The major objectives of the WCRP are to: Determine the predictability of climate, and

1. World Climate Research Programme: Issues of interest for WWRPVladimir Ryabinin (on behalf of the WCRP Joint Planning Staff) • The major objectives of the WCRP are to: • Determine the predictability of climate, and • Determine the effect of human activities on climate • Facilitate analysis and prediction of Earth system variability and change for use in an increasing range of practical applications of direct relevance, benefit and value to society (COPES Framework, 2005-2015).

2. WCRP Open Science Conference 24-28 October 2011 Denver, Colorado, USA http://conference2011.wcrp-climate.org Climate Research in Service to Society • Registered Participants: • 1907 from 86 countries • 541 Early Career Scientists & Students • 332 from Developing Countries http://conference2011.wcrp-climate.org/positionpapers.html

3. WCRP and Global Framework for Climate Services RTT • Opportunity and occasion for developing elements of a seamless prediction technology: • Increase of climate information availability • Work on unknowns in 4 priority areas of GFCS(food & agriculture, H20, health, disaster reduction) • Applied research

4. “Future Earth” A 10-year initiative of international scientific collaboration on Earth system research led by ICSU and Belmont Forum Funding for 2 initial projects: coastal zone and fresh water availability “Rio + 20”, June 2012

5. JSC JPS WDAC WMAC WGRC WGNE WGCM WGSIP (CAS/WCRP) Grand Challenges

6. 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

7. Major Climate Prediction and Projection Experiments 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

8. WCRP Modelling Advisory Council focal point for climate modelling in WCRP advise JSC and WCRP Projects on modelling modelling aspects of the Grand Challenges coordinate modelling activities (finding gaps and reducing duplication) assess strategic priority aims for WCRP modelling and current capabilities recommend to JSC and WCRP Projects activities to meet the priority aims communication and coordination across WCRP modelling groups clearing house on communication between modelling groups & JSC common voice on modelling(for IPCC, climate services & funding agencies) convey modelling needs to observing communities dealing with and advise to supercomputing challenges and centres science of data assimilation (including coupled), modelling aspects of global and regional reanalyzes, and paleoclimatic research promote seamless prediction system, model evaluation, metrics and use of ensembles Membership: 2 Co-Chairs (1 independent, other from a WCRP model panel), 2 reps of other model panels, 4 from core projects + 1 from WDAC

9. CMIP5 : Framework for Climate Change Modelling/Projections • Promote a standard set of model simulations to : • evaluate how realistic the models are in simulating the recent past • provide projections of future climate change on a range of time scales • understand factors responsible for model differences • An important input to IPCC AR5 • Taylor et al. 2009, http://cmip-pcmdi.llnl.gov/cmip5/ Near-Term : (Next 30 years) Decadal climate predictability Ocean initialization Aerosol impacts Regional climate change (high resol) & climate extremes Air quality changes (aerosols, chemistry) Long-Term : (1860 to 2100 & beyond) Evaluation of climate models (e.g. new satellite data) Detection & attribution Climate change scenarios Climate sensitivity, radiative forcing and physical feedbacks (e.g. clouds) Biogeochemical feedbacks (e.g. carbon, chemistry)

10. CMIP5 participating groups (24 groups; 50+ models; 3 Mar 2012: 41 models available from 20 centers)

11. WCRP CORDEX A Coordinated Regional Downscaling Experiment http://wcrp.ipsl.jussieu.fr/SF_RCMTerms.html Generating an ensemble of high-resolution regional climate projections for the majority of land regions of the globe, including the two poles, based on a suitable sample of CMIP5 GCM projections. Strong orientation towards user needs: impacts and adaptation

12. Coordinated Regional Climate Downscaling (CORDEX) •12 domains with a resolution of 0.44° (approx. 50x50km²) •Focus on Africa •High resolution ~0.11°x0.11° for Europe (by some institutions) Example of CORDEX data available for Africa and other regions: July to September mean precipitation for 1998-2008. Four observational (top row), accumulated 12-24 hour forecast from ERA-Interim reanalysis, the ensemble mean and individual Regional Climate Models Jones et al, The Coordinated Regional Downscaling Experiment: CORDEX An international downscaling link to CMIP5, CLIVAR Exchanges, special issue, No56, Vol. 16, No. 2, 2011

