Journal Article

Increasing Synchrony of Extreme Heat and Precipitation Events Under Climate Warming

Wu, Sijia, Tang, Yu, Li, Xiang, Luo, Ming

2025

Overview

Extreme weather events severely impact human and natural systems, and their impacts would be exacerbated when events occur synchronously. Extensive studies have examined changes in individual events under global warming, but changes in the synchrony of multiple events remain less understood. Here we quantify the synchrony of extreme heat and precipitation events over global land areas and assess how it responds to climate change. We show regional disparities with stronger synchrony in lower latitudes and weaker in middle latitudes. Since the 1980s, the synchrony has increased by 34%, especially in the tropics and northern high latitudes. Climate simulations project an 87% increase by 2100 under Shared Socioeconomic Pathway (SSP) 5–8.5 relative to historical level, while low‐emission scenarios (SSP1‐2.6 and SSP2‐4.5) can help mitigate the increased risk of synchronous events. Increasing synchrony is primarily driven by climate warming, and this scaling relationship depends on global warming level rather warming path. Plain Language Summary The synchrony describes the temporal coordination and the degree to which two different events occur synchronously or in close successions. Here we provide a global assessment of the changes in the synchrony of extreme heat and precipitation events, which are typically considered as separate occurrences. We find that human‐induced climate warming causes worldwide increases in the synchrony of extreme heat and precipitation events, with their magnitude depending on the level of warming, rather than the specific warming path. Our study highlights the urgent need to mitigate the increasing threats posed by synchronous heat and precipitation events. Key Points Synchrony of extreme heat and precipitation events has increased worldwide since 1979, especially in tropics and northern high latitudes Synchrony will further increase by 87% by the end of the 21st century relative to 1940–2014 under high‐emission scenario (SSP5‐8.5) Synchrony increases are primarily driven by climate warming, and the increase magnitude depends on warming level, rather warming path

• Publisher: John Wiley & Sons, Inc,Wiley
• Subject: Climate change / Climate change mitigation / event synchronization / Extreme heat / extreme precipitation / Extreme weather / Global warming / global warming level / Latitude / Precipitation / shared socioeconomic pathway / Tropical environments