Human influence on growing period frosts like the early april 2021 in Central France

The study finds that while overall spring minimum temperatures are increasing, human-caused warming has advanced the start of the growing season (bud burst), exposing plants to more intense frosts. The April 2021 event in central France is attributed in part to this shift, with models projecting an increase in the frequency of such growing-period frosts in a 2°C warmer climate.

• Human-induced climate change has reduced the intensity of fixed-season spring cold spells. Without this influence, temperatures in April would have been lower by 1.2°C [0.7°C;1.6°C] compared to preindustrial conditions.
• Despite the general decrease in spring cold spells, human-caused warming has advanced the timing of bud burst. This effect outweighs the decrease in cold spells, increasing the intensity of extreme frosts occurring after the growing season has started by approximately -2°C (range: -3.3°C to -0.6°C).
• The April 2021 frost event was made 60% more likely [20%-120%] due to human-caused climate change, as climate model ensembles simulate a cooling of growing-period annual temperature minima of 0.5°C [0°C to 1°C] since the pre-industrial era.
• The April 2021 event caused massive agricultural damage in France, with the National Federation of Farmers' Unions (FNSEA) estimating combined losses in wine and arboriculture sectors exceeding 4 billion euros, and some regions like Rhône reporting over 80% harvest destruction.
• Climate models generally underestimate the observed trends in growing-period frost intensities, although they accurately simulate the decreasing intensity of the lowest overall spring temperatures.
• In a climate with 2°C of global warming relative to pre-industrial levels, the probability of an exceptional growing-period frost event similar to 2021 is projected to increase significantly by approximately 40% [20%-60%].

APA

Vautard, R., van Oldenborgh, G. J., Bonnet, R., Li, S., Robin, Y., Kew, S., Philip, S., Soubeyroux, J.-M., Dubuisson, B., Viovy, N., Reichstein, M., & Otto, F. (n.d.). Human influence on growing period frosts like the early april 2021 in Central France. World Weather Attribution. https://www.worldweatherattribution.org/wp-content/uploads/GrowingPeriodFrost2021.pdf

Chicago

Vautard, R., G. J. van Oldenborgh, R. Bonnet, S. Li, Y. Robin, S. Kew, S. Philip, et al. Human influence on growing period frosts like the early april 2021 in Central France. World Weather Attribution, n.d. https://www.worldweatherattribution.org/wp-content/uploads/GrowingPeriodFrost2021.pdf.

Wikipedia

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BibTeX

@techreport{vautardndhuman, author = {Vautard, R. and van Oldenborgh, G. J. and Bonnet, R. and Li, S. and Robin, Y. and Kew, S. and Philip, S. and Soubeyroux, J.-M. and Dubuisson, B. and Viovy, N. and Reichstein, M. and Otto, F.}, title = {{Human influence on growing period frosts like the early april 2021 in Central France}}, institution = {World Weather Attribution}, url = {https://www.worldweatherattribution.org/wp-content/uploads/GrowingPeriodFrost2021.pdf}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }