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Forecast Products User Meeting: 14-16 June 2006 Summary. ECMWF progress and performance. High resolution system introduced 1 February 2006 More accurate analyses and forecasts (especially EPS) Better forecasts of severe weather (structure of tropical cyclones)
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Forecast Products User Meeting: 14-16 June 2006Summary Forecast Products User Meeting June 2006 Summary
ECMWF progress and performance • High resolution system introduced 1 February 2006 • More accurate analyses and forecasts (especially EPS) • Better forecasts of severe weather (structure of tropical cyclones) • Very good spring 2006 for Europe (maintain lead over other global forecasts) • Substantial improvement in NCEP forecasts for winter 05-06 • EPS • T399 control closer to T799; EM better at early range; members more skilful; probabilistic scores improved • Initial results from verification of smaller scales (e.g. PV) complement synoptic scale verification (Z500 etc) Forecast Products User Meeting June 2006 Summary
ECMWF progress and performance • Weather parameters • Better cloud forecasts (new scheme April 05) • Improved winds (T799) • 2m temperature skill “plateau” in Europe • Slow improvement in precip forecasts • High-resolution precipitation analysis – reference level for skill • Difficulty of verifying weather parameters • representativeness of observations, observation error • Increasing model resolution and quality • Do the scores give the right signal? Forecast Products User Meeting June 2006 Summary
ECMWF progress and performance • Monthly • skilful v persistence for NH • Good skill for Indian monsoon, less for W African monsoon • Forecast on web (new products – MJO) • verification on web, updated each week • Seasonal • Good skill for tropical SST prediction • Atmospheric skill varies with region and season (Europe: temperature skill in summer); tropical cyclone frequency • EUROSIP multi-model gives enhanced skill • Verification updated annually (this year waiting for obs) Forecast Products User Meeting June 2006 Summary
ECMWF future developments • Model changes – next cycle 31r1 • Variational radiance bias correction, AMDAR thinning • Implicit convection, cloud ice, orographic drag, improved wind gusts • Will be common cycle also for seasonal system 3 and interim reanalysis • VAREPS • EPS • Model uncertainty – new stochastic physics under development • Initial uncertainty – research into revised perturbation methods continues • Seasonal forecast system 3 • Higher resolution, GHG and aerosols, new sea-ice, ocean currents coupled to WAM, improved ocean DA • Improved Nino SST forecasts (spring barrier) • Improved precip, reduced biases • Later - unified medium-range and monthly EPS Forecast Products User Meeting June 2006 Summary
ECMWF product development - EFI • New EFI climate operational from 1 Feb 2006 • control re-forecasts (1971-2000) 48h f/c • Dynamic – will match model upgrades • Allows new parameters (Tmin, Tmax, …) • Re-forecasts archived in MARS • EFI verification – initial results • EFI better than raw probabilities for extremes (calibration needed) • Improved scores with new climate • EFI for monthly forecast • Alternative/complementary measures (SOP, SPS) • See latest ECMWF Newsletter www.ecmwf.int/publications/newsletters/ Forecast Products User Meeting June 2006 Summary
ECMWF product development • EPS re-forecast for calibration and verification (cf monthly) • Initial results: calibration can improve skill compared to using raw EPS data • Number of years, number of members tbd • Combining deterministic forecast and EPS can improve probabilistic forecasts • Representation of probability information – suggestion of possible alternative EPSgrams Forecast Products User Meeting June 2006 Summary
ECMWF data available for research • ECMWF makes data available for Research & Education freely or at a handling charge only • Restrictions on access to real-time (valid) data • For Commercial use, data is also available through Data Services (Archived and Real-time), with additional cost (information charge) • Direct access to more than 2 PetaBytes of data in the ECMWF MARS archive using pseudo-meteorological language • 1 Terabyte of data online on public data server (including re-analysis ERA-15 and ERA-40 and DEMETER seasonal data) • Thorpex Interactive Grand Global Ensemble (TIGGE) archive at ECMWF under development • Variety of data formats and delivery methods • More information: www.ecmwf.int/products/data Forecast Products User Meeting June 2006 Summary
