Using High-Resolution Climate Models to Identify Climate Change Hotspots in the Middle East: A Case Study of Iran

Abstract

The adverse effects of climate change will impact all regions around the world, especially Middle Eastern countries, which have prioritized economic growth over environmental protection. However, these impacts are not evenly distributed spatially, and some locations, namely climate change hotspots, will suffer more from climate change consequences. In this study, we identified climate change hotspots over Iran—a developing country in the Middle East that is facing dire economic situations—in order to suggest pragmatic solutions for vulnerable regions. We used a statistical index as a representative of the differences in climatic parameters for the RCP8.5 and RCP4.5 forcing pathways between historical data (1975–2005), near-future data (2030–2060) and far-future data (2070–2100). More specifically, we used downscaled high-resolution (0.25°) meteorological data from five GCMs of the CMIP5 database to calculate the statistical metric. Results indicate that for the far-future period and RCP4.5, regions stretching from the northwest to southeast of Iran, namely the Hotspot Belt, are the most vulnerable areas, while, for RCP8.5, almost the whole country is vulnerable to climate change. The highest and lowest differences in temperature for RCP8.5 in 2070–2100 are observed during summer in the northwestern and central parts and during winter in the northern and northeastern parts. Moreover, the maximum increase and decrease in precipitation are identified over the western parts of Iran during fall and winter, respectively. Overall, western provinces (e.g., Lorestan and Kermanshah), which are mostly reliant on rainfed agriculture and other climate-dependent sectors, will face the highest change in climate in the future. As these regions have less adaptive capacity, they should be prioritized through upstream policy change and special budget allocation from the government to increase their resiliency against climate change.