The Effects of Model Resolution on the Simulation of Regional Climate Extreme Events

The fifth-generation Pennsylvania State University/NCAR Mesoscale Model Version 3 (MM5V3) was used to simulate extreme heavy rainfall events over the Yangtze River Basin in June 1999. The effects of model's horizontal and vertical resolution on the extreme climate events were investigated in detail. In principle, the model was able to characterize the spatial distribution of monthly heavy precipitation. The results indicated that the increase in horizontal resolution could reduce the bias of the modeled heavy rain and reasonably simulate the change of daily precipitation during the study period. A finer vertical resolution led to obviously improve rainfall simulations with smaller biases, and hence, better resolve heavy rainfall events. The increase in both horizontal and vertical resolution could produce better predictions of heavy rainfall events. Not only the rainfall simulation altered in the cases of different horizontal and vertical grid spacing, but also other meteorological fields demonstrated diverse variations in terms of resolution change in the model. An evident improvement in the simulated sea level pressure resulted from the increase of horizontal resolution, but the simulation was insensitive to vertical grid spacing. The increase in vertical resolution could enhance the simulation of surface temperature as well as atmospheric circulation at low levels, while the simulation of circulation at middle and upper levels were found to be much less dependent on changing resolution. In addition, cumulus parameterization schemes showed high sensitivity to horizontal resolution. Different convective schemes exhibited large discrepancies in rainfall simulations with regards to changing resolution. The percentage of convective precipitation in the Grell scheme increased with increasing horizontal resolution. In contrast, the Kain-Fritsch scheme caused a reduced ratio of convective precipitation to total rainfall accumulations corresponding to increasing horizontal resolution.     

IMPACTS OF CUMULUS PARAMETERIZATION AND RESOLUTION ON THE MJO SIMULATION

Madden-Julian Oscillations (MJO) in six integrations using an AGCM with different cumulus parameterization schemes and resolutions are examined to investigate their impacts on the MJO simulation. Results suggest that the MJO simulation can be affected by both resolution and cumulus parameterization, though the latter, which determines the fundamental ability of the AGCM in simulating the MJO and the characteristics of the simulated MJO, is more crucial than the former. Model resolution can substantially affect the simulated MJO in certain aspects. Increasing resolution cannot improve the simulated MJO substantially, but can significantly modulate the detailed character of the simulated MJO; meanwhile, the impacts of resolution are dependent on the cumulus parameterization, determining the basic features of the MJO. Changes in the resolution do not alter the nature of the simulated MJO but rather regulate the simulation itself, which is constrained by cumulus parameterization schemes. Therefore, the vertical resolution needs to be increased simultaneously. The vertical profile of diabatic heating may be a crucial factor that is responsible for these different modeling results. To a large extent, it is determined by the cumulus parameterization scheme used.     

How Are El Nio and La Nia Events Improved in an Eddy-Resolving Ocean General Circulation Model?

The present study compares the performance of two versions of the LASG/IAP(State Key Laboratory of Numerical Modeling for Atmospheric Sciences and Geophysical Fluid Dynamics/Institute of Atmospheric Physics) Climate System Ocean Model(LICOM) in reproducing the interannual variability associated with El Nio and La Nia events in the tropical Pacific. Both versions are forced with the identical boundary conditions from observed or reanalysis data, in which one version has a finer spatial resolution of(1/10)° in the horizontal domain and 55 vertical layers, and the other version has a coarse resolution of 1° in the horizontal domain and 30 vertical layers. ENSO simulations form the two versions are compared with observations and, in particular, the improvements with regard to ENSO by the finer resolution ocean model are emphasized. As a result of the finer spatial resolution, both the vertical temperature gradient and vertical velocity are better represented in the equatorial Pacific than they are by the coarse resolution model; and thus, the corresponding vertical advections of temperature are more reasonable. Besides the mean climatology, simulated ENSO events and relevant feedbacks are much improved in the finer resolution model. A heat budget analysis suggests that both thermocline feedback and Ekman feedback are mainly responsible for the rapid increase in temperature anomalies during the developing and mature phases of ENSO events.     

