Scaling ,Variability and Persistence of long-term Precipitation across Germany and of Elbe River Flow as Indicators of recent regional Climate Change

It is now commonly accepted that, owing to the increased anthropogenic CO2 production over the last century, the earth’s climate will be affected in the foreseeable future globally as well as regionally. These climate changes will have strong implications on the future living conditions, for the good or the bad. As for Germany, recent regional climate models have predicted significant seasonal changes of, mainly, temperatures and precipitation for the coming century that will require regional adjustments of the management of water resources, particularly, for agriculture. While the average citizen in Germany may have the perceived feeling that climate change, namely, a warming trend with summer extremes has affected the country several times during the last decade also supported by meteorological measurements it is still not clear whether such variations are just outliers in the observed hydro-meteorological time series with it’s well-known stochastic nature, or whether they are just part of a long-term trend pattern that has already been ongoing over most of the 20 century.