Inter-annual and seasonal patterns of precipitable water vapour over Malaysia from 1990–2019 based on MERRA-2 reanalysis

Abstract

In this study seasonal and inter-annual patterns as well as trend in the total precipitable water vapour (TPW) over Malaysia, based on a 30-year data from MERRA-2, have been evaluated using least square regression method. Indicator TPW revealed a pair of minima in February/August and maxima in May/November with highest and lowest long-term means found in East Malaysia. Long-term seasonal variability of TPW exhibited latitudinal dependency in both the NEM and SWM seasons. Indicator TPW showed respective southeast-northwest and southwest-northeast spatial distribution in West and East Malaysia, with the highest statistically significant positive trend found in the former.

Keywords

• total precipitable water vapour
• merra-2
• monsoon
• reanalysis