Users: applications • Increasing range of applications (public and commercial) – expanded range of weather products • Medium-range, monthly, seasonal, archived data, waves • Energy, media, transport, marine • Oil (tropical cyclones) • Health: heat wave medium-range), malaria (seasonal) • Drought planning • Water management boards – risk profile “50mm in 72h, P>30%” important to discuss with users • Triggers, alerts for forecasters, shift management • New applications – “EPS is now thought of first” Forecast Products User Meeting June 2006 Summary
Users: New products • Automated fronts (including occlusion) • Cyclone tracks • Derived products for (severe) weather detection, including stability indices and synoptic weather codes/symbols • Traffic light maps • Risk (severity+probability) • Wave rose • EPSgrams for wave height Forecast Products User Meeting June 2006 Summary
Users: Downscaling, post-processing • Dynamical downscaling • EPS used for initial and boundary conditions • focus on severe precipitation • Growing activity in regional short-range EPS • Statistical downscaling • EPS calibration - BMA (precipitation difficult) • Regimes (Grosswetterlagen) • Subjective (forecaster can improve DMO) • Tools • Statistical downscaling portal • Emtool: “dressing” forecasts (EPS and deterministic) to make PDFs • Climate explorer • ERA40 is useful resource for post-processing applications Forecast Products User Meeting June 2006 Summary
Users: performance • T799 – improvements for severe events • Good example of tropical cyclogenesis (T511) • EPS products much more accepted with T399 • EPS-based early warnings – good skill D1-4, only small drop D5,6 • Good probability of high but not extreme values (precip, wind) • Monthly skill over Europe weeks 1-3 skill, but week 4 (temperature)? • Precipitation difficult to verify Forecast Products User Meeting June 2006 Summary
Users: Performance issues • Convective snow (high priority for Met Office – improve parametrization?) • Temperature and low cloud (inversion) still problem in winter • NCEP temperatures better over Europe last winter • Tmin over deep snow can have large errors in some cases (representation of snow cover and depth?) • Location of convective rain events in summer can be in error • Users find EPS can be helpful with this even in early range Forecast Products User Meeting June 2006 Summary
User comments and requests • Dissemination • 00 UTC products too late for some operational activity • Earlier dissemination of most important products? • Forecasts are already disseminated as they are generated (day 1 well before day 10) – see next page for current schedule. Times will be reviewed after next supercomputer upgrade (Phase 4) this year • How should EPS be used to derive complex (multi-parameter) indices or drive application models? • Drive application with each member and produce pdf of index • All EPS members are available for post-processing and user applications • Archive of severe events including hindcasts with current model version to use in testing new products and diagnostics Forecast Products User Meeting June 2006 Summary
T799/T399 product availability times Table 1: Dissemination Times for selected key components of the Operation Forecasting System Forecast Products User Meeting June 2006 Summary
User comments and requests • Verification • More for tropics on web • Seasonal forecast (will be updated for 2005 soon) • Confidence index or significance for scores (under development - some examples shown) • ECMWF verification package for external users • New verification currently under development; not ready for general use yet Forecast Products User Meeting June 2006 Summary
User comments and requests • Products • More wave data on web • Max wind over period (wind gusts are available) • Model temp profile (BUFR) • Hindcasts/esuite data for calibration • Hindcasts are under development • Updated EPSgrams – • more detail (more quantile info) • more parameters • Interactive (users choose which parameters to display) • Day 1-3 EPSgram with more detail (i.e. 3h time resolution) • Metview facility for users to plot EPSgrams for old cases • Climate information on plumes, EPSgrams • More interactive web plots (clickable, zoomable, choice of parameters) Forecast Products User Meeting June 2006 Summary