Increasing impacts from extreme precipitation on population over China with global warming

Precipitation-related extremes are among the most impact-relevant consequences of a warmer climate, particularly for China, a region vulnerable to global warming and with a large population. Understanding the impacts and risks induced by future extreme precipitation changes is critical for mitigation and adaptation planning. Here, extreme precipitation changes under different levels of global warming and their associated impacts on populations in China are investigated using multimodel climate projections from the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 5 and population projections under Shared Socio-economic Pathways. Heavy precipitation would intensify with warming across China at a rate of 6.52% (5.22%-8.57%) per degree of global warming. The longest dry spell length would increase (decrease) south (north) of ~34°N. The low warming target of the Paris Agreement could substantially reduce the extreme precipitation related impacts compared to higher warming levels. For the area weighted average changes, the intensification in wet extremes could be reduced by 3.22%, 9.42% and 16.70% over China, and the lengthening of dry spells could be reduced by 0.72%, 4.75% and 5.31% in southeastern China, respectively, if global warming is limited to 1.5 °C as compared to 2, 3 and 4 °C. The Southeastern China is the hotspot of enhanced impacts due to the dense population. The impacts on populations induced by extreme precipitation changes are dominated by climate change, while future population redistribution plays a minor role.