High Resolution Global Modeling of the Atmospheric Circulation

An informal review is presented of recent developments in numerical simulation of the global atmospheric circulation with very fine numerical resolution models. The focus is on results obtained recently with versions of the GFDL SKYHI model and the Atmospheric Model for the Earth Simulator (AFES) global atmospheric models. These models have been run with effective horizontal grid resolution of 10–40 km and fine vertical resolution. The results presented demonstrate the utility of such models for the study of a diverse range of phenomena. Specifically the models are shown to simulate the development of tropical cyclones with peak winds and minimum central pressures comparable to those of the most intense hurricanes actually observed. More fundamentally, the spectrum of energy content in the mesoscale in the flow can be reproduced by these models down to near the smallest explicitly-resolved horizontal scales. In the middle atmosphere it is shown that increasing horizontal resolution can lead to significantly improved overall simulation of the global-scale circulation. The application of the models to two specific problems requiring very fine resolution global will be discussed. The spatial and temporal variability of the vertical eddy flux of zonal momentum associated with gravity waves near the tropopause is evaluated in the very fine resolution AFES model. This is a subject of great importance for understanding and modelling the flow in the middle atmosphere. Then the simulation of the small scale variations of the semidiurnal surface pressure oscillation is analyzed, and the signature of significant topographic modulation of the semidiurnal atmospheric tide is identified.     

Performance of a Reconfigured Atmospheric General Circulation Model at Low Resolution

Paleoclimate simulations usually require model runs over a very long time.The fast integration version of a state-of-the-art general circulation model (GCM),which shares the same physical and dynamical processes but with reduced horizontal resolution and increased time step,is usually developed.In this study,we configure a fast version of an atmospheric GCM (AGCM),the Grid Atmospheric Model of IAP/LASG (Institute of Atmospheric Physics/State Key Laboratory of Numerical Modeling for Atmospheric Sciences and Geophysical Fluid Dynamics),at low resolution (GAMIL-L,hereafter),and compare the simulation results with the NCEP/NCAR reanalysis and other data to examine its performance.GAMIL-L,which is derived from the original GAMIL,is a finite difference AGCM with 72×40 grids in longitude and latitude and 26 vertical levels.To validate the simulated climatology and variability,two runs were achieved.One was a 60-year control run with fixed climatological monthly sea surface temperature (SST) forcing,and the other was a 50-yr (1950-2000) integration with observational time-varying monthly SST forcing.Comparisons between these two cases and the reanalysis,including intra-seasonal and inter-annual variability are also presented.In addition,the differences between GAMIL-L and the original version of GAMIL are also investigated. The results show that GAMIL-L can capture most of the large-scale dynamical features of the atmosphere, especially in the tropics and mid latitudes,although a few deficiencies exist,such as the underestimated Hadley cell and thereby the weak strength of the Asia summer monsoon.However,the simulated mean states over high latitudes,especially over the polar regions,are not acceptable.Apart from dynamics,the thermodynamic features mainly depend upon the physical parameterization schemes.Since the physical package of GAMIL-L is exactly the same as the original high-resolution version of GAMIL,in which the NCAR Community Atmosphere Model (CAM2) physical package was used,there are only small differences between them in the precipitation and temperature fields.Because our goal is to develop a fast-running AGCM and employ it in the coupled climate system model of IAP/LASG for paleoclimate studies such as ENSO and Australia-Asia monsoon,particular attention has been paid to the model performances in the tropics.More model validations,such as those ran for the Southern Oscillation and South Asia monsoon, indicate that GAMIL-L is reasonably competent and valuable in this regard.     

