°–30°N, and dry to the north of 30°N. However, for all centennial cold periods, this spatial pattern also exhibits a meridional distribution. The increase in precipitation over the monsoonal regions of China associated with the 20 th century warming can primarily be attributed to a mega El Nino–Southern Oscillation and the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation. In addition, a significant association between increasing numbers of locusts and dry/cold conditions is found in eastern China. Plague intensity also generally increases in concert with wetness in northern China, while more precipitation is likely to have a negative effect in southern China.

Vegetation dynamics and climate variability over the past 2000 years inferred from Son Kul marsh in the western Tianshan Mountains

A pollen study was conducted on an alpine marsh sediment in the Son Kul Basin and was allowed to reconstruct changes in vegetation dynamics and climatic information in the western Tianshan Mountains during the past 2000 years.Pollen diagram reveals that regional vegetation is dominated by alpine meadow in the past 2000 years,being similar with modern vegetation components in the basin.The Artemisia/Chenopodiaceae-indicated moisture exhibits a warm-dry Roman Warm Period(RWP,~0-~500 AD),a cold-dry Dark Ages Cold Period(DACP,~500-~800 AD),a warm-wet Medieval Warm Period(MWP,~800-~1350 AD),a cold-dry Little Ice Age(LIA,~1350-~1850 AD)and a warm-dry Current Warm Period(CWP,since~1850 AD).Our pollen-based moisture reconstructions are supported by other nearby moisture records.Combined with other pollen data in the western Tianshan Mountains,we found that the vegetation was relatively stable before~1650-~1750 AD and the anthropogenic activities obviously intensified afterwards(especially at the middle-elevation sites).Further work involving more and higher-resolution palaeovegetation records would contribute to fully understand the information on the complex links between environmental,climatic and anthropogenic changes in the western Tianshan Mountains.

General characteristics of climate changes during the past 2000 years in China

The general characteristics of climate changes over the past 2000 years in China,regional differences and uncertainties were analyzed based on the recently peer-reviewed high time-resolution climatic reconstructions.The results showed that there exists four warm periods of the temperature variation in China since the Qin Dynasty,including the western and eastern Han Dynasties(200 BC-AD 180),the Sui and Tang dynasties(541-810),the Song and Yuan dynasties(931-1320),and the 20th century,and three cold phases involving the Wei,Jin,and North-South Dynasties(181-540),the late Tang Dynasty(811-930),and the Ming and Qing dynasties(1321-1920).The Song and Yuan warm period is consistent with the Medieval Warm Period over the Northern Hemisphere,and the cold phases of the North-South Dynasties and the Ming and Qing dynasties are paralleled to the Dark Ages Cold Period and the Little Ice Age,respectively.The 13th-15th century could be a shift to the wet condition of the climate,and the low precipitation variability is exhibited in western China prior to 1500.In the context of the climate warming,the pattern of the drought in north and flood in south is prevalent over the eastern China.In addition,the published reconstructions have a high level of confidence for the past 500 years,but large uncertainties exist prior to the 16th century.

Rates of temperature change in China during the past 2000 years

Using 24 proxy temperature series, the rates of temperature change in China are analyzed at the 30- to 100-year scales for the past 2000 years and at the 10-year scale for the past 500 years. The results show that, at the 100-year scale, the warming rate for the whole of China in the 20th century was only 0.6±1.6℃/100 a （interval at the 95% confidence level, which is used here- after）, while the peak warming rate for the period from the Little Ice Age （LIA） to the 20th century reached 1.1_＋1.2~C/100 a, which was the greatest in the past 500 years and probably the past 2000 years. At the 30-year scale, warming in the 20th century was quite notable, but the peak rate was still less than rates for previous periods, such as the rapid warming from the LIA to the 20th century and from the 270s-290s to 300s-320s. At the 10-year scale, the warming in the late 20th century was very evident, but it might not be unusual in the context of warming over the past 500 years. The exact timing, duration and magnitude of the warming peaks varied from region to region at all scales. The peak rates of the 100-year scale warming in the AD 180s-350s in northeastern China as well as those in the 260s-410s and 500s-660s in Tibet were all greater than those from the mid-19th to 20th century. Meanwhile, the rates of the most rapid cooling at scales of 30 to 100 years in the LIA were promi-nent, but they were also not unprecedented in the last 2000 years. At the 10-year scale, for the whole of China, the most rapid decadal cooling in the 20th century was from the 1940s to 1950s with a rate of -0.3±0.6℃/10 a, which was similar to rates for periods before the 20th century. For all regions, the rates of most rapid cooling in the 20th century were all less than those for previous periods.

