Is There an Intensification of Hydrologic Cycle in the Coupled Framework of Atmospheric Entropy Budget and Thermodynamic Cycle?

Urbanization results in land use and land cover change and which impacts regional climate. Similar to land cover changes, land management practices such as crop land management and irrigation are having same impacts on mean annual land surface temperature and precipitation. Increasing land surface temperature due to anthropogenic-induced climate change is expected to alter regional precipitation patterns with the intensification of hydrologic cycle, leading to more frequent heavy rainfall events. Analyzing land-atmosphere coupling in continental scale in terms of soil moisture and precipitation and, irrigation influence on evapotranspiration, convection initiation, precipitation, boundary layer properties and cloud layer properties by considering more realistic irrigation with major crops and land use change with in a regional climate model is needed to quantify the hydrologic cycle intensification over continental scale. In this presentation, we will evaluate the characteristics of dry and wet spells impacted by irrigation and climate variability over the Continental U.S, and quantify future hydrologic cycle intensification over the U.S by considering coupled hydrologic cycle and atmospheric circulation as a thermodynamic engine and estimating atmospheric thermodynamic entropy production. Space-time variation of precipitation in the coupled modeling framework will be presented. It will be useful to understand future irrigation water requirement, food security and also to delineate flood prone areas so that managers and public are better prepared for anticipating and protecting the infrastructure and property.