NCAR Research into climate issues Climate Analysis Section

1. NCAR Research into climate issues Climate Analysis Section • NCAR is sponsored by the National Science Foundation

2. Global warming is “unequivocal”:Adaptation to climate change • Assess vulnerability • Devise coping strategies • Determine impacts of possible changes • Plan for future changes Requires information

3. Imperative:A climate information system • Observations: forcings,atmosphere, ocean, land • Analysis: comprehensive, integrated, products • Assimilation: model based, initialization • Attribution: understanding, causes • Assessment: global, regions, impacts, planning • Predictions: multiple time scales • Decision Making: impacts, adaptation An Integrated Earth System Information System

4. NCAR Climate Information System Trenberth, 2008 WMO Bull Nature 6 December 2007

5. Climate Analysis Section The mission is to increase the understanding of the atmosphere and climate system through empirical studies and diagnostic analyses of the atmosphere and its interactions with the Earth's surface and oceans on a wide range of scales. By increasing understanding, we evaluate and develop datasets, new methods of analysis, new products, and establish attribution and predictability and the processes involved, all of which contribute to a climate information system and climate services ENSO Climate Change NAO

6. CAS Activities Community Service and Outreach e.g. • Assessments (IPCC, CCSP SAPs) • WCRP (CLIVAR; GEWEX), GCOS, IGBP (GLOBEC) • NRC (CRC), CCSP, NOAA, other panels, advisory bds • Working with postdocs, students and visitors • E&O (SOARS, K-12 Education; Public lectures) • Media outreach (UCAR contact list) • Congressional testimony • Editorships • Decision making (WGA, WUCA, …)

7. CAS CAS contributed a lot to IPCC 2007 Coordinating Lead Authors NCAR Some Contributing “Authors” Lead Authors

8. CAS Activities Productivity Some metrics Publications:Since 1 January 2004 CAS scientists have authored or coauthored ~234* refereed journal articles Impact: Publications are highly cited (4 staff members are recognized by ISI as “highly cited researchers”; over 38,700 citations among us (July 2010)) Proposals:16!: all CAS scientists have 1 or more (usually 2) Collaborations: Many in universities and other laboratories Community Service and Outreach: as outlined previously, service is extensive and visibility is high *D42,D28,F21,H23,M1,P10,S5,T9,T61,W34 (July 2010; incl in press): 301 with Meehl ! In place and pending

9. CAS Activities Web page http://www.cgd.ucar.edu/cas Receives many hits: • CAS home page one of most visited in CGD: comparable to CESM1.0 • Top section page (by far) • 13 of top 20 most visited in CGD are CAS • For July 1-25: • CAS home page 1800 hits • Scientists: 230 to 466 hits (well above other CGD)

10. CAS Activities Data Set Development and Community Distribution (http://www.cgd.ucar.edu/cas/catalog) • Acquisition (with DSS) of data (global analyses; reanalyses; satellite; surface) • Reformatting, Evaluation; Improvement • Development of new (value-added) products • Climate Indices • Documentation of methods, metadata, results • Promotion of reprocessing and reanalysis • Web Access and Data Catalogs • Processing and Data Display; Workshops (http://www.ncl.ucar.edu)

11. CAS Activities Data Set catalog http://www.cgd.ucar.edu/cas/catalog Has many pages backing it up: Recently redone. Has 7 of top 20 visits (out of cgd.ucar.edu), mainly for climate indices (3382 hits 1-25 July 2010)

12. Rainfall annual cycle Observed CCSM Diagnostic Studies and Attribution Of the real world • Of mean, variability and change • Phenomena (ENSO, NAO, PDO, AMO, MJO etc) • High impacts events (droughts, floods, hurricanes) • Processes Of models • Numerical experimentation: mechanisms and attribution Development of analytical and diagnostic techniques to process observations and model data and facilitate their evaluation

13. Climate Analysis: Diagnostic, Theoretical and Modeling Studies • Empirical and diagnostic analyses of models and observations • Climate observations • Community data sets • Community software development • Climate predictability • Climate sensitivity • Paleoclimate • Climate change Physical constraints: e.g. The energy and water cycles • How they change over time Trenberth et al 2009; Trenberth et al 2007