THE EFFECT OF MODEL HORIZONTAL RESOLUTION ON THE PRECIPITATION OF RAMMASUN

This paper investigates the effect of horizontal resolution on the precipitation of the super typhoon Rammasun (1409). The experiment uses WRF (V3.4) model with resolutions of 15 km, 9 km and 3 km. The results suggest that the simulated Rammasun rain band shapes and distributions at different horizontal resolutions are nearly the same. When the resolution is increased from 15 km to 9 km and then to 3 km, heavy precipitation is observed to spread in all directions from a concentrated distribution, especially when the resolution is increased from 9 km to 3 km. The 6h and 1h heavy precipitations also show a more significant comma-shape distribution. Moreover, the water vapor distribution shows the same characteristics as the heavy precipitation with a notably enhanced ascending movement and a decreased height of the strongest ascending movement. Of the three resolutions, the precipitation distribution simulated at 3 km resolution is the closest to the observed distribution; however, there is still a noticeable difference between the simulated precipitation and the actual observation. With the absence of the convection parameterization in the model, the precipitation distributions simulated at 9 km and 3 km resolutions demonstrate the same features as when the KF convection parameterization is applied. However, the simulated precipitations at these two resolutions are smaller than those obtained with the KF scheme. Meanwhile the difference between the simulated precipitations at these two resolutions is also smaller than that in the latter case. In general, when KF scheme is applied to the model, the simulation effect of Rammasun precipitation is better than that obtained without the convection parameterization scheme.     

Dependence of Hurricane Intensity and Structures on Vertical Resolution and Time-Step Size

In view of the growing interests in the explicit modeling of clouds and precipitation, the effects of varying vertical resolution and time-step sizes on the 72-h explicit simulation of Hurricane Andrew (1992) are studied using the Pennsylvania State University/National Center for Atmospheric Research (PSU/NCAR) mesoscale model (i.e., MM5) with the finest grid size of 6 km. It is shown that changing vertical resolution and time-step size has significant effects on hurricane intensity and inner-core cloud/precipitation, but little impact on the hurricane track. In general, increasing vertical resolution tends to produce a deeper storm with lower central pressure and stronger three-dimensional winds, and more precipitation. Similar effects, but to a less extent, occur when the time-step size is reduced. It is found that increasing the low-level vertical resolution is more efficient in intensifying a hurricane, whereas changing the upper-level vertical resolution has little impact on the hurricane intensity. Moreover, the use of a thicker surface layer tends to produce higher maximum surface winds. It is concluded that the use of higher vertical resolution,a thin surface layer, and smaller time-step sizes, along with higher horizontal resolution, is desirable to model more realistically the intensity and inner-core structures and evolution of tropical storms as well as the other convectively driven weather systems.     

A Generalized Layered Radiative Transfer Model in the Vegetation Canopy

In this paper, a generalized layered model for radiation transfer in canopy with high vertical resolution is developed. Differing from the two-stream approximate radiation transfer model commonly used in the land surface models, the generalized model takes into account the effect of complicated canopy morphology and inhomogeneous optical properties of leaves on radiation transfer within the canopy. In the model, the total leaf area index （LAI） of the canopy is divided into many layers. At a given layer, the influences of diffuse radiation angle distributions and leaf angle distributions on radiation transfer within the canopy are considered. The derivation of equations serving the model are described in detail, and these can deal with various diffuse radiation transfers in quite broad categories of canopy with quite inhomogeneons vertical structures and uneven leaves with substantially different optical properties of adaxial and abaxial faces of the leaves. The model is used to simulate the radiation transfer for canopies with horizontal leaves to validate the generalized model. Results from the model are compared with those from the two-stream scheme, and differences between these two models are discussed.     

