Ferrantia, Volume 43: Contribution à la Climatologie du Luxembourg: Analyses Historiques. Scenarios Futurs [Contribution to the Climatology of Luxembourg: Historial Analyses. Future Scenarios]

About this book

Language: French, with trilingual abstracts in English, French and German

Contribution à la Climatologie du Luxembourg contains the following four papers:


Jos A Massard: Aspects de l’histoire de la météorologie au Luxembourg

The first meteorological observations in Luxembourg were made by professor Nicolas Bodson (1802-1871), beginning in winter 1837 and ending in 1852. At the same time professor P.J.J. van Kerckhof (1813-1876) made records too, but unfortunately they are mostly lost. The greatest pioneer of Luxembourg meteorology was professor François Reuter (1819-1908) with observations ranging from 1854 to 1894 and published in several books and articles. His last records were published posthumously in 1917 by professor Guillaume Soisson (1866-1918). The first official weather service was created in 1907 and attached to the ‘Administration des services agricoles’ (Administration of agricultural services). In 1946, the opening of the airport of Luxembourg required the creation of a specific weather service linked to the airport.

In 1950 professor Eugène Lahr (1897-1981), observer of the weather station of Luxembourg-Limpertsberg, published the results of one century of meteorological observations made in Luxembourg, a fundamental work for the meteorology of the Grand Duchy which was completed in 1964 by the publication of a comprehensive work on the weather and the climate of Luxembourg. The ‘Annuaire météorologique et hydrologique’ (Weather and hydrological directory) published since 1949 by the 'Administration des services techniques de l’agriculture’ (Administration of the engineering departments of agriculture) remains a precious weather data source.

Some of the publications of the STATEC (Service central de la statistique et des études économiques, Central service of statistics and economic surveys) also provide information on the climate.


Gilles Drogue, Lucien Hoffmann & Laurent Pfister: Les archives climatiques quantitatives de Luxembourg-ville: analyse primaire des longues séries chronologiques (1838-2003)

Instrumental meteorological observations were initiated in the Grand-Duchy of Luxembourg since the early 19th century. Systematic and progressive standard meteorological measurements allowed building up climatological archives, which provide today a historical perspective of the main meteorological parameters over more than 150 years. Nevertheless, it is absolutely necessary that raw data contained in these climatological archives be subject to a homogenization procedure in order to remove any instrumental artefacts on the meteorological observations. The aim of this paper is therefore to apply a homogenization methodology for controlling the reliability of long-term rainfall, air temperature and sunshine duration series recorded in Luxembourg-city in order to be able to perform multi-decadal climatic variability analyses in the Grand-Duchy of Luxembourg.


Gilles Drogue, Lucien Hoffmann & Laurent Pfister et al: Evolution du climat et répercussions sur le fonctionnement des hydrosystèmes au Grand-Duché de Luxembourg au cours des 150 dernières années

The scientific study of the climate of the Grand-Duchy of Luxembourg started by the middle of the 19th century, when systematic observations of climatic variables first took place on a regular basis. This actually was an initiative of a few professors of secondary schools of the city of Luxembourg. The first hydrological observations started by the end of the 19th century on the main rivers of the hydrographical network of the Grand-Duchy of Luxembourg, namely the Sure and the Moselle. As a result of the second World War, many observations that had been made until the middle of the 1940s were probably lost. However, some historical hydro-climatological observation series are still available today. Their analysis, together with data issued by an ever increasing observation network during the second half of the 20th century, has allowed to study trends in the behaviour of the river systems, as well as their sensitivity to the variability of climatological variables. The analysis of those historical observation series has shown that since the middle of the 20th century, winter rainfall has been characterised by a strong increasing trend, mainly due to a marked increase in the number of days with westerly atmospheric circulations. The river systems have reacted to these changes in rainfall with a statistically significant increase of maximum daily runoff during winter.


Gilles Drogue, Lucien Hoffmann, Patrick Matgen & Laurent Pfister et al: Trajectoire climatique et réponse hydrologique à l’horizon 2050: l’exemple de deux cours d’eau luxembourgeois

In the context of a very likely global warming in the future decades, elaborating scenarios for quantifying the impact of climate variations on hydro-systems is of major importance. Based on two IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) emission scenarios, this paper suggests two climate scenarios for the Grand- Duchy of Luxembourg in the 2050’s, both characterized, more or less, by more humid and warmer conditions in winter, as well as drier and warmer conditions in summer. The hydrological response of two gauged Alzette river tributaries to these future climate forcings has been simulated with a conceptual rainfall-runoff model. Outcomes of the modelling impact assessment indicate: i) no evolution for the annual mean discharge, ii) a higher winter flood hazard magnitude for a given return period, iii) more pronounced high water levels with a shift towards a maximum in March, iv) severe low flows in summer.

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