Recent advances on reconstruction of climate and extreme events in China for the past 2000 years

China is distinguished by a prominent monsoonal climate in the east of the country, a continental arid climate in the northwest and a highland cold climate on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. Because of the long history of Chinese civilization, there are abundant and well-dated documentary records for climate variation over the whole of the country as well as many natural archives（e.g., tree-rings, ice cores, stalagmites, varved lake sediments and corals） that enable high-resolution paleoclimatic reconstruction. In this paper, we review recent advances in the reconstruction of climate and extreme events over the last 2000 years in China. In the last 10 years, many new reconstructions, based on multi-proxies with wide spatial coverage, have been published in China. These reconstructions enable us to understand the characteristics of climate change across the country as well as the uncertainties of regional reconstructions. Synthesized reconstructed temperature results show that warm intervals over the last 2000 years occurred in AD 1–200, AD 551–760, AD 951–1320, and after AD 1921, and also show that cold intervals were in AD 201–350, AD 441–530, AD 781–950, and AD 1321–1920. Extreme cold winters, seen between 1500 and 1900, were more frequent than those after 1950. The intensity of regional heat waves, in the context of recent global warming, may not in fact exceed natural climate variability seen over the last 2000 years. In the eastern monsoonal region of China, decadal, multi-decadal and centennial oscillations are seen in rainfall variability. While the ensemble mean for drought/flood spatial patterns across all cold periods shows a meridional distribution, there is a tri-pole pattern with respect to droughts south of 25°N, floods between 25° and 30°N, and droughts north of 30°N for all warm periods. Data show that extreme drought events were most frequent in the periods AD 301–400, AD 751–800, AD 1051–1150, AD 1501–1550, and AD 1601–1650, while extreme flood events were frequent in the periods AD 101–150, AD 251–300, AD 951–1000, AD 1701–1750, AD 1801–1850, and AD 1901–1950. Between AD 1551–1600, extreme droughts and flood events occurred frequently. In arid northwest China, climate was characterized by dry conditions in AD 1000–1350, wet conditions in AD 1500–1850, and has tended to be wet over recent decades. On the northeastern Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, centennial-scale oscillations in precipitation have occurred over the last 1000 years, interrupted by several multidecadal-scale severe drought events. Of these, the most severe were in the 1480 s and 1710 s. In southwest China, extreme droughts as severe as those seen in Sichuan and Chongqing in 2006 are known to have occurred during historical times.

Coincidence of abandoned settlements and climate change in the Xinjiang oases zone during the last 2000 years

The study on the relationship of abandoned settlements and climate change in the oases could provide a historical reference for understanding human responses to present and future global warming in the arid zone. A total of 554 abandoned historical settlements in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, China, were used to examine the relationship between abandoned settlements and temperature change over the past 2000 years. The analysis covered dynastic epochs from the Han Dynasty （206BC-220AD） to the Qing Dynasty （1644AD- 1911AD） in the oases of Xinjiang. Greater density of settlements was found at the oases larger than 2000 km^2, which were more stable and less sensitive to climate change compared to smaller oases. Settlements flourished at small oases and the middle and lower reaches of rivers during warm periods and shrank back to piedmont basins and upstream alluvial fans during cold periods. These results demonstrated responses of oasis agriculture to climate change.

Spatial Patterns of Precipitation Anomalies for 30-yr Warm Periods in China During the Past 2000 Years

The spatial patterns of precipitation anomalies during five 30-yr warm periods of 691-720, 1231-1260, 1741-1770, 1921-1950, and 1981-2000 were investigated using a dryness/wetness grading dataset covering 48 stations from Chinese historical documents and 22 precipitation proxy series from natural archives. It was found that the North China Plain （approximately 35^-40~N, east of 105~E） was dry in four warm periods within the centennial warm epochs of 600-750, the Medieval Warm Period （about 900-1300） and after 1900. A wet condition prevailed over most of China during 1741-1770, a 30-yr warm peak that occurred during the Little Ice Age （about 1650-1850）. The spatial pattern of the precipitation anomaly in 1981-2000 over East China （25^-40~N, east of 105~E） is roughly consistent with that in 1231 1260, but a difference in the precipitation anomaly appeared over the Tibetan Plateau. The spatial patterns of the precipitation anomalies over China varied between all five 30-yr warm periods, which implies that the matching pattern between temperature and precipitation change is multiform, and the precipitation anomaly could be positive or negative when a decadal warm climate occurs in different climate epochs. This result may provide a primary reference for the mechanism detection and climate simulation of the precipitation anomaly of the future warm climate.