THE IMPACT OF HORIZONTAL RESOLUTION ON THE INTENSITY AND MICROSTRUCTURE OF SUPER TYPHOON USAGI

Typhoon Usagi (1319) was simulated by using the Advanced Weather Research and Forecasting numerical model (WRF) with different horizontal resolution to understand the impact of horizontal resolution on the intensity and characteristics of typhoon’s microstructures (including dynamic and microphysical structure). The simulated results show that the improvement of horizontal resolution from 5 km to 1 km has little impact on the track which is comparable to real results, but has a significant impact on the intensity and microstructures, and especially, the impact on wind speed at 10 m height, the vertical movement and precipitation intensity is the greatest. When the resolution is increased to 1 km, the intensity and characteristics of typhoon’s microstructures can be simulated better. In lower resolution simulations, some structural characteristics, including more asymmetrical and more outward tilted eyewall, and less water vapor flux on sea surface, work together to weaken typhoon intensity.     

RIEMS2.0不同模拟区域模拟中国北方多年气候平均态比较

Regional Integrated Environment Modeling System Version 2.0 （RIEMS2.0） is now being developed by the Key Laboratory of Regional Climate-Environment for Temperate East Asia, Chinese Academy of Sciences. In order to test the sensitivity of the RIEMS2.0 model domain to simulate long-term climate and its change, and provide a basis for the further development and application of the model, the authors compared results between simulated and observed precipitation and surface-airtemperature using two model domains under different cumulus parameterization schemes. The model was driven by NCEP/NCAR re-analysis data with a simulation duration ranging from 1 January 1979 to 31 December 2007. There were no significant differences found in the spatial distributions of the simulated precipitation and surface-air-temperature, or interannual variations between the two model domains. There were, however, differences observed between the two model domain simulations of local sub-regions. The smaller model domain more accurately simulated precipitation, especially in summer （June, July, and August）, and decreased the bias of surface-airtemperature, especially in winter （December, January, and February）. The weak summer and winter monsoons simulated by the smaller model domain was a result of boundary forcings and may partially account for the improvements of this model.     

分辨率对区域气候极端事件模拟的影响

利用NCAR MM5V3对1999年6月长江流域的极端异常降水事件进行了模拟,主要研究不同水平和垂直分辨率对极端区域气候事件模拟的影响。数值模拟试验表明:模式能够模拟出极端强降水的主要分布特征;水平分辨率的提高降低了模式模拟的强降水偏差,对逐日降水变化的模拟更加合理,而垂直分辨率的提高基本上也都减小了模拟的强降水过程的偏差,改善对强降水的模拟能力;模式水平、垂直分辨率的提高在一定程度上增强了对强降水过程的模拟能力。水平分辨率的提高能够改善模式对海平面气压的模拟,而垂直分辨率的提高可以改善模式模拟的地面气温和低层环流。分辨率对中层大气环流的影响不是很敏感。不同积云对流参数化方案模拟的对流降水比率随水平分辨率的变化是不同的,Grell方案对流降水比例随分辨率的提高而增加,而Kain-Fritsch方案的结果相反。     

Climate sensitivity of the NCAR Community Climate Model (CCM2) to horizontal resolution

The dependence on horizontal resolution of the climate simulated by the National Center for Atmospheric Research Community Climate Model (CCM2) is explored. Simulations employing R15, T21, T31, T42, T63, and T106 horizontal spectral truncations are compared. Parameters associated with the diagnostic cloud scheme are modified for each resolution to provide similar global average cloud radiative forcing at each resolution. Overall, as with earlier studies, there are large differences between the low resolution R15 and T21 simulations and the medium resolution T42 simulation. Many climate statistics show a monotonic signal with increasing resolution, with the largest variation occurring from low to medium resolution. Although the monotonic signal is often from the low resolution simulations toward atmospheric analyses, in some cases it continues beyond the analyses at the highest resolution. Where convergence occurs, it is not always to the atmospheric analyses, and the highest resolution simulations are not the best by all measures. Although many climate statistics converge, the processes that maintain the climate do not, especially when considered on a regional basis. The implication is that the finer scales are required to capture the nonlinear processes that force the medium scales. Overall, it appears that, at a minimum, T42 resolution is required, but higher resolution would be better. Applications at T42 should take into consideration how model errors indicated by these resolution signals might affect any findings.The National Center for Atmospheric Research is sponsored by the National Science Foundation.     

