Climate Solutions Explorer - hazard, impacts and exposure data

The Climate Solutions Explorer website maps and presents information about mitigation pathways, avoided climate impacts, vulnerabilities and risks arising from development and climate change. www.climate-solutions-explorer.eu

Using the latest data, state-of-the-art models were used to assess the future trends of indicators of development- and climate-induced challenges.

Updated gridded global climate and impact model data are based on CMIP6 and CMIP5 projections, using a subset of models from the ISIMIP project that have been consistently downscaled and bias-corrected.  The data includes various indicators (~42) relating to extremes of precipitation and temperature (e.g. from Expert Team on Climate Change Detection and Indices), hydrological variables including runoff and discharge, heat stress (from wet bulb temperature) events (multiple statistics and durations), and cooling degree days, as well as further indicators relating to air pollution (PM2.5 from the GAINs model), and crop yields and natural habitat land-use change (biodiversity pressure) from the GLOBIOM model.

Indicators were calculated at a spatial resolution of 0.5° (approximately 50km at the equator), and subsequently spatially aggregated to the country level – from which population and land area exposure to the impacts were calculated. This has enabled the country-by-country comparison of national climate impacts and avoided exposure. Impacts were calculated at global mean temperature intervals, i.e. 1.2, 1.5, 2, 2.5, 3, and 3.5 °C, compared to a pre-industrial climate.

The dataset includes: 

• Global gridded projections (in netCDF format) of all the climate impact indicators at 0.5° spatial resolution, at global warming levels of 1.2, 1.5, 2, 2.5, 3, and 3.5 °C
  
  For each GWL, maps for the absolute indicator values, the relative difference, and the scores are provided. The naming format is: cse_[short_indicator_name]_[ssp]_[gwl]_[metric].nc4. Please note that the Greenland ice sheet and the desert areas have been masked out for the hydrology indicators for these datasets.
  
  
• Intermediate output data, including gridded maps of absolute values, relative differences, and scores for all ensemble members, as well as gridded maps of the multi-model ensemble statistics for the global warming levels and the reference period
  
  For the ensemble member data, the naming format is [gcm]_[ssp/rcp]_[gwl]_[short_indicator_name]_global_[start_year]_[end_year].nc4 or [ghm]_[gcm]_[ssp/rcp]_[gwl]_[soc]_[short_indicator_name]_global_[start_year]_[end_year]_[metric].nc4 for the hydrology indicators.
  
  
• Tabular data (.csv) aggregating the indicators to country (or region) level, for both hazards and exposure, population and land-area weighted
  
  The .zip archives ‘table_output_climate_exposure_{aggregation_level}.zip’ contain the tabular data for all indicators. Four different aggregation levels are provided: country level, R10 regions and the EU, IPCC AR6-WGI reference regions, and UN R5 regions. A separate file named ‘table_output_climate_exposure_land_air_pollution.zip’ contains the table data for theland and air pollution indicators. 
  
  
• Tabular data (.csv) for avoided impacts by mitigating to 1.5 °C (land and population exposure)
  
  The .zip archives ‘table_output_avoided_impacts_{aggregation_level}.zip’ contain the tabular data for all indicators. Four different aggregation levels are provided: country level, R10 regions and the EU, IPCC AR6-WGI reference regions, and UN R5 regions. A separate file named ‘table_output_avoided_impacts_land_air_pollution.zip’ contains the table data for the land and air pollution indicators.

Further details are available on the Data Story page – www.climate-solutions-explorer.eu/story/data. A detailed description of the methodology and the calculation of the ISIMIP-derived indicators has been published in Werning, M. et al. (2024).

Release notes (v1.1)

Changes in this version:

• Only table output data for the land and air pollution indicators have been changed, all other indicator data remain unchanged from v1.0
• Updated land and air pollution indicators to use scaled population data to match the latest SSP population projections from the Wittgenstein Center from 2023
• Fixed issue with the region mask for the EU
• Added table output data for the IPCC AR6-WGI reference regions and the UN R5 regions

Release notes (v1.0)

Changes in this version:

• Fixed calculation of the indicator “Drought intensity” (both for the version using discharge and run-off)
• Masked out the Greenland ice sheet and the desert areas for the global gridded projections for the hydrology indicators in the final output files
• Added table output data for the IPCC AR6-WGI reference regions and the UN R5 regions
• Used scaled population data to match the latest SSP population projections from the Wittgenstein Center from 2023
• Added the indicator ‘Heatwave days’
• Added intermediate outputs for all ensemble members for energy, hydrology, precipitation, and temperature indicators
  
  

Release Notes (v0.4)

Changes in this version:

• Removed ssp and metric from variable name in netCDF files
• Removed obsolete coordinates in netCDF files for 'Drought intensity'
• Added intermediate outputs for energy, hydrology, precipitation, and temperature indicators