Vegetation dynamics and its response to climate change during the past 2000 years in the Altai Mountains,northwestern China

Over the past 2000 years,a high-resolution pollen record from the Yushenkule Peat(46°45′-46°57′N,90°46′-90°61′E,2374 m a.s.l.)in the south-eastern Altai Mountains of northwestern China has been used to explore the changes in vegetation and climate.The regional vegetation has been dominated by alpine meadows revealed from pollen diagrams over the past 2000 years.The pollen-based climate was warm and wet during the Roman Warm Period(0-520 AD),cold and wet during the Dark Age Cold Period(520-900 AD),warm and wet during the Medieval Warm Period(900-1300 AD),and cold and dry during the Little Ice Age(1300-1850 AD).Combined with other pollen data from the Altai Mountains,we found that the percentage of arboreal pollen showed a reduced trend along the NW-SE gradient with decreasing moisture and increasing climatic continentality of the Altai Mountains over the past 2000 years;this is consistent with modern distributions of taiga forests.We also found that the taiga(Pinus forest)have spread slightly,while the steppe(Artemisia,Poaceae and Chenopodiaceae)have recovered significantly in the Altai Mountains over the past 2000 years.In addition,the relatively warm-wet climate may promote high grassland productivity and southward expansion of steppe,which favors the formation of Mongol political and military power.

Global Climate Internal Variability in a 2000-year Control Simulation with Community Earth System Model(CESM)

Using the low-resolution （T31, equivalent to 3.75°× 3.75°） version of the Community Earth System Model （CESM） from the National Center for Atmospheric Research （NCAR）, a global climate simulation was carried out with fixed external forcing factors （1850 Common Era. （C.E.） conditions） for the past 2000 years. Based on the simulated results, spatio-temporal structures of surface air temperature, precipitation and internal variability, such as the E1 Nifio-Southem Oscillation （ENSO）, the Atlantic Multi-decadal Oscilla- tion （AMO）, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation （PDO）, and the North Atlantic Oscillation （NAO）, were compared with reanalysis datasets to evaluate the model performance. The results are as follows： 1） CESM showed a good performance in the long-term simulation and no significant climate drift over the past 2000 years; 2） climatological patterns of global and regional climate changes simulated by the CESM were reasonable compared with the reanalysis datasets; and 3） the CESM simulated internal natural variability of the climate system performs very well. The model not only reproduced the periodicity of ENSO, AMO and PDO events but also the 3-8 years vari- ability of the ENSO. The spatial distribution of the CESM-simulated NAO was also similar to the observed. However, because of weaker total irradiation and greenhouse gas concentration forcing in the simulation than the present, the model performances had some differences from the observations. Generally, the CESM showed a good performance in simulating the global climate and internal natu- ral variability of the climate system. This paves the way for other forced climate simulations for the past 2000 years by using the CESM.

Tapping Renewable Energy Resources -with A Combined Capacity of 1236 MW as Target for the Year 2000

China began the research and development of renewable energy generation since 1970s, in particular in the Eighth Five-year Plan period, the State made closer attention to the research and development of renewable energy, therefore the technical level, application scale and economic, social benefits have seen greater progress. The combined capacity of renewable energy generation reached 100 MW at the end of 1994. And it is planned a combined capacity of 1236 MW will be targeted for the year 2000.

Power Production and Construction in China:Review of Tasks in 2000 and Major Targets and Focal Tasks for 2001

This paper, excerpted from General President Gao Yan’s Speech on the State Power Corporation Working Conference for 2001, held in Shenzhen on December 23-25, 2000, reviews the power production and construction tasks in 2000 and puts forward the major targets and focal tasks of power production and construction for 2001.

New Stage of the Northwest China 330 kV Power System Development - A Brief Introduction of System Planning in Northwest China to the Year 2000

The system planning of the Northwest China 330 kV Power System from present to the year 2000 is introduced in this paper. Some technical problems arising from the system planning, such as network configuration, system stability and reactive power compensation etc. are also briefly summarized.