Assessment of upper-ocean variability and the Madden-Julian Oscillation in extended-range air-ocean coupled mesoscale simulations

Atmosphere-ocean interaction, particular the ocean response to strong atmospheric forcing, is a fundamental component of the Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO). In this paper, we examine how model errors in previous Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO) events can affect the simulation of subsequent MJO events due to increased errors that develop in the upper-ocean before the MJO initiation stage. Two fully coupled numerical simulations with 45-km and 27-km horizontal resolutions were integrated for a two-month period from November to December 2011 using the Navy’s limited area Coupled Ocean/Atmosphere Mesoscale Prediction System (COAMPS^®). There are three MJO events that occurred subsequently in early November, mid-November, and mid-December during the simulations. The 45-km simulation shows an excessive warming of the SSTs during the suppressed phase that occurs before the initiation of the second MJO event due to erroneously strong surface net heat fluxes. The simulated second MJO event stalls over the Maritime Continent which prevents the recovery of the deep mixed layer and associated barrier layer. Cross-wavelet analysis of solar radiation and SSTs reveals that the diurnal warming is absent during the second suppressed phase after the second MJO event. The mixed layer heat budget indicates that the cooling is primarily caused by horizontal advection associated with the stalling of the second MJO event and the cool SSTs fail to initiate the third MJO event. When the horizontal resolution is increased to 27-km, three MJOs are simulated and compare well with observations on multi-month timescales. The higher-resolution simulation of the second MJO event and more-realistic upper-ocean response promote the onset of the third MJO event. Simulations performed with analyzed SSTs indicate that the stalling of the second MJO in the 45-km run is a robust feature, regardless of ocean forcing, while the diurnal cycle analysis indicates that both 45-km and 27-km ocean resolutions respond realistically when provided with realistic atmospheric forcing. Thus, the problem in the 45-km simulation appears to originate in the atmosphere. Additional simulations show that while the details of the simulations are sensitive to small changes in the initial integration time, the large differences between the 45-km and 27-km runs during the suppressed phase in early December are robust.     

Impact of horizontal resolution on the simulation of the Asian summer monsoon and tropical cyclones in the JMA global model

To investigate the impact of increasing horizontal resolution on a simulated model climate, we conducted an experiment using the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) operational global atmosphere model (JMA-GSM0103). The models with four different horizontal resolutions ranging from T42 to T213 have been integrated over three years with prescribed climate sea surface temperature in the experiment. The distributions of 3-year averaged seasonal mean fields are basically similar among the models with different resolution, although there are some monotonic and systematic differences with increasing resolution. However, the climatology of synoptic scale phenomena is well represented in higher resolution models. The position and amount of precipitation in Baiu front (or Mei-yu) at higher resolution models agree well with observations. The start time of northward propagation of heavy precipitation over the Bay of Bengal, which is associated with Indian monsoon development, is also well simulated in higher resolution models. The number of tropical cyclones increases monotonically with resolutions. The simulated tropical cyclones become more realistic with increasing resolution.     

A note on horizontal resolution dependence for monsoon rainfall simulations

Summary The motivation for this study came from recent results of an Atmospheric Model Inter-comparison Project (AMIP) coordinated by the Lawrence Livermore Laboratory at Livermore, California. That project included a review of seasonal monsoon simulations from 13 different atmospheric models over the world. Most of the models used a horizontal resolution of roughly 300 km. The seasonal monsoon simulations from these models varied significantly. The poor performance by these models stems in part from the use of the coarse resolution. The purpose of this note is to show that by using the same model physics and lower boundary conditions, such as snow/ice cover and sea surface temperatures, the use of the higher horizontal resolution does have a stronger positive impact on the skill of monthly rainfall when compared to a lower horizontal resolution. In this note we present the results of such a comparison between the horizontal resolutions of T42 and T170. These studies are carried out for the prescribed lower boundary specification of sea surface temperatures and snow/ice cover with the help of an Atmospheric General Circulation Model. Received August 16, 1999 Revised October 14, 1999     