14. Water cycleresearch • The global water cycle and its response to global warming, focusing on clouds, precipitation, streamflow, soil moisture droughts, etc. • Model evaluation and diagnostics • Land precipitation closely matches river discharge • Large ENSO effects • Mt Pinatubo effects Trenberth and Dai 2007 Dai et al 2009 Drought is increasing most places Dai et al 2004

15. GHG+O3 Forcing SST forcing only Attribution CAShas carried out many studies on mechanisms and modes of variability that have contributed to observed climate anomalies. CAS helps develop capabilities that contribute to an operational attribution activity by pioneering studies and numerical experimentation that might be used in near real time to allow reliable statements to be made not only about what the state of the climate is, but also why it is the way it is. Studies involve the atmosphere and the fully coupled system. Sea Level Pressure Trend Simulated by CAM3: 1950-2000 All forcing: (SST+GHG+O3) (pattern correlation with nature = 0.8) Deser and Phillips (J. Climate)

16. CAS Activities Atmospheric Reanalyses Current atmosphericreanalyses, with the horizontal resolution (latitude; T159 is equivalent to about 0.8 ), the starting and ending dates, the approximate vintage of the model and analysis system, and current status.

17. Transport • E-P_ocean • P-E_land

18. CCSM4 1990s vs Trenberth et al for 2000-2005 Lower as the 1990s include Pinatubo

19. Decadal Climate Variability • 1900-2009 • 1900-2009 Change in Winter Sea Level Pressure (1980-2008) • Dec-Mar • (hPa) • Pressure Falls • Pressure Rises Hurrell et al. (2010)

20. CAS Activities Pacific Cold and Atlantic Warm CAS: CESM Numerical Experiments and Data Sets e.g. SST product for AMIP integrations • Updated frequently (supports attribution) • Available through Community Data Portal • Used by major modeling groups Leadership of and involvement in CESM WGs • Leadership of overall project, CCWG and CVWG • Many experiments for community use: (http://www.cesm.ucar.edu/working_groups/Variability/experiments.html) • Coordinated experiments addressing role of SSTs and soil moisture in regional drought • 40-member CCSM ensemble (2000-2061: A1B) Evaluation of CESM and component models • Comparisons among models and with observations and evaluations to score the results, including in multi-model ensembles

21. CAS Activities North Atlantic MOC Predictability Trend (1st “Decade”) Trend (2nd “Decade”) Prediction and Predictability e.g. Initialized Decadal Prediction Studies to assess the predictability associated with the initial state and thermal inertia, modes of variability, internal mechanisms and coupling among climate system components and forcings Nested Regional Climate Modeling Develop two-way nesting capability (WRF/ROMS and CAM/POP) Apply to investigate scale-interactions and develop approaches to address systematic CGCM biases Provide community support for the modeling system Apply the models for climate change research involving extreme events such as hurricanes Develop unified global modeling system representing a wide range of scales

22. An Informed Guide to Climate Datasets with Relevance to Earth System Model Evaluation(proposal submitted to NSF 10-554 EaSM) Objectives: Evaluate and assess selected climate datasets Provide “expert-user” guidance addressing strengths & limitations Fills and major community gap and an immediate need within CESM Features: Facilitate and enhance access to relevant datasets for diagnostic analyses and model evaluation (including CMIP5/AR5) Web-based guide, including a means for enabling additional informed commentary and datasets outside of our own expertise Atmosphere, Ocean, Land, Cryosphere, Biosphere Expertise within CAS well positioned for this task

23. Prototype of the “Informed Guide”

24. NESL Imperatives (paraphrased) • promote innovation and creativity • improve prediction and attribution of variations and changes in climate; assessment of impacts; and communicating results; • advance our world-leading numerical modeling systems of the atmosphere and earth system, and support their wide community use; • advanced supercomputing and data services; • support earth system research and understanding through development and support of observational facilities, and leadership of focused observational studies; and, • attract diverse students and early career scientists, and provide them with exciting opportunities for educational and professional development.

25. Future needs: Observations and Analysis • Observations: in situ and from space (that satisfy the climate observing principles); • A performance tracking system; • Climate Data Records (CDRs) • The ingest, archival, stewardship of data, data management; • Access to data • Data processing and analysis • The analysis and reanalysis of the observations and derivation of products, • Data assimilation and model initialization