This study investigates present and future European heat wave magnitudes, represented by the Heat Wave Magnitude Index-daily (HWMId), for regional climate models (RCMs) and the driving global climate models (GCMs) over Europe. A subset of the large EURO-CORDEX ensemble is employed to study sources of uncertainties related to the choice of GCMs, RCMs, and their combinations.

We initially compare the evaluation runs of the RCMs driven by ERA-interim reanalysis to E-OBS (observation-based estimates), finding that the RCMs can capture most of the observed spatial and temporal features of HWMId. With their higher resolution compared to GCMs, RCMs can reveal spatial features of HWMId associated with small-scale processes (e.g., orographic effects); moreover, RCMs represent large-scale features of HWMId satisfactorily (e.g., by reproducing the general pattern revealed by E-OBS with high values at western coastal regions and low values at the eastern part). Our results indicate a clear added value of the RCMs compared to the driving GCMs. Forced with the emission scenario RCP8.5, all the GCM and RCM simulations consistently project a rise in HWMId at an exponential rate. However, the climate change signals projected by the GCMs are generally attenuated when downscaled by the RCMs, with the spatial pattern also altered.

The uncertainty in a simulated future change of heat wave magnitudes following global warming can be attributed almost equally to the difference in model physics (as represented by different RCMs) and to the driving data associated with different GCMs. Regarding the uncertainty associated with RCM choice, a major factor is the different representation of the orographic effects. No consistent spatial pattern in the ensemble spread associated with different GCMs is observed between the RCMs, suggesting GCM uncertainties are transformed by RCMs in a complex manner due to the nonlinear nature of model dynamics and physics.

In summary, our results support the use of dynamical downscaling for deriving regional climate realization regarding heat wave magnitudes.