An Updated Coupled Model for Land-Atmosphere Interaction. Part I： Simulations of Physical Processes

A new two-way land-atmosphere interaction model （R42_AVIM） is fulfilled by coupling the spectral atmospheric model （SAMIL_R42L9） developed at the State Key Laboratory of Numerical Modeling for Atmospheric Sciences and Geophysical Fluid Dynamics, Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences （LASG/IAP/CAS） with the land surface model, Atmosphere-Vegetation-Interaction-Model （AVIM）. In this coupled model, physical and biological components of AVIM are both included. Climate base state and land surface physical fluxes simulated by R42_AVIM are analyzed and compared with the results of R42_SSIB [which is coupled by SAMIL_R42L9 and Simplified Simple Biosphere （SSIB） models]. The results show the performance of the new model is closer to the observations. It can basically guarantee that the land surface energy budget is balanced, and can simulate June-July-August （JJA） and December-January- February （DJF） land surface air temperature, sensible heat flux, latent heat flux, precipitation, sea level pressure and other variables reasonably well. Compared with R42_SSIB, there are obvious improvements in the JJA simulations of surface air temperature and surface fluxes. Thus, this land-atmosphere coupled model will offer a good experiment platform for land-atmosphere interaction research.     

Impacts of cumulus momentum transport on MJO simulation

Vertical cumulus momentum transport is an important physical process in the tropical atmosphere and plays a key role in the evolution of the tropical atmospheric system. This paper focuses on the impact of the vertical cumulus momentum transport on Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO) simulation in two global climate models (GCMs). The Tiedtke cumulus parameterization scheme is applied to both GCMs [CAM2 and Spectral Atmospheric general circulation Model of LASG/IAP (SAMIL)]. It is found that the MJO simulation ability might be influenced by the vertical cumulus momentum transport through the cumulus parameterization scheme. However, the use of vertical momentum transport in different models provides different results. In order to improve model's MJO simulation ability, we must introduce vertical cumulus momentum transport in a more reasonable way into models. Furthermore, the coherence of the parameterization and the underlying model also need to be considered.     

IAP AGCM4.0模式对热带大气季节内振荡的模拟评估

基于中国科学院大气物理所大气环流模式IAP AGCM4.0总共30年(1979~2008年)的模拟结果,评估了IAP AGCM4.0模式对热带大气季节内振荡的模拟能力。分析结果表明IAP AGCM4.0模式可以在一定程度上模拟出热带大气季节内振荡的主要时空谱结构特征,在周期30~80天处存在明显的谱能量中心;模式模拟的季节内振荡东传的主要特征与观测基本一致,东移波的能量远大于西移波。基于RMM指数(All-season Real-time Multivariate MJO Index)的分析表明,模式模拟的850 h Pa和200 h Pa季节内尺度风场和对流活动在赤道地区的空间分布与观测基本一致。但与观测相比,模式模拟的热带大气季节内振荡的周期较短,东传速度快于观测,虚假的西传特征过强,对流活跃区域范围较小、强度较弱。就非绝热加热而言,模式模拟结果与再分析资料比较接近,但最大加热在印度洋和西太平洋地区出现的位相较晚。进一步分析表明,模式中影响对流触发的相对湿度阈值(RHc)的不同取值(RHc分别取为85%、90%、95%和100%),可以显著影响热带大气非绝热加热垂直廓线,从而影响模式对热带大气季节内振荡的模拟;当对流触发相对湿度阈值取为90%时,IAP AGCM4.0模式对热带大气季节内振荡模拟的能力相对最好,非绝热加热垂直廓线在不同位相的分布特征也与再分析资料最为接近。这说明模式对流参数化方案中不同参数的合适选取,可以改进模式对热带大气季节内振荡的模拟能力。