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ABSTRACT Jang, C.J.; Choi, W.; Shin, H.-J., and Kim C.-H., 2018. Future changes in the sea surface wind over the East Asian marginal seas projected by regional climate models. In: Shim, J.-S.; Chun, I., and Lim, H.S. (eds.), Proceedings from the International Coastal Symposium (ICS) 2018 (Busan, Republic of Korea). Journal of Coastal Research, Special Issue No. 85, pp. 591–595. Coconut Creek (Florida), ISSN 0749-0208. Sea surface wind plays a crucial role in coastal safety including flooding and coastal erosion mainly by changing sea level and ocean wind waves, and the regional characteristics of sea surface wind can be influenced by global warming. This study aims to investigate future changes in sea surface wind due to global warming in the East Asian marginal seas (EAMS) projected by four different regional climate models contributing to CORDEX-EA (COordinated Regional climate Downscaling Experiment-East Asia) downscaling project, by using daily mean winds for the present (historical runs for 1980–2004) and the future climate (RCP4.5 scenario run for 2025–2049). In general, the climatological-mean wind speed is projected to decrease up to 30 % in winter, but to increase up to 40 % in summer, indicating seasonally different large-scale atmospheric responses to global warming in EAMS. The prevailing wind direction, a critical factor in coastal erosion in EAMS, is projected to be significantly changed in both winter and summer, contributing to the changes in the mean wind speed. Extreme winds, defined as an annual maximum of the wind speed, show negligible changes with considerably large intermodel differences. Our findings suggest that projected future changes in sea surface wind over EAMS can be considerably different depending on seasons and models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent decades, extremely cold winters have occurred repeatedly throughout the Northern Hemisphere, including the Korean Peninsula (hereafter, Korea). Typically, cold winter temperatures in Korea can be linked to the strengthening of the Siberian High (SH). Although previous studies have investigated the typical relationship between the SH and winter temperatures in Korea, this study uniquely focused on a change in the relationship, which reflects the influence of the Arctic Oscillation (AO) and El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO). A significant change in the 15-year moving correlation between the SH and the surface air temperature average in Korea (K-tas) was observed in January. The correlation changed from −0.80 during 1971–1990 to −0.16 during 1991–2010. The mean sea-level pressure pattern regressed with the temperature, and a singular value decomposition analysis that incorporated the temperature and pressure supports that the negative high correlation during 1971–1990 was largely affected by AO. This connection with AO is substantiated by empirical orthogonal function (EOF) analysis with an upper-level geopotential height at 300 hPa. In the second mode of the EOF, the temperature and pressure patterns were primarily affected by ENSO during 1991–2010. Consequently, the interdecadal change in correlation between K-tas and the SH in January can be attributed to the dominant effect of AO from 1971–1990 and of ENSO from 1991–2010. Our results suggest that the relative importance of these factors in terms of the January climate in Korea has changed on a multidecadal scale. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]