Climate change has a distinct impact on agriculture in China, particularly in the northeast, a key agriculture area sensitive to extreme hydroclimate events. Using monthly climate and agriculture data, the influence of drought on maize and soybean yields—two of the main crops in the region—in northeast China since 1961 to 2017 were investigated. The results showed that the temperature in the growing season increased by 1.0 °C from the period 1998–2017 to the period 1961–1980, while the annual precipitation decreased slightly. However, precipitation trends varied throughout the growing season (May–September), increasing slightly in May and June, but decreasing in July, August and September, associated with the weakening of the East Asian summer monsoon. Consequently, the annual and growing season drought frequency increased by 15%, and 25%, respectively, in the period 1998–2017 relative to the period 1961–1980. The highest drought frequency (55%) was observed in September. At the same time, the drought intensity during the growing season increased by 7.8%. The increasing frequency and intensity of drought had negative influences on the two crops. During moderate drought years in the period 1961–2017, 3.2% and 10.4% of the provincial maize and soybean yields were lost, respectively. However, during more severe drought years, losses doubled for soybean (21.8%), but increased more than four-fold for maize (14.0%). Moreover, in comparison to the period 1961–1980, a higher proportion of the yields were lost in the period 1998–2017, particularly for maize, which increased by 15% (increase for soybean was 2.4%). This change largely depends on increasing droughts in August and September, when both crops are in their filling stages. The impact of drought on maize and soybean production was different during different growth stages, where a strong relationship was noted between drought and yield loss of soybean in its filling stage. Given the sensitivity of maize and soybean yields in northeast China to drought, and the observed production trends, climate change will likely have significant negative impacts on productivity in the future.

Maize (Zea mays L.) is one of the most important staple crops in Northeast China, and yield losses are mainly induced by climate anomalies, plant diseases and pests. To understand how maize yield loss is affected by global warming, daily precipitation and temperatures, together with provincial agricultural data sets, were analyzed. The results showed that the accumulated temperature, an important factor in agricultural productivity, increased by 5% in 1991–2017, compared to 1961–1990, and that the frequency of low temperatures decreased by 14.8% over the same time period. An increase in drought by 21.6% was observed from 1961–1990 to 1991–2017, caused by decreased growing-season precipitation by −4 mm/decade. In addition, days with heavy rain in August and September increased slightly in Northeast China. In general, maize growth responded positively to the increased thermal conditions; in 1961–1990, 22.7% of observed maize yield-loss cases were due to low temperatures, but only 10% in 1991–2017. However, during the same time, the number of drought-induced yield loss cases increased from 27.3% to 46.7%. Moreover, yield loss cases caused by heavy rainstorms increased from 4.5% to 13.3%, indicating that heavy rainstorms have become an increasing threat to agriculture in Northeast China over the last three decades. In total, at least 70% of cases of provincial yield losses in Northeast China over the last three decades could be attributed to climatic factors. The frequency of climate hazards has changed under global warming, resulting in new challenges for agriculture. While drought and low temperatures were the primary causes for climate-induced yield losses before the 1990s, negative impacts from extreme events, mainly drought but also heavy precipitation, have increased in the last three decades, associated with global change. Farmers, agricultural scientists, and government policy makers could use these results when planning for adaptation to climate change.

In the winters of 2012-2018, a total of 25 'ultra-long' (≥6 days), wide-ranging pollution events occurred in northern China. The results showed that the atmospheric circulation pattern corresponding to 62.5% of the persistent 'most serious' and 'more serious' air pollution events in northern China were the blocking structures, and that 43.75% of the 500-hPa atmospheric circulation anomalies in the middle and high latitudes of Eurasia were 'dual-blocking', 18.75% of them were 'single-blocking'. The abnormally stable blocking situation provided a special circulation background for the occurrence and maintenance of persistent heavy air pollution in northern China. The Okhotsk blocking is significantly positively correlated with the persistent 'most serious' air pollution events. 'Stagnation' of the blocking system and its dynamic effect play an important role in regulating atmospheric environmental capacity and accelerating the accumulation of aerosols during the persistent heavy pollution episodes. Due to the synergy between the weak wind effect of the leeward slope on the eastern side of the Loess Plateau in this region and the downward airflow of the large-scale blocking system, the effect of sustained suppression of atmospheric pollutant diffusion in northern China is more significant. The downward air flow along the eastern leeward slope of the Loess Plateau is very important for accumulation of air pollutants, which is controlled by the tropospheric blocking high. In addition, the 'subsidence (temperature) inversion' effect produced by the synergy between the downward airflow of the eastern leeward slope of the Loess Plateau and the large-scale blocking system creates a continuous and stable 'warm-cover' structure in the middle of the troposphere on the eastern of the Loess Plateau; this effect strengthens the radiation effect of aerosols in the atmospheric pollutants, as well as the 'two-way feedback' mechanism between adverse meteorological conditions in the boundary layer and atmospheric pollutants.

The correlation characteristics between anomalous changes in summer precipitation on the Qinghai–Tibet Plateau (QTP) and the high-impact areas of global sea-surface temperature (SST) are mainly studied in this paper. The results show that the interdecadal change of the regional “warming-wetting” in China is especially prominent in the northern part of the main body of the QTP, which is therefore identified as the high-value area of precipitation variability. Investigations have revealed that the high-value areas of summer precipitation variability in the northern QTP are significantly correlated with four high-value areas of SST variability, namely the western North Pacific, the western Central Pacific, the Southwest Pacific, and the central Indian Ocean. In these four high-impact areas, a synchronous tendency is found in the SST increase and sea-surface specific humidity. Through the tracking analysis of the correlated vectors of the water vapor source for the warming-wetting of the QTP, it further confirms that the four high-value areas of SST variability in the Indo-Pacific Ocean are the major impact sources of water vapor transport for the warming-wetting of the QTP. Moreover, the comparison of the characteristics of various interdecadal global water vapor transport circulations show that from 1991 to 2020, the trans-equatorial water vapor transport from the Southern Hemisphere witnessed a notable increase, which furthermore suggests that the interdecadal change of SST increase in the Southwest Pacific and central Indian Ocean is the key reason for the warming-wetting of the QTP. In addition, a comprehensive image of high-impact marine water vapor sources for modulating the warming-wetting tendency in the QTP is proposed.

As an important part of surface hydrothermal process, the study of evapotranspiration has been paid more attention, and it has an important reference value for the optimal allocation of regional water resources. It hinders the accurate assessment of evapotranspiration in arid zones and its response to climate change because human activities have changed the original underlying surface of deserts and increased the complexity of calculations. In this study, the encrypted observations of natural sand land (hereinafter referred to as NSL) and constructed green land (hereinafter referred to as CGL) in the heartland of the Taklimakan Desert were analyzed by the Penman-Monteith-H (PM-H) numerical model to accurately assess the applicability of the evapotranspiration calculation method to different underlying surfaces, analyze the associated errors, and quantify the effects and contributions of the main impacting meteorological factors on the evapotranspiration calculation. Our study finds that the PM-H algorithm exhibits good applicability in Tarim Basin, where the vegetation growth period significantly affects evapotranspiration. The evapotranspiration calculation is positively affected by the difference between saturated and actual vapor pressures and the 2-m mean wind speed and negatively affected by the 2-m mean temperature and gradient of saturated water pressure. Based on high-resolution grid data, the applicability of the PM-H algorithm has been improved, and our calculations show that the mean annual potential evapotranspiration in the Tarim Basin is 2,750 mm.