Warmer temperatures due to climate change lead to wetter air, and we've seen more extreme rainfall and flooding across North America.

A new study from researchers at Environment and Climate Change Canada found that climate change has made: .

"We're finding that in North America, we have seen an increase in the frequency and severity of heavy rainfall events.

And this is largely due to global warming," said Megan Kirchmeier-Young, a research scientist at Environment and Climate Change Canada and lead author of the study published this week in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The largest increases in extreme precipitation were in the eastern part of North America.

In general across North America, Kirchmeier-Young says storms that would happen:.

Once a century without human-caused climate change now happen every 20 years.

Once every 20 years without human-caused climate change now happen every five years.

Rising flood insurance claims were just some of the evidence that already pointed to increased extreme rainfall in North America before the publication of the new study. .

Other studies had already found human-caused climate change was linked to increasing extreme rainfall on a global or hemisphere scale.

But Francis Zwiers, director of the Climate Impacts Consortium at the University of Victoria, said the new study is the first to link more frequent extreme rainfall and climate change in North America. .

The fact that it now can be measured on the scale of North America is significant, he said.

For example, engineering standards are designed to expect building repairs from extreme rainfall and flooding at certain intervals, such as every 50 years.".