Creating High-Resolution Precipitation and Extreme Precipitation Indices Datasets by Downscaling and Improving on the ERA5 Reanalysis Data over Greece

The aim of this study was to construct a high-resolution (1 km × 1 km) database of precipitation, number of wet days, and number of times precipitation exceeded 10 mm and 20 mm over Greece on a monthly and on an annual basis. In order to achieve this, the ERA5 reanalysis dataset was downscaled using regression kriging with histogram-based gradient boosting regression trees. The independent variables used are spatial parameters derived from a high-resolution digital elevation model and a selection of ERA5 reanalysis data, while as the dependent variable in the training stages, we used 97 precipitation gauges from the Hellenic National Meteorological Service for the period 1980–2010. These stations were also used for validation purposes using a leave-one-out cross-validation methodology. The results of the study showed that the algorithm is able to achieve better R2 and RMSE over the standalone ERA5 dataset over the Greek region. Additionally, the largest improvements were noticed in the wet days and in the precipitation over 10 and 20 mm, where the ERA5 reanalysis dataset overestimates the number of wet days and underestimates precipitation over 10 and 20 mm, while geographically, the ERA5 dataset performs the worst in the island regions of Greece. This indicates that the ERA5 dataset does not simulate the precipitation intensity accurately over the Greek region, and using our methodology, we were able to increase the accuracy and the resolution. Our approach delivers higher-resolution data, which are able to more accurately depict precipitation in the Greek region and are needed for comprehensive climate change hazard identification and analysis.