13. Working Group on Regional Climate(2-way communication: science - users) coordination of WCRP research on regional climate information & services communication between WCRP, GFCS and Future Earth, point of contact to regional climate information/service entities prioritization of WCRP regional climate research and prediction advice for impact assessment, decision making and climate services, especially on water, health, food and disaster risk reduction oversee regional climate research initiatives such as CORDEX visibility of WCRP regional science and communication of advances to climate service institutions (through web, reports, workshops, etc.) liaison with other programmes, communication of science priorities to funding agencies, NGOs and development agencies Membership: 2 Co-Chairs, 4 from core projects + experts inregional climate downscaling, regional process research, regional climate observations, climate prediction research or operation, change impact assessment, climate service provision, adaptation/vulnerability and/or socio-economic community

14. CMIP5 output is being served via a distributed archive managed by the PCMDI-led Earth System Grid Federation (ESGF) Data Nodes (at major international climate research centers) Three Primary CMIP5 Data Portals Node 1 Node 3 Node 5 BADC Data Portal Node 2 Node 4 PCMDI Data Portal DKRZ Data Portal Local copy of heavily-used data Data Portal Model & expt. documentation > 1 PetaByte of data already available! Data Users (climate model analysts worldwide)

15. Climate system Historical Forecast Project • Specializedexperiments • GLACE(2) • Stratosphere • Sea-Ice HFP 92*12_A_SSG CHFP: 18 participating groups WGSIP promoted -> now a WG on WCRP level

16. Reanalysis Conference Themes Status and Plans: Major international reanalysis development, including broad disciplinary overviews (e.g., atmosphere, oceans, hydrology, cryosphere). Validation and Metrics: Intercomparison and validation studies; assessing the impact of the assimilation and analysis increments; innovative diagnostics that characterize the degree to which a reanalysis represents reality and ultimately applicability for weather and climate research. Data Assimilation: Data assimilation techniques and impact on eventual reanalysis data products, especially producing a climate quality time series. Space and In Situ Observations: Studies on the quality and stewardship of observations and their use in reanalyses and exploiting new data types and sources. Applications in Support of Climate, Weather and Environmental Services: Innovative research using reanalysis to study the weather, ocean, hydrology and climate, including operational climate monitoring, study of extremes and high impact weather, climate assessment and end-to-end decision making studies. International Collaborative Efforts: Projects and plans for developing and using reanalysis to the benefit of the international community.

17. WCRP Data Advisory Council focal point for observations and data in WCRP advise JSC and WCRP Projects on observations and climate data promote research using sustained observations and process studies assessment of adequacy of observations and products for climate research assessment of gaps in the observing system in cooperation with observation programmes promote assessment and comparison of climate-data products, including from reanalyzes promote research for improvement in the processing and reprocessing of FCDRs promote mechanisms for archival of, access to and analysis of data, and metadata promote standards for products, including global and regional reanalyzes promote science of coupled data assimilation and coordinated approach to reanalysis liaise with GCOS, CEOS and CGMS Membership: 2 Co-Chairs, 4 from core projects + 3 GCOS Panels + representatives from WDAC, WGRC, IGBP, SOLAS, CEOS and CGMS

18. GIPPS • Toronto workshop (April 2012): focussing on implementation strategy GIPPS WWRP PPP WCRP PCPI Sea-Level R WCRP polar climate predictability initiative Frontier Questions (+ science Qs): How predictable is Arctic climate? How will changes in the variability in the coming decades, when variability is perhaps different, affect predictability? Imperatives: Methods for proper initialization of the coupled system Resolution requirements Implementation Mechanisms: Workshop to construct metrics… • Bergen workshop (October 2010): science-driven

19. WCRP – WWRP (healthy) Cooperation S2S – in hand, developing YOTC - in hand Polar (YOPP?) – WCRP still needs to do a lot for this WCRP initiative to start making good sense, but the prospects are there Significant joint work via WGNE, as Andy reported