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WCRP polar climate predictability initiative. Vladimir Ryabinin www.wcrp-climate.org. A notable gap was that between scientific communities, as most people knew only a small minority of the other participants.
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WCRP polar climate predictability initiative Vladimir Ryabinin www.wcrp-climate.org
A notable gap was that between scientific communities, as most people knew only a small minority of the other participants. …it seems apparent that progress in polar predictability will require crossing disciplinary boundaries to understand the feedbacks between the troposphere and the stratosphere, ocean, land, and sea ice • Bergen workshop (October 2010): science-driven • Informal WCRP Report
(SST) (Douville, 2009)
Predictability: seasonal (J. Cohen, 2011) Seasonal Forecast from AER(Atmospheric & Environmental Research) Role of snow cover
Snow Forced Signal J. Cohen, 20…
Multiple feedbacks involving sea ice J. Overland
-- > “Warm AO – cold continents” J. Overland
Role of Sea Ice Y. Orsolini
Predictability: inter-annual Correlation between wintertime Arctic sea ice area and SATs Annual mean Arctic sea ice area anomalies and oceanic volume flux (upper 125 m)through Spitzbergen-Norway meridional (about 20E) cross-section r = - 0.77 Cyclonic circulation (Bengtsson, 2004) Westerly winds Barents Sea Barents inflow
Predictability: decadal (Boer & Lambert) (Ed Hawkins) Decadal: forced change + natural variability
Climate Predictions and Projections Coupled Model Intercomparison Experiment 5 – CMIP5 IPCC AR5 Climate-system Historical Forecast Project - CHFP sea ice,stratosphere seasonal decades, centuries Coordinated Regional Downscaling Experiment – CORDEX IPCC AR5 Arctic Africa Chemistry-Climate ModelValidation chemistry, ozone Antarctic regional
The nature of feedbacks appears to be different in the two hemispheres leading to different “big questions”: • Understanding and predicting the rate of Arctic sea ice loss • Understanding the drivers of change in the Antarctic, including connections to ozone, ocean circulation, carbon uptake, and ice shelves • Imperatives • Improve models • Identify measurement needs, both for initialization and for monitoring variability and long-term changes
IASC Atmosphere meeting in Denver (October 23, 2011) • IASC-A sees itself as more “bottom up”, e.g. field experiments, and sees the WCRP initiative as being very complementary (link through Jim Overland, NOAA PMEL) • Toronto workshop (April 2-4, 2012) • Aim for around 30-35 people, representing science topics and partner activities (some continuity with Bergen) • Outcome will be a draft implementation plan to be considered at the JSC meeting in July 2012
Expected implementation mechanisms • Targeted workshops • Climate process teams • Coordinated evaluation/assessment of data sets • Observational data sets • Reanalyses • Seasonal predictions (CHFP) • Historical simulations (CMIP) • Decadal and longer timescale predictions (CMIP) • OSSEs to define measurement needs • Coordinated model experiments
WCRP Grand Challenges • Provision of skillful future climate information on regional scales (includes decadal and polar predictability) • Regional Sea-Level Rise • Cryosphere response to climate change (including ice sheets, water resources, permafrost and carbon) • Improved understanding of the interactions of clouds, aerosols, precipitation, and radiation and their contributions to climate sensitivity • Past and future changes in water availability (with connections to water security and hydrological cycle) • Science underpinning the prediction and attribution of extreme events
WCRP polar climate predictability initiative & WWRP Polar Prediction Research Project: commons • Models, a lot of similarities • Observations, almost enough for NWP, not the case for climate • Data assimilation: melt ponds, land surface, stratosphere, more for climate • Goal: seamless multi-scale prediction system • Different readiness to address prediction needs in NH and SH • Polar regions are only the focus of targeted improvements within our projects but the overall progress in prediction will be achieved by global systems -> need a reliable and welcoming entry of our results into global systems – roles of WWRP & WCRP • Same communities? How big is the overlap? • Welcome to Toronto… Thank you!