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Turkey

Climate change

The climate of Turkey

The southern and western coastal areas have a Mediterranean climate, but further to the east and north a number of factors make the climate more complex. These factors include extremely varied topography, an inland sea (the Black Sea) to the north and, beyond that, the vast Russian plain which, in winter, acts as a close source of very cold air. Contrastingly, the east of Turkey adjoins Syria and the Middle East which become very hot in summer and the southern coastline is only around 500km across the Mediterranean from the hot continent of Africa. Most of Turkey is high plateau and the terrain becomes increasingly mountainous towards the east. Even in the lower-lying west the terrain is mostly hilly (5).


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Air temperature changes until now

Annual

Annual temperature over the period 1961–1990 showed a trend of statistically significant warming over land in south-east Europe of approximately 0.4–0.6°C per decade (14). For Turkey, annual mean temperature seems to have increased only after the first half of 1990s (16): statistical analyses of Turkish temperature series over the period 1950–2006 showed a turning point at the year of 1992 (1993). Following this year, annual temperatures began to increase gradually (16).  


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Precipitation changes until now

Throughout the period 1951-2004 winter precipitation in the western provinces of Turkey has decreased significantly. Fall precipitation, on the other hand, has increased at stations that lie mostly in the northern parts of central Anatolia. In the spring and summers, there are only a few stations with statistically significant changes; still, they do not show a coherent regional behavior (2). For the period 1961-1990, precipitation trends differ between regions and seasons; a decrease in spring and winter precipitation was found to be statistically significant over Turkey (14).


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Glacier changes until now

The Ararat mountain is an ice-capped volcano in Eastern Anatolia (Turkey), close to the borders with Iran, Armenia, and Azerbaijan. The evolution of the Ararat mountain glaciers has been investigated for the period 1976-2014. The glacier area has decreased in this period by 30% (2.38 km2) of the initial area. This decrease seems to be driven by increasing temperature and decreasing winter snow cover at the highest altitudes, especially since the 1990s (18).

Air temperature changes in the 21st century

According to results from different climate change scenarios, an increase of 1.2⁰C in mean annual temperature can be expected for 2030. In 2050, the mean annual temperature increases by around 2⁰C. In the context of model estimations, increase in monthly temperatures indicate that warmer winters are expected, while summers get hotter (2).


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Precipitation changes in the 21st century

In general, precipitation decreases in the period 2071-2100 with respect to 1961-1990 along the Aegean and Mediterranean coasts and increases along the Black Sea coast of Turkey. Central Anatolia shows little or no change in precipitation. The most severe (absolute) reductions will be observed on the southwestern coast; in contrast, Caucasian coastal region is expected to receive substantially more precipitation. These observations are valid both for the annual and the winter totals (2).


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References

The references below are cited in full in a separate map 'References'. Please click here if you are looking for the full references for Turkey.

  1. Kuglitsch et al. (2010)
  2. Güven (2007)
  3. Moberg et al. (2006), in:Kuglitsch et al. (2010)
  4. Ezber et al. (2006); Karaca et al. (1995), both in: Güven (2007)
  5. MET Office (2011)
  6. Lelieveld et al. (2012)
  7. Kuglitsch et al. (2010), in: Lelieveld et al. (2012)
  8. Nastos and Zerefos 2009, in: Lelieveld et al. (2012)
  9. Kuglitsch et al. (2010), in: Coumou and Rahmstorf (2012)
  10. Önol and Unal (2014)
  11. Lelieveld et al. (2014)
  12. Chenoweth et al. (2011), in: Lelieveld et al. (2014)
  13. Erlat and Türkeş (2013)
  14. Kostopoulou et al. (2014)
  15. Tanarhte et al. (2015)
  16. Dogan et al. (2015)
  17. Zittis et al. (2016)
  18. Baldasso et al. (2019)
  19. Ünal et al. (2020)
  20. Erlat et al. (2021)
  21. Erlat et al. (2022) 

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